the last of the film

As we were cleaning out the old fridge in preparation for its departure, we threw out a lot of stuff. In one of the door compartments we found film. I knew it was there, but I didn't get into that compartment very often.....

[Dramatization. This is really the new fridge...... The film was behind an opaque door in the old fridge.]





I haven't shot a single frame of film since I got my first digital camera in the fall of 2004.

Who knew the 400 and the 800 came with slightly different lids! I never looked at them together until just now..... And -- don't you love the shadows of the film? With all those holes along the edge............??




The only thing I've missed, from olden times, is my ability to set the film camera for deep or shallow focus, and there have been times when I have missed the manual focus. I know that my bigger digital cameras will allow me to do more with depth of field than I do.... I really need to read the manual..........

My first digital camera can do some (but not all!) manual focus, right on the lens like a real camera. The newer one has a little joystick, which has given me no joy whatsoever........ Luckily its autofocus does a fine job in 9 out of 10 situations.

But anyway.

I won't be going back to film. Being able to take an essentially infinite number of shots "for free" is not something I'm going to give up. Having the built-in zoom is not something I'm going to give up. Having my pics ready, NOW, to look at and mess with is not something I'm going to give up. Messing with my pics is NOT something I'm going to give up!!!!

The film in the fridge is useless to me.



I called the local film-developing place to see if they would recycle it. I said it had been in the fridge for years.

The guy told me I should shoot it up.

Hmm. Let's think this through. If I wanted to shoot it up, well, I probably *would* have, don't you suppose? And ... if I had something I wanted to use the film camera for, wouldn't I go buy new film, rather than taking a chance on the old?

I told him I was never going back from digital, and he told me, adamantly, that film was "better quality, and would always be better quality."

Well now.

Hmmm.

I mean -- I can understand how someone who works in a film-developing place might possibly have a certain bias about all of this.

But -- let's think it through. How exactly shall we define "quality"?

I have shot thousands of images with my film camera. I have shot thousands (and thousands and thousands!) of images with my digital cameras. I have lots of prints. (!!!)

I can't tell the difference in quality between the old way and the new, in 4x6 prints, which is what I want, essentially always, when I want prints at all (which I don't, mostly, especially now that I have this bloggy way to show people the images without printing and mailing them!).

So -- if I can't tell that "the quality is better" in the finished print......

And ... the way to take better *pictures* is to take more pictures. So -- if I want the quality of my *pictures* (nevermind the quality of hardcopy versions of images) to be as good as possible, well, it's clear that I need to take more pictures, and that is, hands down, the digital route.

I imagine I'm preaching to the choir here in blogland, but I was so boggled that the guy would state categorically that film is superior that I was almost speechless.

I'll be dropping the film off at the place. I told him that if *he* wants to shoot it up, he is more than welcome.

Whatever.

They'd have to pry my digital camera(s) out of my cold dead fingers. I have kept the old Pentax for sentimental reasons, but I don't suppose I'll ever use it again.

Film is just too cumbersome (changing film after every 36 exposures? on vacation, nowadays, I'll easily take 300 or more pics in one day! not to mention carrying all those rolls of film and protecting them from heat and xrays and whatnot....).

Too slow (from click to finished image -- shoot it all up and then *how* long for developing? and let's not forget schlepping it to be developed and then going back after the finished prints......).

Too expensive (75 cents an image???).

Too dirty -- developing film requires the use of a bunch of nasty chemicals (and so does manufacturing it, I bet).

And -- I don't *want* all those prints. All those negatives. All taking up space. All deteriorating day by day.

Which is another aspect of quality, now that I think of it. My digital images, safe on multiple computers, are exactly as good now as the day I took them. My prints, taken 20 years ago, even the ones closed up in "archival" albums, show noticeable fading. Where's that putative superior quality now????

Boggled, I say.

Ok. Walking away from this topic. [shaking head, mumbling, fondly giving my little digital camera, the one I carry with me essentially all the time, a little kiss on the top of its shiny little head]





I tried to take a pic of the old Pentax, but it must have been wiggling, as all six attempts were blurry. Or maybe it was I that was wiggling -- holding it at arm's length..... It's a lot heavier than ... well, I bet it's heavier than my three digital cameras put together............

It was a low-end but very good camera, and worked well for me for 20 years. It and I took lots of good pics together. Now its disadvantages weigh as much as it does, and I've moved on..........

And now, because I can, a watercolor version of the previous image (which is pixelated and grainy because it's a tiny fraction of the actual image). I like this one much better, but because I was trying to be sort of "documentary" I wanted to stick with the "unfiltered" image for the story..........