Every artist secretly wants to continue doing what they love doing, and in doing so, they also hope to have the funds to continue this endeavor. 

I find it difficult to call myself an artist these days. Though never poor of talent but never rich enough to conquer the inevitable challenges of a chosen path. Everywhere I go these days, people talk of art for art sake, and how they have been robbed of their creation thanks to the digital world we live in. Take for example, Prince, who died recently and absolutely refuse to let people use his music unless it was paid for in some way. Or for that matter, artist photographers who are routinely called photoshop hacks because nothing they do is ever good enough for an audience fed on a steady stream of fake digital photos. 

What about the aging artist continue to struggle to get their work noticed, not that they are not any good but have yet to be discovered by social media. Then there are the craftsmen, who do what they do because of skill and technique and will never attain the merits of being an artist. 

Photography is no different. Photographic art sells, but for that you need to be a desktop artist and not one operating a digital camera. 

It's hard to justify the worth of a picture these days if it is shot in digital. I remember a time when being a photographer was a hardskill that had to be applied creatively. You need to know about the various types of film, how to develop it in a darkroom and how to print and dodge it with a enlarger. The chemicals were different, color negs, positive film, b/w and let's not forget about the type of paper used in the darkroom printing process. If a client want to blow up a picture to poster wall size, they come back to you and you have to find a good lab to do that. This was craftsmanship at its finest. 

Photographers were artist in the time of analogue film. They were admired and respected. The craftsmen of the photo trade also existed of course but they were not in high demand. These were the journeymen of the industry. Photographers who mastered the art of analog photography only developed those one of a kind prints. It wasn't something you'd find off a line printer because developing it on print also took a certain kind of skill. 
Today, the darkroom is a computer and the art is the digital filters you can dial in through Instagram or a camera app that works on your iPhone. 

Then the Internet came Along....


Digital is the way to go. There is nothing more to learn beyond processing it on a computer, which you must own of course, and with the right software...available free online if you know where to find it. What's more mobile apps offer you the chance to dial in those enhancements to photos with minimum skill. Want a sepia effect? Just ante up on that in-app purchase if you don't already have it. Digital has leveled the playing field so anyone with a smartphone can be a photographer. Even Steve McCurry, an ambassador of sorts for photojournalism declared he is no longer a photojournalist but a visual story teller. He switched places and got a whole lot of flak for this. 

Digital Photography is a non skill judging from the low expectations of both clients and photographers. If you try to explain the complex digital procedures during a shoot, they will laugh at you. Got a problem? The use Photoshop to solve it. For this, you need to be skilled in Photoshop....and talent hasn't got anything to do with it. It is a matter of skill on how you brush in or brush out a subject. You need to illuminate a certain area of a picture, you just dial in the overexposed in photoshop. You become a keyboard jockey once you learn all the hot keys needed to perform this on the fly. 

Lighting is very easy to learn these days with the instant results you get from digital filters and enhancements. Got a studio with strobes? Even simpler! Shoot each frame and compare the lighting exposure. It takes a fraction of a second for a frame to be shot and if you can't get it right after 3 shots, you got to be autistic. It was different in the days of analog. Even after taking exposure readings, you had to bracket the frame (three shots) to be safe. There is no fall back if exposure is wrong.

For years, Kodak and Fujifilm had to teach people how to use their film, and even held seminars for professional photographers. I attended them in my time and that's when the manual cameras were going out of fashion. People switched to all automatic film cameras but thanks to the film stocks, you could never be sure you have a hit or miss because Kodachrome behaved differently than negative film. So it was back to manual controls. I started to appreciate photography because it was complicated and knew that if I picked it up, it would go well with my writing. Yes, I started writing for newspapers and magazines using a manual typewriter....you know the sort that had actual physical keys which hammered a thin film of ink ribbon to paper. With a film camera in my bag, I was a photojournalist as well. How times have changed now that everything you want to do can be performed from the comfort of a Starbucks cafe with free WIFI and your smartphone. Everything you write or photograph can be up in social media in a matter of minutes. 


How Digital Killed the Analog Star

Did I shoot using Kodachrome? Yes I did. It was a bitch to learn to use but I picked it up after countless failures. Each time I got a package in the mail (you had to send it overseas for developing), my fingers could not contain the excitement as the postman rung the door bell to tell me I had mail.

