film photography challenge

Many years ago, I stepped away from film photography.

With the onset of digital, I jumped in. First, it was with a Canon point-and-shoot. Then, it was a digital Rebel. From there, I went to a 30D to my current 7D, which I’ve had since early 2010.

I’m a digital junkie, too. I like being able to see things instantly, so I can adjust settings, the setup or whatever else. It’s also nice to have the “digital negative,” so I can correct things if needed on the computer.

I started with digital in 2006 and haven’t really looked back. Film cameras have gained dust, outside of me occasionally using my Holga. But with the addition of a Holga (as well as a Diana and pinhole) lens for the digital camera, I’ve truly phased out film.

That being said, it’s kind of fun to shoot a roll of film sometimes. It’s still kind of cool to go back to how things were and how I learned photography.

Then there’s reality. Shooting film is way more expensive than digital. Film costs money, it costs more to develop etc. Some develop their own (I used to, but never did color), but I no longer really want to deal with that.

Besides that, there’s the whole forgetting thing.

See, this challenge was to shoot two rolls of film — one color, one black and white. When I finished the color roll, I went to rewind. Little did I remember that I needed to hit the button on the bottom. Little did I know, that was big. So I tried to rewind, and instead pulled the roll right out of the canister.

Great.

Thankfully, I had access to an old dark room and had some old reusable canisters. I saved the film, for the most part, so that’s a good thing. The black and white roll went better.

Still, I went without prints. I got the negatives and a CD and it cost me $10 per roll. Consider the fact that when I go out for a day of photo taking with the digital camera, I often take 250 or more shots. I play with settings and do different things. Let’s say I had 36 exposure rolls — that means I will need about seven rolls of film. So, at $10 a pop, that’s $70 if I have a full day of shooting.

No thanks.

I’ll stick to digital and use film on those special occasions. This was a fun challenge. I did it over a couple of days and I like, for the most part, the results. Even with a light meter, my settings were off slightly, but I also was using this film camera for the first time.

So, the rules for this challenge were pretty simple — take two rolls of film with the theme “your life,” making it easy to interpret. When done, do a blog post with 15 of the images. Below will be my 15. Below that is the link list where others who participated will put their links. Hopefully some have done this and there will be some fun things to look at.

Without further ado, here’s my submission …

1. Car Wash is open

This sign is usually out in my town. I have photographed it before, but still love the look of it.

 2. Indeed it is

The car wash definitely is open. This is one of the shots, though, that must have caught a little light when I screwed things up with the film.

3. Railroad crossing

I love the look of rail-related things in black and white.

4. Stay off the tracks

Photos of the tracks are always classic and cool, I think.

5. Go buy!

If you need hay, you know where to go.

6. Santa parade

Watching the Christmas parade in town.

7. Mr. and Mrs. Claus

Santa and the missus made a stop in town for the parade!

8. Cold picnic

Hot dogs? Hamburgers? What do you think?

9. Which way?

Oh, the choices. As a baseball nut, Cooperstown is usually the easy choice.

10. Get the map

If you go to parks, it’s never a bad thing to check out the info.

11. Go walk

It’s never a bad day to go out for a walk or an easy hike.

12. Handle with care

This was one of the first shots I took as I was testing settings. I actually like how it came out.

13. Back road

Back roads in the winter are so serene.

14. Hay

I don’t think this is the same hay that is for sale in the photo from earlier.

15. Posted

Posted property is quite normal around my area.

That’s my 15 shots for the challenge. I won’t lie that it was a hard challenge. It’s one I’ll likely do again, but maybe plan a little better. I do like what I came up with, but I also wish I didn’t have the issues I had with my camera as there were six or seven shots that somehow got wiped from the color roll, which is disappointing as one or two of them could have been cool.

Ahhh well.

Anyway, if you were one of the ones who participated, link up below (film only, though)! I look forward to checking out other posts and what you came up with!

Thanks to all who participated and I look forward to trying this again!

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog@gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

OK, so as those of you in the Facebook group and/or with an e-mail who had expressed an interest in this challenge already know, I’ve postponed the date of this challenge.

Now, to be fair, it’s on me. I slipped and screwed up. So I’ll take the blame. That being said, hopefully the added time will help.

