Saturday, June 26, 2010

Film is Forever

Call it fate. I don't really know how else to describe it. Its like the stars magically align themselves in pushing me to a certain direction. I've been toying with the idea of getting a lomo camera for some time, but never really acted upon that desire. The idea of sending film to the photo lab to develop and print never really appealed to me. The last time I shot with a film camera (my dad's Minolta SLR) was when I climbed Mount Kinabalu in 2007. I never got around to finishing that roll of film and even if I did... sending it to process was a hassle for me. My nearest photo lab doesn't deal with film anymore so I have to drive further to find one that is willing to develop.

Recently this idiot (sorry but there's no other way of calling him...believe me, I've tried to think of some) started posting on my facebook wall about scanning film with the DSLR in addition to sending me messages on MSN asking me to google the topic. I did. There were some interesting techniques and the results they got weren't too shabby.

In addition to that, another friend visited me in Kota Kinabalu a few days ago after he climbed Mount Kinabalu. That reminded me of my roll of film still sitting in my camera. I knew I had to finish it off quickly so I can try the above technique.

I downloaded a flashlight app for the iPhone recently - didn't know it will come in handy this soon. What I did was unroll the film, place it over the screen with the flashlight on and the took a picture with the DSLR.

After that, it was just the routine photoshop work.

It may not look great, but suddenly having a lomo camera made sense. Heheh.

This is from the Blackbird, Fly camera. Still getting to grips with using it, but will do a full review on it soon.