I’m not gonna lie - my 2021 was off to a ROUGH start. While I’m grateful that I was able to work steadily throughout 2020 and move into a bigger home, there’s definitely a lot of anxiety when it comes to working freelance. There’s the privilege to be able to work from your own desk, but I constantly get locked into my own head and I’m terrible at recognizing when I’ve taken on too much. Jumping to the point - I needed a new hobby.
One of my Christmas gifts this year was a point and shoot film camera along with a box of Kodak Portra 400 that Raleigh thrifted for me. Between the holiday work schedule I had and trying to keep my mind off not being able to see my family, I had pretty much forgotten I even had it until mid-February. I had messed with polaroids, disposable cameras, and another film camera I thrifted at the flea market before, but never a 35mm camera of my own. I remember loading the first roll of film and asking Raleigh to take my photo on New Year’s Eve, hoping that it turned out somewhat okay. I’ve read up a little on film photography since then and a piece of advice that stuck out to me was that you shouldn’t “save” your film for the right moments. When you’re in the mood to shoot, load your film, and snap through the entire roll. I was definitely in the mindset of not wanting to waste any of the exposures and only snapping one photo at a time over long periods of time, but then I realized that if I shot my film that way, I’d never get through the roll. Before I knew it, it was almost March and I couldn’t even remember what photos I had taken.
Right before February ended, I met up with a couple of friends in my quarantine bubble to go on a walk outside and decided that I would just bring the camera to finish the rest of the film roll from January. I’ll admit that there wasn’t much intention to what I was shooting other than getting through it all, but soon enough, the “story“ became about documenting what I love about spring here in California.
There’s also the fact that shooting film really takes a lot attention if you want any of the photos to turn out any good. From lighting to framing to subject matter, carefully taking note of all those had me rediscovering why I even wanted a film camera in the first place: I wanted to find happiness in something new. Now, not all of the exposures turned out wonderful. There are some shots that came back and left me thinking “what the fuck“, but that’s what practice is for, right?
I had my film developed at The Photo Lab in Costa Mesa and I can officially say that I’m hooked. Maybe it has to do with the nostalgia that comes with staying isolated from most of my friends and family for the past year. That’s really what the draw is for me. I’m so used to the immediate gratification from my DSLR and iPhone that once a moment is past and posted, it’s almost instantly lost and forgotten. Knowing how much more effort it took really gives me a different perspective when it comes to photography (and as corny as it may sound - life). I enjoy things more when I take the time to appreciate them.
xx Audrie