Hey everyone, it's Colin. How's it goin'?
Pretty much everyone shoots pictures digitally these days, and it's been this way for quite a while.
But shooting to film has had a bit of a resurgence lately, so,
this time, we're gonna take a look at the way photography used to be...
with a bit of a twist.
[♪ Music - Intro ♪]
It's been a while since I've used this setup, hasn't it?
So, in 2016, I inherited a decent amount of camera equipment from my grandparents:
camera bodies, lenses, accessories, that sort of thing.
Hidden inside one of the camera bags was *this*:
a brand new, unused, unopened roll of Kodak Plus-X black and white film.
It's ISO 125 and 20 exposures,
but what really caught my attention was the expiration date,
listed as March of 1983.
Considering that film is generally good for a few years after it's manufactured,
that means that this roll of film, at the time I'm shooting this video,
is over 35 years old.
Now for fun, I took a picture of it and posted that up to Instagram, and it got a decent response.
But I was really surprised by some of the comments.
Lots of people were saying that I should go ahead and shoot the film anyway.
Chances are, it was still good, and in some cases, I could even get really interesting results.
So I figured, "Why not?"
The next question though, was "Which camera to use?"
My first choice was my Nikon N65. This is a fairly modern film SLR,
with auto-focus and multi-area electronic metering.
I have several lenses for it and I'm really familiar with its operation.
The downside is that film speed is only set on this camera automatically by it reading the
DX coding on the film canister. Now, considering DX
wasn't invented until 1983, that means this old roll of film...
doesn't have it.
So, the N65 was out.
My next choice was actually one of the cameras that I inherited: a Nikon FE.
This is a really cool vintage camera and I've got a lot of accessories for it,
including the motor drive and several lenses.
Everything on it can be set manually and it does have a
built-in single area electronic meter.
The downside is that it hasn't been shot in probably a couple of decades
and the shutter is somewhat sticky.
I didn't really want to risk that with a one-off roll of film like this, so...
the FE was out.
The camera I ended up going with though was my old standby:
an Olympus OM10.
I'm very familiar with how it operates because it was my
first film SLR and the camera that I learned photography on.
I also know that it works great because it received service back in the late '90s
and still operates flawlessly.
There are a couple of small downsides to it though.
First, in order to manually set the shutter speed, you need an optional adapter.
...which I don't have.
Otherwise, the camera just
steps into what's effectively Aperture Priority Mode, like you would see on a modern camera - it just
picks the shutter speed automatically, based on what the single point electronic metering decides.
The other downside is that I have only one lens for it: a 50 millimeter f/1.8,
which admittedly, if you only have one lens, is probably one of the better ones to have.
But neither of these downsides were really deal-breakers. I could work around them easily enough, so
I packed up all my camera gear and spent the weekend on Minnesota's North Shore, along Lake Superior.
Here's what I came back with.
[♪]
You know, it was really fun shooting film again,
especially since I haven't done it in about 15 years.
Because there are limited number of frames on a roll,
I found myself having to really focus on every picture that I took,
and I think this is partially the appeal for why film is actually kind of coming back into fashion again.
But it also reminded me of why digital took over to begin with.
The ability to fire off multiple shots in a row, and review 'em even before you leave a location
is really really convenient.
Cost is also a factor too.
With that particular roll of film, it cost me almost $30 US to get it developed and scanned, and the process took about a week.
Whereas with digital, after you make the initial equipment investment,
you can pretty much shoot for free and get the results instantly.
I was also reminded why I wasn't the biggest fan of Kodak Plus-X when I was shooting film.
I found these negatives to look fairly flat, and it took a bit of tweaking to the levels of these images
in order to get 'em to look somewhat decent.
As for this particular 35 year old roll of film, well obviously, it still worked.
Though I did notice that for a 125 speed film, grain was a bit coarser than I was expecting.
I have a feeling this is more due to the age of the film than anything else.
But not because of how expired the film was,
but rather that it's simply a chemistry from the late '70s or early '80s,
and the quality of film in the decades since has gotten much better.
You know, these days we pretty much carry around digital cameras with us everywhere,
but the process of shooting film really helps one reconnect with the act of taking pictures,
and goes to underscore just how trivial digital imaging has caused photography to become.
So if you like the video, I would appreciate a thumbs-up. Be sure to subscribe if you haven't already.
You can follow me on Twitter and Instagram at thisdoesnotcomp, and as always, thanks for watching.