Potala Palace, Lhasa, Tibet. September 2001

I’ve been running a wholly digital workflow for my cultural travel photography since 2004. Prior to that, it was film and only film, from my very first days learning photography as a child, through to a lot of the traveling across Asia I did between 1997 and when I retired my film cameras in late 2004. The photograph above was shot on film in mid-September 2001 during an overland trip from Kathmandu, Nepal to Lhasa Tibet.

I do have a small confession to make. For me, nostalgia doesn’t enter the picture. Image quality mostly but also cost (in both time and money) and convenience are what’s important to me, and at least in the 35mm SLR/DSLR field, digital wins hands down. I don’t really miss film, but that may be because I spent so long using it. I have a few friends who’ve recently gotten into using film but they’ve almost all been people who only came to photography after the advent of digital. If I could go back with the professional grade DSLR I have to and revisit all the places I previously shot on film during my travels, I’d do it in an instant.

That said, for a lot of photographers, film is still important. This may be more common in the realm of medium format where the entry point for digital is priced at a level that’s out of reach to most amateurs and a lot of pros. Particularly for the hobbyist, dropping US$30K on a digital back is unlikely to be justifiable unless they are a retired doctor or something similar.

There is obviously still a strong desire for film. Adobe chose to include a Grain Effects tool in Lightroom 3 and just last week Kodak announced the introduction of a new Professional Porta 400 film. Clearly, film isn’t dead. There’s also been a renewed interest in (the somewhat misleadingly named) toy cameras such as the Holga, the Diana and the Lomo. Here in Taipei, there’s even a store dedicated to the Lomo that’s just opened, and I believe other cities around the world often have similar stores.

Hyderabad, India. January 1998

If you’ve never shot film, now is as good a time as any to give it a go. Maybe you’re lacking inspiration or need an exercise in discipline. Some people feel that using film forces them to slow down and become more deliberate when shooting. Others like the art of the wet darkroom. Whatever your reasons, film is still a viable option today for the creative photographer.

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