Coming into PrairieView, one of the things I was most excited about was getting neck-deep into old analog techniques. I feel like I'm in this middle age where I am old enough to remember film cameras when they were still fairly popular, but still young enough so that by the time I got my first camera, there was no way that it wouldn't be a digital SLR. Being this sort of in-between, I ended up getting a strange feeling that I can only describe as being nostalgic for something I never had. I think I was always a bit scared of shooting film, as well. It seemed nerve-wracking that I couldn't snap off however many shots it took to get it right, or see the image I had taken immediately after capture; in my head, it seemed like capturing on film would take more patience, knowledge, and expertise than I possessed.
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| Flames on colour slide film. |
Our first assignment in Analog Techniques was to shoot an entire roll of 35mm colour slide film. In retrospect, the images that I shot on that first roll of film weren't all that interesting. But I was outside on a beautiful day, and I learned just how rewarding it was to shoot film, for a few reasons: because I didn't want to waste any film, I spent more time thinking about the composition of my photographs before I snapped them, and because I couldn't instantly review the images, I would feel a high-energy excitement while waiting for my film to be processed.
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| One of my many cats, taken on colour slide film. |
My first dive into film wasn't all that successful in the end, but I loved seeing the amazing colours that slide film produced, and I ended up buying more rolls of it, so that I could shoot for myself at home. One of my film photographs that I love the most (so far!) is a simple shot I took on the patio behind my house; a cat sat in the sun and stared at me, and while I was madly trying to focus my camera, I kept thinking, 'Don't move, don't move, don't move...'. As soon as I snapped the shot, the cat leapt away, and I wasn't sure if I was going to see a cat or a furry blur on my negative. Once I got the film back, it was amazing and rewarding to see what I had actually captured.
After colour slide film, we began to work in 35mm black & white film. It kind of changed how I took pictures, because when I looked at a scene in front of me, I had to pause and think of how those bright, eye-catching colours would look in greyscale, and whether or not the image would still be interesting without the colours. I found that shooting in black & white added this strange mood to my images. For example, the bright monkey-bars at a playground seem less playful, and remind me of some sort of industrial ribcage (morbid, I know).
After colour slide film, we began to work in 35mm black & white film. It kind of changed how I took pictures, because when I looked at a scene in front of me, I had to pause and think of how those bright, eye-catching colours would look in greyscale, and whether or not the image would still be interesting without the colours. I found that shooting in black & white added this strange mood to my images. For example, the bright monkey-bars at a playground seem less playful, and remind me of some sort of industrial ribcage (morbid, I know).
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| A park bench. |
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| Monkey bars at a nearby playground. |
Once we started on black & white film, we also began to develop our own prints in the dark room. I had to learn fast, but it was everything I had hoped it would be. We learned first how to make a simple image straight from our negatives. After that, we learned an immense amount of techniques to improve our prints, including controlling the contrast, dodging/burning, double exposures, and colour toning.
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| Cassie Steep at the Forks with her Holga camera. |
Our latest class brought us to medium-format cameras and film, and we spent a couple hours in the afternoon shooting another roll of film. I had decided to try out a Holga camera, and was excited with the strange quality of the images.
I have learned so much about film techniques and cameras in the past three months of school, and it is really exciting to think about the progress I've already made, and the progress I will still make in the future. The next thing I'm looking forward to learning? How to develop my own negatives!
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| A double-exposure of the Winnipeg Skyline from the Forks, taken with a medium-format Holga camera. |
Cori Bezan
PV Diploma Student
2012-13
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