It is like when you buy a new car and then suddenly every second car on the road seems to be the same make and model.

I was recently gifted a new (old) film camera¹. You can read about that here:

My new (old) camera.

Since then, I have definitely noticed more people out and about shooting with film. Perhaps not every second person, but enough for me to reassure myself: shooting film is cool². And I am in the cool club.

The photo I present today is of a girl I spotted who had two cameras slung over her shoulders; a Canon AE1 just like mine, and a what I think is a Shanghai Seagull TLR³ Camera, made in China around 1958.

–ooOoo–

Heres the thing. A number of times now I have been taking a photo of someone out in the metaphorical wilds…sometimes they spot me just as I hit the shutter button, and I can see them processing the situation deciding how to react.

And then I wind on the film, klick-zzzink…and the second I do that, they go: Oh…a film camera! And there is conversation. And there is approval. It is like a street photography superpower.

–ooOoo–

I finally mustered the courage and changed the light seals on my new (old) camera, which all went down without a hitch. I was expecting a DIY catastrophe. I have form.

So now I am well into shooting my first roll, a test to see if I got it right. Whatever the outcome I will post the best and worst of the roll as soon as it is back from the lab.

1. Thank-you Tony…I owe you a beer or three. ↩︎
2. Cool yes. But it is totally irrational. The cost of developing my first roll of film will cost between $17 and $25 AUD depending in where I send it. Despite this there is something that makes film photography a value added experience compared to digital. IMHO. ↩︎
3. TLR = Twin Lens Reflex. The top lens is for the top down viewfinder and the bottom lens is for exposing the film. ↩︎