When auto focus was first available, I could not wait to get my hands on an AF camera. The camera that introduced me to this new way of taking pictures was a borrowed Minolta Dynax 7000, and I was hooked. I changed to an auto focus camera at the earliest opportunity. I alternated a bit between Canon and Nikon, although my final big purchase was with Nikon, partly due to an attractive deal that I could not turn down, but also because I liked the camera. The choice ticked all the boxes so to speak.
Then came digital, and that really rocked my world. My first proper digital camera, and by that I mean DSLR, was a Nikon D100. This was a truly monumental shift in my photography. I was a full time photographer and webmaster (so retro), so each day I shot I would typically expose 30-40 rolls of 35mm film. The AF saved me from being quite so mentally exhausted, and the digital work flow saved my sanity – quite literally.
My main business was web content, so when I was not shooting I was scanning transparencies. I was on first name terms with all the staff at the lab, so it was also quite a social relationship. The negative element (no pun intended) was the scanning.
I forget how many times I was up at midnight or later 'batch' scanning. There were automation options for my scanner; the manufacturer made a slide holder that you could load all your slides into and it would scan them one by one without user intervention. However, it still needed to be loaded and very often, despite my care, the scans were not clean or cropped as accurately as I liked. Computers were not as fast or refined as they are now, so everything took time, and time was something I did not seem to have.
This will not need much explanation, but to be able to take a memory card out of a camera and transfer the contents onto a hard disk was, quite simply, a gift from the Gods. Most of my work was studio based on or location, which meant the images tended to have pretty constant lighting. This meant I could do the basic edit on a few from each set from the day, and then batch process them. Suddenly I gained hours in each day, and with each hour a little of more of my sanity returned. I have lost count of the number of baths, showers and nice meals I was able to build back into my life while all this 'computer stuff' went on in the background.
The rest, as they say, is history. Digital progressed, and image quality improved. Computers became faster. Strangely, this is what brought part of my work back to film. Shooting a couple of rolls of film over a day or two is really enjoyable. Manual focus is not as slow or stressful as I remember it, although the circumstances now are much more preferable. I can still use AF with film, but tend not to. Most processing labs now provide a good quality develop and scan service, so this work is not omitted from being included in the digital world. My old film cameras have big, bright viewfinders and decent lenses. I have owned them from new, so they are all in excellent condition and were stored well when not in use. I never had the heart to get rid of them, which has turned out to be a good decision.
My love of film is partly nostalgia, but also a genuine love of the process. Everything seems a little slower, which is no bad thing. I also think because it is not part of every day or even every week, it means I can enjoy all the stages of the process from buying the film to sharing or doing something else with the images. There is also that slight element of worry that you have made a mistake in exposure or did not get the image you hoped for, but that is all part of analogue.
