On the joys of collecting:
"Among the many things I resent about digital imaging is the slamming of the door on one of my favorite hobbies, camera collecting. Aside from getting a discontinued model cheap to use as a backup, can you tell me why someone would be excited about buying an obsolete digital camera for any purpose other than to use as a doorstop?"
(Popular Photography & Imaging, August 2007)
Film is here to stay:
"No, no, dammit, film is not going to disappear, so stop writing me scaredy-cat letters about how 'we duffers are gonna fade away silently clutching the last rolls of Kodachrome to our breasts.'"
(Popular Photography & Imaging, September 2007)
Relating a comment by renowned photojournalist Alfred Eisenstaedt:
"After Nikon introduced the first motordrive-compatible in 1954 (2.5 fps), I asked Eisie if he ever used a motor. 'Never,' said Eisie. 'It might miss something that this would have caught.' He wiggled his shutter release finger at me."
(Popular Photography & Imaging, April 2007)
If you were alone on a deserted island and could only have one camera and lens, what would it be?
"An all-mechanical Nikon F with a coupled selenium meter (no battery) and a 105mm macro lens to photograph flora and fauna, big and small, and to take a fine portrait of the person who rescues me!"
(Popular Photography & Imaging, August 2006)
There are no books and precious few articles for those who want to go from digital to film: surprisingly few editors are far-sighted enough to publish them, say Roger and Frances Hicks. "Well, we still use film, and here is why, garnered from our own experience and that of others who have never stopped; or have gone back to film after trying digital; or who, after growing up on digital, have decided to use film either alongside or instead of digital.
"The last point is important. We use both digital and silver halide. We also ride motorcycles as well as driving cars, and eat vegetables as well as meat. You don't necessarily need to abjure the one in order to enjoy the other -- unless, we have to say, you want the best possible results on the lowest possible budget, in which case silver is a clear winner in most cases. Increasingly, too, people take a hybrid silver/digital route, scanning and printing from film. In colour, this is the way we do it, though in black and white we still print the vast majority of our pictures in a traditional 'wet' darkroom."
The May 2008 issue of the magazine is a special, one-topic issue covering China. An interesting—although not necessarily planned—fact is that most of the photographs were shot on film. This could turn out to be the last issue of NGM in which the majority of the photographs were not shot digitally.
Of the five main contributors: Fritz Hoffman, Lynn Johnson and Greg Girard shoot film; while Randy Olson and George Steinmetz use digital. I had a chance to sit down with Fritz recently to talk about his thoughts on film vs. digital.
Fritz was quick to point out that it is not so much about the method of capture, but for him, more about the camera. Fritz shoots primarily with a 35mm film Leica rangefinder. “If you have ever held one...it’s a love affair” he explained. “A camera is something you become one with...I see in a way that matches the camera and its lens.”
Fritz was an early adopter of digital technology, working with a Nikon SLR six years ago (which indeed were the most primitive days of digital). But he found the cameras simply too bulky for the kind of intimate and personal photography he has mastered. He still feels today's professional SLRs are still too cumbersome.
One digital camera that Fritz does actually carry with him now is a Canon G7 point & shoot (the newest model is the G9). He tends to use it to check lighting, color balance and also as a way to make visual notes—he may shoot a Chinese sign and then later have it translated.
For a shot of Shanghai’s skyline at night, Fritz was using his G7 point & shoot to check the lighting, and then shot the scene using his Leica and film. Later, when editing the story, the digital snapshot proved to have captured detail that was beyond the range of the same scene shot on film. The photo that ran across two pages of the magazine was the only digital photo that Fritz made, and it was shot with his little G7.
When it comes to digital vs. analog cameras, Fritz cites a sentiment that I have heard from other pros: digital cameras tempt you to look at the preview, or constantly check settings. Fritz explains succinctly: “Film keeps me in the moment.”
But Fritz is thinking about moving to digital, but he wants to do it when he feels that he has found an appropriate aesthetic reason for doing so. Fritz notes that “digital images are like sugar-coated Rice Crispies, they’re too glossy. Not that there is anything wrong with that, it’s just not right for what I’m doing right now. When I go to digital, I want to do something new with it.”
More at http://ngm.typepad.com/editors_pick/2008/05/film-is-dead-lo.html
