Is film photography "alternative photography" yet?

[Jay Decker]

A young man was in my office yesterday. He looked at portraits hanging on the wall, which were taken with a Petzval lens, view camera, and 8x10 film. He asked me why the photographs looked so "different", I told him, and he said to me that he thought "alternative photography" was awesome.

Is film photography "alternative" now?

[Kimberly Anderson]

1 Billion to acquire Instagram. Yes, I'd say film-based photography is pretty alternative. Within *this small group* on LFF...clearly 'Alternative Photography' means something a little different.

[Kirk Gittings]

I heard today on the news that is 12 times the value of Kodak.

[dpn]

I agree wholeheartedly with the OP.

[Michael Alpert]

Your portraits were likely called "alternative" because you use a Petzval lens. I don't think film has much to do with it. The contemporary use of Petzval lenses is clearly an alternative to more mainstream sharp-focused photography.

[Merg Ross]

Michael is perhaps correct about the role of film in this instance. However, without doubt, film capture has a unique look.

In a recent interview, Nick Brandt made an observation about film: "There continues to be an indefinable, impossible to quantify magic, that occasionally happens with the interplay of light and negative. Oftentimes, it's actually the imperfections that give you this indefinable, magical quality."

He concludes with this: "I bought a Hasselblad 60 megapixel H4, took it to Africa, and began photographing with it alongside my film camera. I found the results deeply disappointing. There was a kind of perfection to the images that I didn't like, a sort of sterility and an overly-clinical quality that just didn't work with the sensibility that I was after. For what I'm doing, and in black-white, I really didn't like it. I returned to shooting what is now, crazily impractical, film."

I am in total agreement with his observation of the "magic" that occasionally happens with the interplay of light and negative.

[Steve Smith]

I agree wholeheartedly with the OP.

But he asked a question rather than making a statement!


Steve.

[Brian C. Miller]

According to a Pew Research study (http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2010/Mobile-Access-2010.aspx), DSLRs may become "alternative process," as 76% of cell phone users are more likely to use a cell phone for their photographs rather than a camera.

With all of the comments I get about my film cameras, yeah, modern film is "alternative process."

(OT: As for the Instagram price, it's really cheap when you consider how many users the service has. How that translates to revenue, I'm guessing advertising, of course.)

[Mark Sawyer]

In a recent interview, Nick Brandt made an observation about film: "There continues to be an indefinable, impossible to quantify magic, that occasionally happens with the interplay of light and negative. Oftentimes, it's actually the imperfections that give you this indefinable, magical quality."

...which I would take more seriously if he didn't photoshop bad imitation wet-plate artifacts onto his images to get that indefineable, magical quality: :rolleyes:

http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g139/Owen21k/LionCUPortrait.jpg

[Vaughn]

Well, film and carbon printing are my alternatives of choice...:)

[darr]

Here is a recent short read by Brooks Jensen on "Dead Media" that touches on film photography:

http://daily.lenswork.com/2012/04/dead-media.html

[Bill_1856]

Lol!

[Kimberly Anderson]

Excellent points by Brooks.

[Renato Tonelli]

How ironic. My own children prefer to use their cell phones instead of the digi cameras I bought them for Christmas.
Last year I started using a Canon 5D to photograph musicians in performance. I tried, honestly, I really tried. I went back to Tri-X/Diafine.

[Merg Ross]

Thanks for the link, Darr. I believe that Brooks is "dead" right!

[E. von Hoegh]

Your portraits were likely called "alternative" because you use a Petzval lens. I don't think film has much to do with it. The contemporary use of Petzval lenses is clearly an alternative to more mainstream sharp-focused photography.

When using a Petzval to get "swirlies", it's not "alternative", but a perversion of the original design of the Petzval, which was to be a fast portrait lens - any careful worker getting "swirlies" in 1865 would have gone to a longer lens.

Petzvals aside, I think film has become an alternative process, just as wetplate did.

[SamReeves]

We're officially old fogeys now!!

[Jim Noel]

"There was a kind of perfection to the images that I didn't like, a sort of sterility and an overly-clinical quality that just didn't work with the sensibility that I was after."

I think you have hit the nail on the head.I have been searching for a word or phrase to describe what is unappealing about digital image, and I believe sterile and overly clinical are certainly a part of it.

[cyrus]

Actually nowdays I consider film photography - especially LF - to be more "printmaking" !

[E. von Hoegh]

"There was a kind of perfection to the images that I didn't like, a sort of sterility and an overly-clinical quality that just didn't work with the sensibility that I was after."

I think you have hit the nail on the head.I have been searching for a word or phrase to describe what is unappealing about digital image, and I believe sterile and overly clinical are certainly a part of it.

"Sterile" and "clinical" are two words I've heard used to describe audio CDs compared to vinyl. I've heard both, on equipment that can show the differences, and it's about right. There's a nuanced smoothness, for lack of a more thought out descriptive term, that is missing from both digitised music and digitised images.

[E. von Hoegh]

We're officially old fogeys now!!

In the 1990s I had on my business cards "Practitioner of obsolete technology"

[Ken Lee]

Thanks for the link, Darr. I believe that Brooks is "dead" right!

Ditto.

[Drew Wiley]

I recall what Mark Twain routinely said to howling laughter on his popular speaking tours later in life: "Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated!"

[tgtaylor]

Excellent points by Brooks.

+1. The Van Dyke brownprint is killer!

Thomas

[Merg Ross]

Hi Mark,

I was deliberate in not endorsing the work, which perhaps belies Brandt's observation of film. However, I understand what he was suggesting about film, and the indefinable magical quality.