Kodachrome was a hidden art that few photographers would learn to use in their lifetime. Casual photographers would never turn to Kodachrome as learning it was a trial by fire. You see, there are no sample shots you can look at or metadata to refer to. Each time you took a shot, you jot down the exposure data. The scene had to be remembered in your head as when your Kodachrome slides came back, you had to remember why it didn't turn out the way you remembered it. That was how difficult it was but you could pick that up if you spent time learning about film stocks and its nuances.

These days everything in photography has to do with economics and there is nothing Nikon and Canon can do to change that. First, I have been shooting for over 20 years, on film, instant and now digital, worked with some of the best photographers in the world and now seen how photography has taken on new meaning with digital thrown in.

Economics is what determines the success of any type of technology and for digital, the same is true for users who buy into those thousand dollar equipment in the hope of making it professionally.

It ain't easy making a living with digital equipment. Think of the investment, then think of the returns and you know why digital has been a difficult value point. Nikon and Canon want you to spend more money on equipment, buy more lenses, upgrade to new camera bodies every 12 to 18 months. 

Rapid Growth before a Decline

Digital DSLRs saw rapid growth from 2006 onwards, before tapering off in 2011, the trend now is to headed south, thanks largely to mobile smartphones.

I must say that I don't use a DSLR to shoot anymore. There is no reason to as I don't shoot professionally for anyone. Even when I do, I try to capture everything on a mobile device. Why? Coz it's a hobby. I turn down request to shoot because the pay is far too little and I am not in the mood to compete with people who flash around hefty DSLRs. Besides, taking a good photo is not difficult. If you know how to position your camera in view of the scene before you, you'd get a picture. It is not rocket science. Digital makes it real easy for you to get an idiot proof instant result that you can share with the world on Instagram.

DSLRs are great to have. Good to use if you find paying clients but these days, the only paying clients are those in wedding, commercial events or products and news. Even photojournalism doesn't pay enough to warrant you to take up a hefty insurance tab from Lloyds of London and going out to a war zone to make money shooting images. It's much cheaper for the news agencies to hire the locals from the war zone. Pay them peanuts too.

Does the world remember the last conflict photojournalist who fell in the line of duty? No. The world at large doesn't much give two hoots about who died photographing a war because digital images are apparently worthless beyond a use by date. Those who have died in Syria, Iraq, Libya....will be forgotten.

Digital pictures are passed around like a cheap hooker and after constant use as memes, would you even pay to enter an art gallery to see the real picture from the one you find on the web?

Would I have given two hoots about a photographer who gets beheaded on a YouTube video? Nope. I really have no business to care. People die all the time and I hope it was worth your entertainment because the real pictures from a war zone isn't worth much these days.

Pictures are Sold as Royalty Free

Yes, I have sold my pictures online. All of them are royalty free. Rights managed photos don't sell well because, well, they are expensive. 

These days, people rarely buy photos which are rights managed for print advertising. And I have pointed this out before when competing brands sometimes stumble on the same image and these gets used in a newspaper advert....both at the same time. 

Turn to the internet, and you would be inundated with offers to royalty free stock image libraries that sell loads of photos for one flat price. 

Crowd sourcing single use photos are now popular. A brand name yogurt company can now do away with a dedicated photo shoot with a commercial photography when they dangle an offer to the crowd sourcing community to produce a picture they can use online and in print. The cost? maybe in the region of 300 to 500 USD. WTF? A commercial photographer would charge 4 times as much to produce that same photo. Now you see the difference?

And if you have good skills on photoshop, you can make those royalty free images even better by removing the background brand names on the city streets and replacing them with less obvious signs. This is what you need to do to sell a five dollar royalty free stock photo. 

The Future is in Limited Prints

Digital photos are retouched, it's like a model whose had a ton of plastic surgery done on her. Film photos can be digitally scanned and enhanced, but you can still buy the real thing, a print from an analog negative. That's the real deal. No hocus pocus with Photoshop.

Iconic photo prints from analog film are going to be collectables one day. Just like the ones that was used to shoot Steve Jobs for the book. Both pictures featured in the book were taken on analog film. So who gets the last laugh? Certainly not the digital photographer.

