The Film Resurgence for Photography in 2023

Film is ascendant. Everything analog is coming to terms and bumping up against the digital zeitgeist.

Why?

Because it is awesome!

Digital is precise and amazing, but cold and dehumanizing.

Analog is warm, fuzzy and beautiful. Analog is like sitting by a fire with a cozy book about the dystopian future (so cuddly).

Digital (whether we are talking about sound or imagery) is quick and efficient.

Analog (both sound and imagery) is clunky. It takes patience. When the light meter in your Leica CL breaks you have to make due. You have have some knowledge of f-stops and film speed. You have to improvise.

Digital is immediate gratification.

Analog – you have to wait for it….

You have a roll of Kodak Tri-X 400 B/W and you don’t even know what is on it. You are impatient to expose the whole roll so you can have it developed and see what existed in your previous Universe…

The analogies to analog sound and analog imagery are legion. I have heard that sound people don’t often appreciate when imagery metaphors are brought into their discussions – like “the sound is transparent, or warm, or bright.” Vision is so powerful the sound people have a bit to catch up on.

Analog imagery is Warm, Bright, and Transparent.

Film is Analog imagery. Film is old. Film is nostalgic but also impossible to reproduce with digital.

Analog sound (vinyl or tape) is here to stay.

Analog imagery (film) is back in ascendancy and will never die.

Long live film.