The recent resurgence of film photography has fascinated me to the point that now, years after it began, I finally decided to go back to my film/darkroom days where my interest in photography is rooted and shoot my first roll of film for the first time since the mid 1990s.
As one who was schooled and worked many days and hours on end in darkrooms over several years, I thought getting back into film after 20+ years of digital photography shouldn’t be difficult at all. That said much has changed with the new incarnation of film. For one, Kodachrome is no longer available for color film photography, my absolute favorite for capturing the best 35mm images back in the day. Most of what I did in school/work during my early days of photography was of a commercial nature, so technically perfect and high-quality realistic sharp images were what was in high demand. There was nothing like processing an 8 x 10 color transparency in the darkroom and taking a look at it after it dried, and it was almost looking like the real subject, not a positive image since the resolution was so high and grain almost invisible! Creative photography was not something I was involved with professionally but was my favorite genre on a purely artistic level. Black and white gilm photography was paramount for me in the creative realm then and still is today in the digital world.
This all brings me to today, and my planned venture into black and white photography after decades away. As mentioned, much has changed since then, so to venture forth, I wanted to begin with a familiar “constant” from my past. With that said, I decided to go with the first two basics, a camera and film. I chose my Nikon Photomatic FTN 35mm camera I’ve owned since 1974 for my camera and Kodak Tri-X 400 for my film. While Kodachrome was my favorite color film, but it is long gone. Kodak Tri-X 400 was my favorite black and white and needless to say. I was elated when I found it is available today!
I am looking forward to this endeavor and still looking at film processing and print options. To get the most out Kodak Tri-X 400 film, they closely work together, almost one and the same. I was never able to get all the creative and extraordinary images out of Kodak Tri-X 400 back in the day that others did, so now is my chance to make happen, what didn’t back then.
https://theslantedlens.com/2022/how-i-shoot-tri-x-black-and-white-film/