Today, people keep photo albums on Flickr and Google Photos. No one even prints photos anymore. I have a family album which I pieced together and this is for those who wish to remember me when I am gone. But for the rest of you on digital, your digital account dies with you. Forgotten as though cobwebs had obscured your digital account. I don't even have digital photos of my best friend who died seven years ago, just a memory of his email address. And if a friend had a Facebook account, his profile will be put in cold storage if left inactive for more than a year. The memory of the dead will not stay alive on Facebook.

An iconic analog print photo signed and autographed will be an investment. That is art. It increases in value over time. The other stuff shot on digital, not so. 

Photography has evolved into the fast food business—and anyone can learn to make a burger from scratch at McDonalds. Make of that what you will....

First and foremost, the picture above is credited to David Slater, who says that he owned the photo but he didn't capture it. He created the conditions that were optimum for such a picture and as such had claimed to it. Unfortunately, Wiki-commons disagreed and now there is a ongoing copyright battle on who owns the picture. 

What is Public Domain?

Wiki-commons lets people put up copyright free images for everyone's use and these become public domain picture which cannot be used commercially. But seriously folks, do you think people will ever care to respect this bit?

public domain images of Steve Jobs

There are plenty of images in public domain which you can use for blogs and researched papers that will be deposited in pubic domain. Such images cannot be used for commercial gain so even if you used this picture on a banner advertising your garage sale, that would be in breach of the law, citing wiki-commons isn't going to save you.

Who can put Pictures in Public Domain?

Only the photographer can decide to donate a picture he took to public domain. Nothing else matters. The problem here is two folds, Slater didn't take the picture nor did he get a signed release from the Monkey as a model. This makes the whole idea on Slater owning the picture very murky.

So technically, the monkey owns the picture, regardless if it was Slater's camera that took the picture. And since Slater did not get a signed model contract....there is no copyright contention.

Monkey See Monkey Do

Slater baited the monkey to take the selfie. But in the end, he could have just sold the picture as something he had owned. To save himself, he could have fibbed about the picture and then made millions in selling the image for commercial use. Selfie was in essence a bad tag for the picture because this is what created the copyright debate.

Stupidly, he didn't have the brains to do this and now it is too late. However all is not lost. Even if the image is in public domain, it still cannot be used commercially. Slater can still profit from this if he can prove he is the holder of the analogue image.

Opps. He shot digital. Damn. He could have gone the analogue route and saved himself a ton of problems.

Digital files are useless. You may own the RAW image of the file but no one is going to look at a RAW file as proof of copy. Anyone can technically steal a RAW image from your HD and put that up as his own. Even a high resolution JPG can be turned into a DNG file with the right app. Quite a different story if you had a copy of the analogue image in your HD and the real slide or film image in safe keeping.

Lesson is, professional stock image photographers would be better off shooting analogue to protect their own interest. Digital is vaporware...think about it.

This is the lesson gleaned from photographers all over the world who have accidentally shot and released images onto the Internet and regretted it later as it would have cost them lots in commercial licensing.

Rated at ASA200, the new Cine200 Tungsten film isn't all that new to begin with. During my day as a photographer, I would not have bought such a film for use for outdoors for one simple reason, the film gives a cold cast, looking more blue than what you'd get with daylight film.

What are Tungsten Rated Films

Used primarily in studio that have floodlights, these lights give a extremely warm cast, and to balance them, you'd use a Tungsten film so that the colors would appear accurately as perceived in daylight.

The idea behind this is to allow the photographer the freedom to shoot in Tungsten lighting without the use of lens filters. This was a god send for analog photographer who worked constantly under floodlights shooting magazine adverts to printed catalogs.

All you needed to do is to load up the film and shoot. You could also do a vise-versa on normal daylight balanced film with a lens filter that balanced the harsh lighting. Either way,  Tungsten film fell out of fashion during the digital age because White Balance controls negated the need to use any type of filters.

Digital Tungsten White Balance

You can of course switch on your digital camera, go to your White Balance controls and select Tungsten lighting and get the same effect. There is no big deal about this. This method will only give you a bluish looking tint. Not a bad thing if that's what you are looking for but if you have RAW files on your HD, you can give all your digital photos the same look in any post production program like Photoshop or Lightroom.

