{"id":6383,"date":"2026-09-29T10:02:04","date_gmt":"2026-09-29T09:02:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/?p=6383"},"modified":"2026-09-29T10:02:04","modified_gmt":"2026-09-29T09:02:04","slug":"would-i-shoot-film","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/would-i-shoot-film\/","title":{"rendered":"Would I shoot film?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 2006, when I transitioned to Canon EF system, one of the reasons for it was the option to use the same lenses and other hardware to shoot film. I bought a used EOS 3 on ebay, and also an EOS 650 on the local used photo gear market, together with the EF 35-70mm f\/3.5-4.5 lens.<\/p>\n

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I also bought lots of Astia and Velvia and put them in the fridge, for whenever I decide to actually go and shoot film, and an Epson 4990 flatbed film scanner, because I already sold my Minolta Dimage IV to finance the Olympus E1 purchase.<\/p>\n

However, as it turned out the 5d was so much better than film, that this turned out to be pointless. I did shoot some film, but my heart wasn\u2019t in it. There was no actual gain. There was no artistic reason to do it. The digital actually gave me more artistic freedom, and it also gave me better shadows, better detail crispness on magnifications, less noise, and higher ISO.<\/p>\n

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Canon 5d, EF 35-70mm f\/3.5-4.5<\/p><\/div>\n

The question \u201cwould I shoot film again if that were a real option?\u201d was unanswered for me in 2006. I retained all the necessary hardware \u2013 two film bodies, film in the fridge, scanner on my desk. However, having this option available and knowing that I didn\u2019t really want to use it answered it for me.<\/p>\n

I stopped caring about film, because digital did everything for me. When I bought into the Sony FE system, that question was long answered, and I no longer cared that the new lenses will never be able to work on film. So, that\u2019s my answer to the question \u201cwould you shoot film again, if it became a real option for you?\u201d. No, I wouldn\u2019t. It\u2019s just hassle with no benefits. I like the way film looks, but I like digital more. \u201cOh, how can you say that, the film is organic, it\u2019s physical, it\u2019s not just a computer producing numbers\u201d yada yada. Yeah, sure, and the point of shooting it for me was to scan it and produce a set of numbers on a computer. It\u2019s just that the process of getting there introduced dependency on other people, whole other industries, and was pointlessly messy. I loved photography, and film was how you got it. I suffered through all its quirks because that was what you had to do. That\u2019s no longer the case.<\/p>\n

With digital, it doesn\u2019t matter that I live on an island where there are no film labs or photography stores. I don\u2019t have to figure out how to buy film, where to process it, how it will deal with the summer heat, how to scan it. I don\u2019t have to worry that my favourite emulsions went out of production or are about to. My favourite \u201cemulsion\u201d was a digital 35mm sensor ever since the Canon 5d. It did exactly what I wanted. I could shoot deep, juicy dark colours, finally. I could shoot hand-held in the dark woods after rain and get workable exposures. And, finally, I could do every part of photography myself.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s my favourite film emulsion? The Sony 35mm sensor from A7RV and A7CR.<\/p>\n

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A7RV, FE 135mm f\/1.8 GM<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 2006, when I transitioned to Canon EF system, one of the reasons for it was the option to use the same lenses and other hardware to shoot film. I bought a used EOS 3 on ebay, and also an … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-photo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6383"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6383\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6386,"href":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6383\/revisions\/6386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.danijel.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}