viewshed

Yesterday I processed two rolls of Neopan 1600, and the results reinforced what I've been feeling recently about the relative merits of shooting digital vs. film.

This one is from the recent shoot with Amy. The digital shots that I had a look at within minutes of downloading the cards were gaudy, bright red, attention grabbing. But once past two or three images that I liked a lot, I found myself struggling to find any substance in the rest of the images. They were close, but my attention faded after a few seconds.

Yesterday I had no problem finding 10 B&W film images to scan. Considering I shot more than 200 digital images, and 36 on film.. that means I really like about 2 percent of the digital images, and more than a quarter of the film images, and actually it's more than that. Some were sequences, similar images except for perhaps expression or a slightly different framing. Often any of a sequence of three or four would have worked well, and I had to choose one of the batch. And I found myself excited about doing that.

Maybe I've just been shooting B&W so long that it's natural for me to see that way. But I feel like I know exactly what I want with film, and tend to drift with the instant gratification of digital.

I'll be shooting more film on the trip these next two weeks.