Lomo's Tungsten Revival

For the young and aspiring analog photographer, the whole Tungsten film revival might seem like a big deal but to the old hands in the industry, it's a yawn.

But this is not a bad thing for people who continue to shoot film. The reason? Well, for art sake. These days, you can virtually tell if an image is digital or analog based on its tint and color reproduction. The closest to digital reproduction can only be achieved through good quality slide film but that too must be under optimum lighting conditions. Films are generally balanced for daylight exposure, if you have heavy clouds hovering before you, that changes the definition of daylight as well so your pictures won't look as good.

Digital Auto White Balance is better at detecting and correcting these minor shifts in the weather so you won't have to do this manually.

Shooting Tungsten in Daylight

Easy as pie but don't be surprised if you don't get the cooler tint during a hot summer's day at the beach. Very warm and sunny weather almost mimics the real conditions of Tungsten lights so you get a well balanced picture in the end.

There is no reason not to use it in everyday mixed lighting conditions just to take your artistic freedom up a notch.

My advice is ultimately this. Film is expensive so remember to capture something worth keeping.

With 30 days to go, Lomography has exceeded all its expectations with over 200K pledged on a 100K required funding on Kickstarter. That is a resounding cheer for analogue photographers but the biggest winner has to be Fujifilm, the only remaining instant film maker on the planet. The consumables don't cost much, which at US$1 buck a print, it makes for good memories.

The Lomo Instant Camera is a generic Fuji Instax Mini as it uses the same type of mini instant film but it goes one step further by offering a choice of clip on lenses for the camera that gives you fish eye and portrait angle shots. The colored gel filters are not going to be much of a hit for me, at least in a traditional sense but hipsters will no doubt double down on them.

Long exposure is included if you want to get creative but you have been warned as this is essentially a bulb mode for instant photography. Get the exposure wrong, and you'll wind up having an overexposed pile of goo.

To be fair, I think the portrait lens is a great inclusion but the fish eye is pure rubbish. Then again, Lomo intends to sell the camera kit within the ballpark of US$150 for the camera that comes complete with a wide angle lens. This bodes well for photographers who want a choice and can ante up to the portrait lens clip on as an accessory.

Shutter controls are pretty limited, just at one speed, 1/125 sec. The Mini Instax film is rated at ASA 800. The only way to control the exposure is through the aperture setting. 

But my main beef with this system is the sheet film size. It is small. Probably not as tiny as the first generation Zink prints but close. This means the instant film format isn't suitable for scenic, architecture or even street photography for that matter. It is a format meant for having fun with, shooting friends and family and the family pet. There is no macro capability either, so it would be a hassle to shoot anything smaller than a canary. Size wise, it's not much bigger than the Fujifilm instax mini cameras though I must add that it does bear some resemblance to Lomo's Belair series of cameras in terms of design. The Belair X6-12 has a Fuji Instax wide attachment to allow you take larger size instant pictures but from the initial test samples offered by users, only the 90mm lens seems to perform up to expectations. So if you gotta have that camera, then I suggest you wait for the Lomo Instant which should be made available to users all over the world in 2015. 

Film Format: Fujifilm Instax Mini Film

Exposure Area: 42mm x 64mm

Shutter Speed: 1/125s / Bulb

Exposure compensations: +2/-2 Exposure Values

Ejection Mechanism: Motorized

Multiple Exposures: Yes

Built-in Flash Guide Number: 9(m)

Automatic Flash Output: Yes

Battery Supply: 6V (4x AAA batteries)

Tripod mount: Yes

Cable Release Mount: Yes

Aperture: f/8, f/11, f/16, f/22, f/32

Is there hope for analogue photography? Seriously? Well in the day of 3D printing, it might just be what you need to keep those rolls of film going.

The Open Reflex camera is completely printable camera designed by Leo Marius. The idea behind it was to adapt a camera body to a lens mount which takes in a spool of film. This camera is only capable of firing at a fixed 1/60s shutter speed. This might ruin a lot of moments but at least you have a good lens to pair with it.

The whole project will cost you less than 50 bucks, that's provided you already have a 3D printer at home.

There isn't much room for analogue photography other than the stuff you find on Lomography, much of which take less than normal photos. The Open Reflex camera on the other hand makes for a very good kit camera, which can be adapted as a complete kit sans the lens. 

