Anyone using film?

I still have my OM1 and OM2, as well as my two TLR's I don't have much chance to use film at the moment, because money is tight, but I'm keeping the kit because its lovely have.

My 83 year old Dad still uses film..he steadfastly refuses to use digital although he is secretly fascinated.

Good point Daisy. I think most people are this way, yet it's fascinating that so many people have never used a film camera. I'm grateful, because it was that involvement with film that taught me the basics of exposure, composure, depth of field etc,

'composure' eh?

need to be calm.....

You know I meant composition.........

Composure is important though. Zen photography, be the shutter........................

Still have a film SLR and a few rangefinders but never use them.

I also cut my teeth using film in fact back in the late 80's I did photography at college. I really enjoyed the darkroom work - contact prints, test strips, enlargers, manually dodging and burning (still have some lollipops somewhere lol). Even the smells are fresh in my mind.

Having use of a dark room is one thing but once you give that up and put your printing in somebody elses hands - you loose control of the process - something digital gives us back.

Film seems to be making something of a comeback at the moment. Unlike 15 years ago when anyone serious about photography would have experienced film - younger people who are serious about photography these days might never have never used it so seem to be getting into it almost in reverse.

There's no doubting that learning with film helped me understand the basic principles of photography.

I got started in photography in 1970 when an Air Force base sent its squadron of B52 bombers to another base. They gave their stock of B&W ASA 2 35mm mapping film to the hobby shop for free disposition. They handed me a 10,000 foot roll of film in a metal can resembling a motion picture reel. They included a 5 pound can of powdered concentrated Kodak Dektol developer for that film. I learned how to hand load re-loadable cassettes in my barracks closet. I was stationed in Misawa, Japan at the time and it was Winter.

I bought my first camera, a Canon FTQL SLR for $100. Japanese cameras & stereos were really cheap in Japan. Because it was Winter, my first 200 rolls of film were shot using snow scenes of temples, houses and fishing boats. I would crawl in my locker and hand load each exposed roll onto metal reels before securing them in metal development tanks. My bathroom was my processing lab.

It was all a lot of fun and a great opportunity to learn photography from the ground up. The base hobby shop had a huge, well equipped darkroom with the only expense being paper. I learned all the tricks of the trade there from more experienced photographers. It was the beginning of a life long love of photography.

I've owned too many film cameras to count. I had two Mamiya 645 medium format cameras I used as a professional wedding & portrait photographer. I also used to love my Yashika Mat 124 twin lens reflex roll film camera. It was all part of my education. I'm completely self taught.

Hi Dave, not any more but I still have my Pentax "me-Super" which at the time had a fastest shutter speed of 1/2000 second.

I use to develop a lot of my own slides at the time too.

I did a thread for scanned slides here: http://www.yophotographer.com/page.php?t=12111

My wife and cat were constant targets for my camera, to the point where my wife would get very miffed at me (take a good few years ago):

Ok, now you've made me spit up a hot mouth full of tea when I saw your wife's expression. I think she is expressing her thoughts brilliantly. LOL

I've got quite a few of those expressions on film Bob .