I’ve had a ton of things happen over the past month. And this week, even, which is why I’ve been a little sporadic with any posts. Next thing I knew, boom, the deadline for the challenge was here and I had taken, oh, no photos.

Jeez.

So, I’ve decided to postpone the date. With that in mind, if you post ran today — awesome. Keep it in mind and come back here and link it up when we do it. That way, it’s a quick hit, hopefully. If you didn’t have things done, bonus for you, too!

With that in mind…

I’ve moved the deadline to Dec. 12. That’s adding several weeks, I know. But it also allows people to get things done and set up. It also gives some others a chance to hop in, should they choose to do so.

If you are interested in jumping in late, all the information can be viewed in this post.

Thanks to all for understanding. I’m hoping to have some posts updating the things I’ve been doing recently. My plan tomorrow is to get all the film stuff ready and hopefully snap a few shots through this weekend and see what I can get into.

So come back Dec. 12 and link up. And if you want a reminder, either let me know in the comments you’d like an e-mail or drop a note in the Facebook group.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

I seriously can’t believe I’m going to do this — but I am.

It’s time to use some film, folks.

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a total digital film buff.

Despite learning on a film camera and working many years in a true darkroom, I’ve become fully engulfed in digital. I love the instant gratification of a shot and knowing I can rip off a dozen or more for an action sequence and still have hundreds of images left to shoot on a memory card.

But, there’s still something about film.

Film is classic. Rolling or unrolling a roll of film is amazingly cool. Waiting for the images to come back from the lab to see how you did is high in anticipation. And the best part is the look. Maybe you have an older roll and it has some light leaks. Or if you used a Holga camera, maybe you have a really cool look.

Either way, film is great.

While smartphones these days can mimic a lot of what film did or does, it still isn’t the same. Sometimes, it’s just really fun to shoot a true roll of film.

More than a year ago, I set out to do a film challenge on the blog. Six people — including myself — got together to shoot a couple of rolls through a Holga camera. The rules were simple — take two rolls (one color, one black and white) of the same ISO film, with 12 exposures on each roll of 120 film. Participants took photos from their home area and, when finished, chose 12 (a minimum of three from each roll) for the final project. Once done, they wrote up a blog post and we did a week’s worth of posts on this blog.

The breakdown we had was incredible. We had three men and three women. Three of us (all the men) were from the United States. The women represented England, Kuwait and Switzerland.

The results were incredible! You can see all of these posts by clicking here.

So, why not do it again?

Alas, this time I wanted to open it a bit more. I wanted to make it any film camera. You want to use a Holga? Feel free? An SLR? Sweet. A point-and-shoot? Have at it.

Just make it film.

The theme is simple — your life. Anything going on in your life. Anything at all. Travel. Your town. Sports. Hobbies. Kids. Whatever.

You have about a month to take the photos, give or take (I’m taking into consideration time to get the film developed, or do it yourself, scanning etc.), which is why the challenge runs longer than a month.

The rules for this year’s challenge are simple enough:

• Film only. Please no digital, no matter what you can make them look like.
• Two (2) rolls are to be used (24 or 36 exposure is fine) — one color, one black and white.
• The photos should show pieces of your life over the time frame.
• Fifteen (15) photos will be selected to be used for your post.
• You post these on your own blog (can be any blog you write for — Tumblr included). This way, you can format and write as you see fit.
• On the day we are to post, come back here and link up. I’ll have my post live by 3 a.m. Eastern time.
• Check out and comment on all the other blogs for the challenge and let’s make this a fun community event!

The dates:

1. Challenge starts: Today (Oct. 7, 2013)
2. Challenge ends: Monday, Nov. 11, 2013
3. Have blog posted on and come back here to link: Thursday, Nov. 14, 2013

If you would like an e-mail reminder about a week before things end, let me know in the comments below. I’ll grab your e-mail address from the comment (nobody sees your e-mail, obviously). Also, please let me know in the comments below if you are participating so I have an idea of how many, just as a curious thing.

You can also join the Facebook group I set up last year for the Holga Challenge, as I’ve made that the “film” challenge.  I’ll do my best to keep things up to date there.

I hope many will join as I’d love to see how people look at their lives through the eyes of the camera — with film.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog@gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!