Trusted that the lens will be the problem, I reckon the only way around this is to package a cheap Russian made lens as part of the kit. It just doesn't make sense for kids to assemble something and look out for a used lens on eBay.

As you already know, much of the picture quality (which you can see here) is determine by the lens. Color negative film don't have much contrast and even with b/w film, you can see that may have to tune it up a few notches with Photoshop.

Leo likes the idea of having this turned into a kickstarter project of some sort but seriously folks. Film is in decline and unless it's for a school project, there won't be many backers.

Homebrew, all you need is a 3D printer. For that alone, I think it rocks!

OpenReflex by LeoMarius on Sketchfab

Every year, new film stocks are being discontinued by either Fujifilm or Kodak, the latter being a target since it is emerging from bankruptcy. So it should not come as a big surprise that the sort of new gear you can buy on the Internet these days are limited. Film is forever they say but film sales has been in a comatose state for years. What's out there today? If you are going to start on film, what is available?

Medium Format Rules

How do you get started on medium format photography? You could go buy a new camera or an old one from eBay but your best bet is still on a camera which is still in production. There are many old used cameras you can buy online but the danger is that it will break on you. Having experienced this first hand, you need to appreciate the working value of a camera versus an unreliable used unit. This is not to say that you should not buy used cameras. For beginners, I think you need to find a place to fix a camera should it break down. In big cities, its often very easy to find a camera repair shop run by those old dudes in glasses. But in a smaller city, such folks can only be found in retirement homes.

Wanderlust Travelwide 4x 5

Kickstarter funded Travelwide medium format camera will be on sale soon this summer at US$149. Not a bad price for a medium format camera except that it is not really a camera in the first place. What you get is a body and a pinhole lens cap which essentially lets you start shooting but they don't tell you that you also need to have a film back and a set of real lenses, 90mm type, which could cost you anything from US$150 to US$450 on eBay. The film backs are cheap, you can find one at Keh for less than 10 bucks.

Lubitel 166+

Nice little number from Russia, this TLR plastic bodied camera is capable of a variety of shutter speeds—a serious consideration if you want to shoot on the go. As a packaged  TLR camera, the features are good so you can shoot the moment you take it out of the box. It comes with a fixed lens, 75mm and cost about US$350. Sold on the Lomographic store, I think you can buy this and get it delivered anywhere in the world.

Kiev 60, 88, 645

The Hasselnyet cameras are great value for money and unfortunately, with the ongoing problems in Ukraine, I am not sure this camera will still be manufactured. The Kiev 60 sells for US$390, while the 88 model goes for US$475, the 645 sells for US$430. Not a bad idea really as all the camera kits come with a 80mm lens. The 88SWC model is a wide angle version, sells for US$775 with a 30mm lens.

Buying Used Equipment on eBay

Very risky affair but it might be worth it if you can find something that is of value. These days, eBay sellers are a dime a dozen. Almost anyone can sell something they consider a piece of antique and it is only the more experienced among us who will know what is a piece of junk.

All mechanical parts have a life span. It could be the shutter, winder or the photocell that measures light. Then there is wear and tear, like the glass being used as a mushroom farm, where it gets really foggy.

I would not advise anyone to get something they do not know enough about and with used cameras, there are heaps. Technically speaking, mechanical wear is less obvious if the item has been rarely used but the gunk they used for parts lubrication (often of animal origin) would have to be cleaned out and you need to send it for a CLA (clean lubricate and adjust) that is performed by a professional. Do not for one moment think that you are handy with the screwdriver and thus have the license to take it apart. Cameras are not like cars, they have delicate parts and once broken, you may have just inherited a junk heap.

Medium Format Film Development

Developing film isn't all that difficult. It's actually quite fun if you happen to have a dark room but in most cases, you don't really need one if you are only going to develop negatives.

If you don't plan on playing with chemicals, be sure to look out for color labs that still process film found in big cities. You can mail in your exposed roll and have that digitally transferred onto a CD.

Analogue photography is very rewarding. It is difficult to master but once you do, it's like getting that license to drive and own your first car. Medium format allows you to think about big pictures, and to have the film as mementos to share with others in later life is a real blast.

