Getting back to my recent outing on Flag Day, I was thinking about how I noticed that out of the many people out there photographing, I was the only one using a film camera (probably the only person making black and white pictures too).  Ok, not exactly a news flash, but it reminded me of a conversation I had with someone several weeks earlier at the annual Doylestown Memorial Day Parade.  I would say that the gentleman was in his late thirties and was fascinated by my “old school” camera.  Yes I suppose my silver Leica M3 and tiny 50mm lens does look a little strange to those accustomed to seeing or using digital black plastic-like cameras with built in motor drives, LCD viewing screens and large zoom lens appended to them.

He asked me … if it was … a film camera.  I told him it was and that it was built in the 1960s.  Holy cow, shock and amazement!  I also told him I didn’t use digital cameras and made only black and white photographs. I guess this caused a moment of deep reflection as he then proceeded to tell me that he used to own a film camera in the late 1990s but gave it up and had “shot” well over 60,000 or so pictures.  He missed his old camera and the prints he made, but digital was so much more convenient, especially the storing and viewing of pictures on his computer.   I said that I thought there was something about a black and white film based silver print that was unmatched or at least different in a special sort of way.  The other thing I told him was that I felt there was something about the whole film camera/darkroom creative process that is unlike the rapid fire making of hundreds if not more of pictures in a day and the digital “workflow”.  What is it? A certain amount of discipline perhaps, knowing you only have a finite amount of pictures that can be taken on a roll, that paper and chemicals cost a certain amount of money so it’s important to make everything count … the craft involved to do it right?

I knew deep down he agreed but understood he just couldn’t break from the ease of operation of his chosen method.  That’s all right. He fits in with the majority of those out there.  The problem is that easy isn’t really better.  And viewing the world in black and white forces us to step out of the snapshot world we live in, and perhaps our comfort zone … to think about things differently, even in the fraction of a second it takes to make the picture.  Definitely removed from the way we look at everything else during our daily lives.  Then of course you must take the time to develop the film and take the necessary steps over many hours to create something special that brings to life what your mind’s eye envisioned the moment the shutter was released. I know this can be scary for some, but I think of it as a wonderful experience I am lucky to have.