Are you hanging onto your old film cameras?

CPT Jack Durish — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 11:25:24 -0500

I'm hanging onto my Nikon. Who knows? Film may come back. Vinyl did...

Response by MSgt Daniel Attilio made Jan 25 at 2016 11:27 AM

MSgt Daniel Attilio — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 11:27:14 -0500

Got rid of mine, don't think I've touched "film" since 04 or so

Response by Sgt Kelli Mays made Jan 25 at 2016 11:47 AM

Sgt Kelli Mays — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 11:47:40 -0500

Nope...got rid of them...actually have no idea what happened to them, though I do have lot and lots of negatives.

Response by LTC Stephen F. made Jan 25 at 2016 11:53 AM

LTC Stephen F. — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 11:53:20 -0500

Yes, I am holding onto my 35-mm cameras CPT Jack Durish. I have some nice East German lenses. It has been harder to find film locally and even harder to find places that develop film anymore. I saved a couple hundred jazz, rock and blues LPs and have been interested to seem LP records come back.
I expect within the next decade that a resurgence in the 35-mm film and cameras will occur as people long for analog completeness instead of settling for digital sampling technologies.
I have always preferred looking at physical photographs to viewing digital images.

Response by GySgt Carl Rumbolo made Jan 25 at 2016 12:03 PM

GySgt Carl Rumbolo — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 12:03:03 -0500

No, definitely not - I shot film for a long time (started with digital in 98 and went straight digital in 2001) and while film has some niche applications but digital is much less expensive and easier to process. As for antiques, i have a couple of film cameras tucked away - but film stock is getting harder to come by for old models, maybe worth something as curiosities one day, but....no more film for me.

Response by Capt Seid Waddell made Jan 25 at 2016 12:05 PM

Capt Seid Waddell — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 12:05:36 -0500

Gave all of my film cameras and darkroom equipment to my nephew. He wants to set up a lab to show his employees how it was done and to learn first principles of photography. I had everything from 8X10 format down to 35mm cameras and enlargers and trays, etc. The 8X10 enlarger was a beast to move.

Response by SGT Jeremiah B. made Jan 25 at 2016 4:37 PM

SGT Jeremiah B. — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 16:37:58 -0500

Mine broke, but yeah, I'm not sure film will ever completely go away. There's always an art community out there doing things the old way. It's just getting really hard to process.

Response by SGT Private RallyPoint Member made Jan 25 at 2016 5:50 PM

SGT Private RallyPoint Member — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 17:50:03 -0500

I have a Pentax I've had since the 70's. I'm hanging on to it. I also have a Canon Elf I won't part with, and an old Ansco 35 mm. Ya never know when they may come back.

Response by PV2 Bengie Gonzalz LMHC made Jan 25 at 2016 7:10 PM

PV2 Bengie Gonzalz LMHC — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 19:10:30 -0500

my son has my cannon a1 and he also has a 110 camera.

Response by Sgt Mike Sarris made Jan 25 at 2016 10:12 PM

Sgt Mike Sarris — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 22:12:19 -0500

I've still got my Canon AT-1 that I had re-foamed prior to buying my first (Panasonic DMC-FZ7) digital, and two Pentax K-1000's with a bunch of lenses. If it didn't cost so much to develop film these days, I'd still use them. But Digital has made it so much easier, and my Panasonic and Sony SLR style digital cameras take much better pictures, at least to me.

Response by PO2 Mark Saffell made Jan 26 at 2016 6:50 AM

PO2 Mark Saffell — Tue, 26 Jan 2016 06:50:52 -0500

I have the one my dad brought home from Germany in 1952.

Response by GySgt Carl Rumbolo made Jan 26 at 2016 4:40 PM

GySgt Carl Rumbolo — Tue, 26 Jan 2016 16:40:03 -0500

Going to add something to this thread because it may be useful to the group. If you are storing negatives or have a large collection of analog images you'd like to preserve, there are many services available to digitize those collections, often at a fairly attractive price.

There is an independent photography shop (yes some do exist) near me here in Charlotte that sells an over sized shoe box kit - you pay $136 and can put any non copyrighted prints into the box, and they will scan them (very high resolution scans) and put them on a DVD for you, and return your images.

There are several online services that will reliably scan your negatives or you can by a relatively inexpensive reader that will take negatives and scan them into digital images.

I have scanned and digitized some pictures myself - very old (some from the 1890s) portrait pictures using a large flatbed scanner, I preserve the original scan, but will also retouch with software to remove water stains, rips etc.

I basically digitize everything - and yes it takes up a lot of storage :) - which is why I have 48 TB of redundant storage :)

Response by PO3 Ed Shiffler made Jan 26 at 2016 6:52 PM

PO3 Ed Shiffler — Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:52:46 -0500

Still have my old Olympus OM. Haven't used it in years, but still have it none the less.

Having a DSLR is great. I can get an idea if the photo turned out well without having to wait for it to be developed. I can take as many photos as the memory card will hold, download them to the computer and start taking more. I always take multiple shots and I can easily delete the ones that don't turn out without all the development costs of film.

Response by SGT Private RallyPoint Member made Jan 27 at 2016 11:17 AM

SGT Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 27 Jan 2016 11:17:22 -0500

I still have my old Minolta. One of these days I'll brush the dust off and use it again.

Response by PFC David Ryba made Jan 28 at 2016 11:44 AM

PFC David Ryba — Thu, 28 Jan 2016 11:44:15 -0500

I have 2 left. One is a 35mm film camera, the other is a Kodak Brownie...uses 120 film.