Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time
Back in the 1980s, fans weren’t allowed to bring their cameras to concerts, but a Depeche Mode fan had an idea. He threw a roll of film on stage during the band’s concert with his name and address attached to it and a plea to the band to take photos.
It wasn’t only the idea that was cool, it was the band’s reaction, too. They picked up the film, took some photos, and later mailed them back to the fan. His widow recently shared them online and the story made my heart melt.
Rumor has it that Leica is about to announce yet another 35mm film camera next month. And yes, we’re living in 2022, you didn’t accidentally walk into a time machine. If you still enjoy shooting film, then you’ll be happy to know that the upcoming model should be far more affordable than the $20k limited edition M-A “Titan” introduced earlier this year.
There isn’t much of a shortage of LEGO cameras. We’ve covered a bunch on here before that either look like real cameras, such as Nikon, Olympus, Leica, Hasselblad and Polaroid and we’ve covered a few functional LEGO cameras, too, although most of those require some… non-standard (LEGO standard) components. This one, though, looks just like a real camera and works just like a real camera, too.
The LEGO ZH1 is a fully functional pinhole camera by Zung92 made entirely of LEGO. It features an actual shutter button, film advance, film take-up reel, a wind lever with a wind release, customisable lenses and you can even switch it up between half and full-frame mode.
Film’s resurgence in the last few years has left many analogue photographers with something of a problem, particularly if they want to shoot medium format film. That’s the lack of scanners on the market capable of scanning film compared to 20 or even 10 years ago. Sure, there are some out there that can do medium and even large format but they’re often prohibitively expensive.
So, photographer Christian Chapman decided to have a go at modifying his Plustek 8100 – a scanner designed for 35mm film – to make it scan medium format 120 roll film. As well as modifying the scanner and designing up some 3D printed replacement parts, he also had to modify the driver to make it scan further than it usually would for 35mm film. And he’s made it all available to download so you can do it yourself.
Leica has announced a new, limited edition version of its M-A camera. The Leica M-A “Titan” is the existing M-A dressed in new clothes, and like other Leica’s limited edition pieces – it’s pretty expensive. It will set you back nearly $20k, but there’s something different about it compared to the more recent limited-edition models.
Unlike the more recent limited-edition cameras from Leica, there’s something different about this one – it’s a film camera. Yup, Leica has re-introduced a film camera in 2022 and priced it at nearly $20k.
Dubblefilm has announced its newest film stock. Called dubblefilm CINEMA iso800, this colour negative film comes in standard 36-exposure rolls. It’s priced at $19, €18 or £16 depending on where you are in the world and uses the C-41 development process. The company says that while dubblefilm CINEMA is available for sale, it is still a work in process.
It’s essentially repurposed movie film with the protective remjet layer removed to make it more useful for 35mm stills photographers. It has “epic colours, “insane tones at night, halo effect around bright red lights and a bluish tone in daylight”. It sure seems pretty wild.
I’m pretty sure all of us have at least one old phone collecting dust in the depths of some drawer. And to be fair, it’s difficult to put it to good use. But Iranian photographer Alireza Rostami thought of something pretty cool to repurpose his broken old phone: he turned it into a film camera.
You may already know Alireza. He’s a is a super-creative and resourceful photographer who’s shared a few of his DIY projects with us before. Each is more creative than the other, and now he’s made something pretty cool again. He has kindly shared his photos and some backstory with DIYP, so let’s see how he turned a camera phone into a film camera phone.
Well, this is sad news. film company Street Candy Film, founded in 2018 by Vincent Moschetti is calling it a day. In a post to their Facebook page, the company announced that while they had great hope for the future, rising costs from their suppliers have given them no choice. They say the manufacturer who produces their product “decide[d] to triple the price of film overnight” there was nothing left for them to do.
The company released two films. ATM 400 in 2018, which was made from security surveillance film and offered a fantastic contrasty look and MTN100 in 2021, another black and white film made from motion picture film stock. As of the Facebook announcement, they said there were 174 rolls of ATM400 left, but now both films are now listed as discontinued and out of stock on the Street Candy website.
It looks like yesterday’s post about Fujifilm price increases has been confirmed directly by Fujifilm. A press release on the Fujifilm website, states that film prices have increased as of today from 20-60%, with more increases to come on paper, chemicals and lab products and services over the next two months.
They say that the price increase comes as a result of a recent rise in costs for raw materials, as well as transportation, and the decline in demand for photographic-related products. Perhaps this must just be a Fujifilm thing because film’s more popular now than it’s been in years.
It almost always seems to be bad news when it comes to Fujifilm. Well, ok, not so much when it comes to their mirrorless cameras but it tends to be when their film stock is the topic of the conversation. If they’re not killing them off completely then they’re ramping the prices up and it looks like that’s what they’re about to do according to a note published to Twitter by Japanese camera shop, Print Koubou.
In a tweet, Print Koubou posted a photo of the note along with a description stating that the prices for paper, chemicals, processing fees, etc. is going to go up from their Fujifilm suppliers and that they’re obviously going to have to pass these costs along to the customer. They say that they’re going to try alternate supplies to keep the prices down but also recommend customers stock up on film rolls as soon as possible.
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