Film Photography News

There is something about mistletoe and holly that makes my heart scream out: “It’s time for some more cool photo gear.” The mere thought of reindeer hooves on the rooftop gives me the urge to clean out my gadget bag collection and make room for something new. If you suffer from the same seasonal malady—or if there’s a photographer in your life who deserves more than a re-gifted lump of coal—here’s a list of camera stuff that every picture-taker will enjoy receiving as a holiday gift.

Fujifilm has launched a new instant film camera with a more slender profile and automatic exposure control: the Instax Mini 70. The new Instax Mini 70 features an updated, sleek design with a special Selfie mode and a  powerful flash that automatically calculates surrounding brightness and adjusts shutter speeds.

Ninety years ago, at the 1925 Leipzig Spring Fair in Germany, a camera was launched that was destined to change the face of photography. This was a time when it was still common for glass plates to be used in cameras, and those that took roll film were thought of as miniatures. So imagine the culture shock when a still photography camera was produced to take 35mm movie film.

Ilford Photo recently confirmed reports that there are no plans to discontinue production of their XP2 SUPER film. The product is in free supply globally from Ilford Photo distributors and retailers.

Here’s another in our series of reports from photokina 2012. As you will have noticed we do not attempt to create a laundry list of new products and companies from the show, but prefer to report on what struck our eye and thought might be of special interest to Shutterbug readers. In this report Roger Hicks tells us about numerous instances of life in the film arena he found at the show, with special cameras, film, paper, and even processors part of the mix.—Editor

While black and white digital photography is based on the conversion of a color (RGB) image to monochrome via software, those who remain adherents of film photography have an entirely different route to obtaining a black and white image.

When a photographer deals with the emotions generated by black-and-white prints, and the methodology of creating and defining those emotions and how they are generated, he or she begins to deal with developing a sense of the aesthetics of the monochrome image.