Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2006/10/26

[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]

Subject: [Leica] Film, a few thoughts.
From: harrison at mcclary.net (Harrison McClary)
Date: Thu Oct 26 13:19:14 2006

Following are a few thoughts I have had on why shoot film over digital. 
This along with other things relating to my daily photography are 
located on my blog at:

http://web.mac.com/whmcclary/iWeb/tobacco-road/Blog/Blog.html

Over the last few months I have been finding myself shooting more and 
more film. This is mostly film shot for personal photos, my professional 
work is still done using my EOS digitals.

Why would I shoot film, when I have one of the best digital cameras 
made? For me there are several reasons.

First is that I get to use my Leica M6es more. Those are, to me, simply 
the best photographic tools I have ever used. They are a no nonsense 
camera. Somehow the M?s seem to ?get out of the way? of my creative 
shooting and allow me to make photos that I like better and easier with 
less thought than any SLR I have used.

Second I like dropping my film off, going back picking up the negs, 
prints and a CD...all done and ready to put in a scrap book or whatever. 
With digital I have to download, edit and then put on a CD take to the 
lab and get prints made. The ability to edit and do final prep work on 
the images is why I like Digital for work, but I HATE it for personal 
photos. I do more than enough of that junk on a daily basis for paying 
customers, do not care to do it for myself. I am just too lazy. LOL

I have discovered that at Costco they give excellent prints at a very 
cheap price, also the photos they place on CD are more than adequate for 
putting on the web, or other things I need a digital file for. Should I 
need a larger file from a film image I can always scan it with my Nikon 
4000 and get a 40 meg scan.

One thing I think many many people who are buying the tiny point and 
shoot digitals are not thinking about is how are they going to look at 
those photos 5 years down the road when they have a new computer or a 
disk fails on them. Most ?happy snappers? have no clue as to the 
downfalls of digital and the storage issues.

For my personal photos of my kids and family I try to get 4x6 prints 
made so that I at least have a hard copy of the memories the photos 
represent.

Anyway, for me and now I am having fun once again with my Leicas and 
shooting film on my kids and wife.

-- 
Harrison McClary
Harrison McClary Photography
harrison@mcclary.net
http://www.mcclary.net
ImageStockSouth - Stock Photography
http://www.imagestocksouth.com
Tobacco Road: Personal Blog:
http://web.mac.com/whmcclary/iWeb/tobacco-road/Blog/Blog.html


Replies: Reply from photo.forrest at earthlink.net (Philip Forrest) ([Leica] Film, a few thoughts.)
Reply from philippe.orlent at pandora.be (Philippe Orlent) ([Leica] Film, a few thoughts.)