hyalineskies

It’s amazing how old I feel, and I’m still a naïve, learn-everything student. I feel increasingly like a relic of a generation whose childhood was placed directly in a cultural transition from the industrial to the electronic.

Eight years ago, I was an incoming freshman into the world of high school, a tech-nerd in love with punk rock, the newly-released PowerPC G3, and snowboarding. I also picked up a single-lens reflex camera for the first time, first using the camera solely on automatic mode, handing off my rolls of film to our art teachers for development in the school darkroom. By the time I was a senior, I shot manually with my Pentax ZX-50, spending free periods getting messy in the darkroom, printing my black and white photos for my own archives as well as for friends.

At the beginning of that year, the majority of us purchased digital cameras. At 2.1-3.0 megapixels, our little point-and-shoot gadgets offered very little in comparison to our SLRs. Once I graduated, my Pentax, then with a broken motor drive, found its way to its final resting place in my parents’ closet. I was in college with a five-megapixel Panasonic Lumix and my photo-nerd friends had the new Canon 300Ds. The digital revolution had won, and the idea of using film was laughable. The day of the darkroom was gone.

Over the past few years, I had found that nearly of all of my most memorable moments in high school had involved that broken camera. When I went to stay with my parents for a week in August last summer, I came across my old, broken friend and a box of Ilford Multigrade IV photo paper. Peering through the viewfinder made me feel as if I had been reunited with a lost relative. Although technology had moved on, my heart hadn’t.

The repair bill on the ZX-50 was more than purchasing a new 35mm body, so I reluctantly bought the ZX-60, Pentax’s “successor” to the ZX-50, and attached my old Tamron lens. The ZX-60 felt like a Holga in comparison. The new camera’s grip angle was obnoxious and each shot was followed by an annoyingly loud winding sound. The entire thing felt like an engineering abortion. My stubborn self, however, refused to give up.

Four weeks ago, I walked into a meeting for the University of Michigan’s Darkroom Club in Alice Lloyd hall. Although the first meeting was just an explanation of camera basics for total newbies, the last two sessions (including one yesterday) were spent in the darkroom (more a darkcloset than a darkroom) developing film and printing photos. It certainly wasn’t romantic, but being in a darkroom at all felt like a return home. Out of the entire University of 30,000 students, sixty have access to this darkroom. Less than ten use it regularly.

This lack of interest in film photography indicates not only the adaptability of youth to new technology, but also a retrospective moment for my bashing of those who don’t instantly adopt. As much as I will use my Lumix and enjoy digital photography - I plan on buying a Nikon dSLR within the next month - the old, messy methods of film development still have some sort of allure. When I buy my D50, my Pentax gear will find its way onto eBay not to buy accessories for the digital camera, but to buy a matching Nikon 35mm body. Although 35mm has seen its heyday, the technicalities and nuances of silver gelatin live on in intensive-care under the label of “fine art.”

Even with this shift of position, some of the more creative endeavours of the film industry are dying due to waning mainstream support. The aging Polaroid, struggling to make some name for themselves in the consumer-electronics market, is killing off their namesake instant-film cameras. The Time-Zero film, famous in creative circles for its photomanipulative capabilities, has been discontinued. Their Creative Photography Kit is being offered “while supplies last.” The end of Polaroid 600 is rumoured to not be far behind. It’s a sad, silent death for a once-innovative product.

It’s becoming difficult to find the bare necessities of black/white film photography in camera stores. My local source, Big George’s on Stadium, no longer sells 35mm cameras. According to a store employee, they actually make losses on their film photography products and only sell them since the rest of the store keeps the section afloat. The venerable Ilford Delta 100, Tri-X, and T-MAX films have become sparse, with only specialised camera stores selling small amounts for expensive prices. I can’t even find Fujicolor Velvia locally, a colour film famous for its saturation.

I guess there’s something to be said about obsolescence after all. If I’ve learned one thing from this venture, it’s that sometimes it’s depressing to lose something you enjoy to the world of technology. Even when the last roll of Tri-X is produced, it will always hold a special place in my heart.