When James Thurber wrote his story of Walter Mitty, little did he know that Ben Stiller would turn it into a homage of sorts to analogue film. Thurber wrote this short story in 1939 and it was actually made into a film back in the 1947 but this remake with Ben Stiller starring and directing became something of a nostalgic journey for many.

The movie featured Sean Penn as a photographer, who worked exclusively on film but in one scene, a camera seen in the movie was paired wrongly with an AF-S 300mm f/2.8 VR G lens. That's a bit of a misuse of creative license for historical accuracy for that matter.

Nikon F3T paired with an AF lens?

The Nikon F3T was the very last workhorse from the dark ages of film photography. I remember the F3 well, I wanted to own one but never had the chance to. Here's a short quote from Wikipedia on the F3.

A significantly more durable, robust titanium version of the F3HP was also offered, called the "F3/T", initially in a more natural titanium finish or 'champagne' coloring, and later in a less conspicuous black. It weighs 20 grams less than the comparable F3. The champagne offering was introduced in 1982 and was quickly discontinued around 1985, making it the rarer (and costlier on the used market) of the two titanium models. The F3/T featured titanium clad viewfinders (DE-4), titanium back, titanium top and bottom plates. It also benefited from the conformal coating of the internal circuit board. The mechanical specifications between the black finished F3/T and the natural finish F3/T were identical.

Beautiful things don't ask for attention- James Thurber

The camera is manual but to a point. You can only fire it at one speed, 1/80 sec if you don't have any batteries. It uses two LR44 batteries sold at most watch shops. There were several variations of the F3, including the HP (high eyepoint which the FT is based) and the P for Press. This version had a dedicated hotshoe ontop of the petaprism bulkhead. This meant you could use a standard flash with the hotshoe mount as opposed to a dedicated hotshoe mount found on far left of the camera. This was in fact a pain for some to use as the Nikon hotshoe was non-standard.

For those of us old enough to remember, seeing Life magazine featured in the movie brought back many memories. It was the only way to see the best of what photojournalism has to offer.

Life was an American magazine that from 1883 to 1936 was published as a humor and general interest magazine. Time founder Henry Luce bought the magazine in 1936 solely so that he could acquire the rights to its name when it became a weekly news magazine launched by Luce with a strong emphasis on photojournalism. Life was published weekly until 1972; as an intermittent "special" until 1978; and as a monthly from 1978 to 2000.^[1] It became a weekly newspaper supplement published by Time Inc. from 2004 to 2007 and was included in some American newspapers. The website, life.com, existed from March 2009 to January 2012, as a joint venture with Getty Images under the name See Your World, LLC,^[2] which in January 30, 2012, became a photo channel on Time.com.

Death of Photojournalism?

Life Magazine's final demise was in 2000. It was just after the Dotcom bubble of the 90s. For that, I think the movie had it right as up until then, there were still film photographers but Instagram? That's another creative license which was abused by Hollywood for the sake of entertainment.

Today, real photojournalist are a rare breed. Many who enter the profession now have to spend a big load of cash on equipment alone, and the big payoff is a myth unless you were a paparazzi.

Molhem Barakat, the Reuters freelance photojournalist killed recently while covering the Syrian conflict was paid only a hundred bucks for uploading his pictures. He was 18 years old. His gallery of work can be viewed here.

I don't think Reuters would have paid him pittance if we were all shooting on film. Digital photography has in some way depreciated the value of images regardless of where they come from. There is nothing more rewarding than to see your work pay off in some way and to be able to do what you do best.

Digital photography is not sacred. It can be tampered with, edited and enhanced with a computer. Analogue photos on the other hand exist in celluloid. Shooting a picture is only one part of the equation. You had to find a way to develop the film and send it over to the News agencies. Not easy I tell ya.

I remember working in a darkroom where a photo was developed by hand, the print had to be dried and later line scanned transmitted to the head office. It was fucking hard work compared to what people had to do now. Developing film has two stages, the first is to develop the roll into a negative and the next, using an enlarger, a hardcopy print was made from that frame. This is what you see in "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty". Digital photographers today have no idea how this was done and couldn't understand the process to appreciate it. In the age of digital, the last thing you needed to do was to create a two step process to sharing your pictures to the world. For this I can proclaim one thing.

Photojournalism is dead. Long live the Selfie.