I believe that there is currently an exhibition of Brandt's work at Brooks in Santa Barbara, in case anyone is interested. Check first, this is from memory (often unreliable)!

[Andrew O'Neill]

Yup, and that's fine with me. Film has always been my alternative.

[Jay Decker]

Your portraits were likely called "alternative" because you use a Petzval lens. I don't think film has much to do with it. The contemporary use of Petzval lenses is clearly an alternative to more mainstream sharp-focused photography.

In this case, I do not think the Petzval lens aesthetic motivated his "alternative photography" comment. I am not "swirly" Petzval portrait photographer. The image below is one of the images he was commenting on and is representative of the photographs he was looking at. I should also add that there were a few portraits taken with RR, Heliar, and a Kodak Portrait (meniscus) lenses.


http://monkeytumble.com/tmp/Billy.jpg

Billy

8x10 Kodak 2D
Dallmeyer 4D - Wide Open
8x10 FP4+ in HC-110
Kennewick, WA

[Jay DeFehr]

Jay, this is so beautiful, spontaneous and natural, I'd never guess it was made with a view camera. Regarding your question, I think the answer depends on who you ask. For the guy who made the comment; yes, I suppose LF film photography might be considered an alt process in much the same way Nirvana might be considered an alt rock band -- a convenient label in absence of a deeper understanding of the subject. I'm sure he meant it as a compliment.

[Michael Alpert]

Jay,

Your portrait is lovely. I think the classic eyes-in-focus wide-open-lens approach is, these days, quite unusual and thus "alternative," regardless of lens or even technology. Also, you made no effort to "air-brush" her face, which was the norm back in the day. I think the same portrait made with a high-end digital camera would be "alternative." Your young visitor was, apparently, responding quite nicely to your artistic vision, albeit is a somewhat inarticulate youthful manner.

[Kirk Gittings]

Personally, I think being an alternative to the commonplace, the mainstream, the comfortable, the Q&D, or the usual methodology is a really good thing. IMHO film has been "alternative photography" for a few years now.

[Adrian Pybus]

Slide film is fast becoming alternative photography as lab after lab stop developing it.
I'd say b&w and colour negatives isn't alternative as almost all labs do them.
When most labs only 'develop' and print digital then film will be alternative.

Adrian

[Drew Wiley]

Reggae is alternative music in Nashville; Country-Western is alternative in Jamaica. All this
nomenclature is utterly relative. I find this applies to film photography even between one
local outdoor space and another. When I prop up the 8X10 down by all the jogger and picnic crowd they think I'm some kind of terrorist. When I do it on the hiker trails they
congratulate me on still doing "real" photography and often even ask to look through the
groundglass. And if I wanted environmental portraiture, it would be an easier tool for
getting people to cooperate. Point a Nikon at them and they're suspicious. Totally different
ballgame. Just depends who, where ...

[Mark Sawyer]

There's a film of dust accumulating on my digital camera. It seems a shame to clean it off...

[alexn]

Since buying into MF and LF my digitals have only been used to photography myself using MF or LF... For me digital is the alternative process.

[E. von Hoegh]

There's a film of dust accumulating on my digital camera. It seems a shame to clean it off...

Let the dust accumulate. Every so often, spray it with lacquer. When it gets a nice thick coating, sell it on epay. Tell them it's special vintage dust.

[Mark Sawyer]

Tell them it's special vintage dust.

I prefer to think of it as a "patina"...

[ROL]

Is film photography "alternative" now?

Well, if that Rubicon hasn't been already crossed, I'm at least feeling a bit damp.

[Jay Decker]

Personally, I think being an alternative to the commonplace, the mainstream, the comfortable, the Q&D, or the usual methodology is a really good thing. IMHO film has been "alternative photography" for a few years now.

At first, I did not want to own the term "alternative photography", because hearing it applied to what I do was a shock and surprise. For the past couple years, I have just explored and done my thing. Hearing the term alternative photography applied to my work made me look up from what I am doing and look around. I found myself far from the mainstream and I got there without knowing that I had left the mainstream. Does it matter? No, but the realization was a shock.

[cosmicexplosion]

now that is a beautiful woman and photo in one. bravo Jay Decker!

i bet you he did not know his comments would eat into the lives of so many artists.

i would like to see another please.

ANdrew

[E. von Hoegh]

In this case, I do not think the Petzval lens aesthetic motivated his "alternative photography" comment. I am not "swirly" Petzval portrait photographer. The image below is one of the images he was commenting on and is representative of the photographs he was looking at. I should also add that there were a few portraits taken with RR, Heliar, and a Kodak Portrait (meniscus) lenses.


http://monkeytumble.com/tmp/Billy.jpg

Billy

8x10 Kodak 2D
Dallmeyer 4D - Wide Open
8x10 FP4+ in HC-110
Kennewick, WA

That is a lovely portrait.
And, I'd like to thank you for using that lens as it was intended - without the nauseating abberations.

[unixrevolution]

I can buy film for my 93 year old Kodak Brownie at Annapolis Mall. I can't get memory cards for my Kodak Digital Science DC3800 or my Sony MVC-FD91 anywhere but online, and used at that for the Kodak.

The Sony will still have new memory cards and batteries produced as long as Sony sticks to the InfoLithium concept, and *someone* has a use for floppy disks.

This is what I call an Obsolesence Gap: A gap in time between the technology being a going concern and supported by the infrastructure of its industry, and the time it's practical, or even possible, to do at home with readily sourced materials.

[mikebarger]

Nice/excellent print Jay. Glad to see this lens type used as intended. I've never understood the popularity of the swirls....I guess different strokes is one of the things that makes this an interesting hobby.

Mike