Vintage Film Photography
I was really sad to hear that Kodak filed for bankruptcy last week. One of their films, Kodachrome, is quite possibly one of the most beautiful things that ever happened in photography, and opened up the opportunity for millions of people to experience colour photography – it was as revolutionary in the twentieth century as digital has been in the twenty-first! Some of my very favourite photos were shot on Kodachrome, by the likes of William Albert Allard and Sam Abell. Now neither of us has ever shot Kodachrome, but I knew that my parents had, so we spent the day with them recently looking through some old photos. I was amazed when I discovered these photos were actually pretty damn good – go mum and dad!
Vintage Wedding Photography? We both started out photographing with film – in fact the rather lovely Rolleiflex camera you see in our website’s menu was used to take the two photos below! We’ve been asked if we use our film cameras for our business, but as of yet it just hasn’t happened – it’s hard enough to keep track of all the digital cameras dangling from your neck let alone a fifty year old mechanical wonder that may or may not break at any time! Given how fashion is very vintage and retro-orientated at the moment, it’s no surprise that there is also a movement in alternative wedding photography that is fixated on offering that retro or vintage film look in their wedding photos.
Some photographers, like Jose Villa, are actually using film, as their wedding services come with a premium price which can cover the enormous cost of processing and scanning the film. For the majority of photographers, this isn’t an option, but digital photography has opened up a whole world of opportunity for all photographers, especially when it comes to colour, and we’ve seen loads of vintage film effects popping up all over the place! The funny thing is its really hard to mimic a lot of films like the Kodachrome that my parents used – there’s an inherent (and beautiful) look which everyone seems to have spent ages trying to recreate, but can’t quite reach. We tried too, but eventually we said sod it, lets just do something completely new! Of course, if anyone does pull off that perfect Kodachrome effect, count us first in the queue!
