Six months ago, I started using my film camera alongside my digital cameras, hoping to offer an alternative look to my wedding photography.
Shooting film itself was not a new experience for me. Before digital cameras emerged, film was my primary tool for photography and image composition. In that sense, returning to film should have been an easy transition.
What I didn't expect was how different the entire workflow would be.
Before the digital age, after finishing a roll of film, my next step was simple: find a local lab to develop it. A few days later, I would have the negatives and prints in my hands. After trying a few different labs, I could eventually find one that understood my preferences and consistently developed and printed the images in a style I liked.
But after more than two decades of digital photography, many of the local film labs have disappeared. I can no longer simply take my rolls to a nearby store. Instead, I have to mail them to a lab and wait one or two weeks before I can see the results.
And there is another problem that makes me uncomfortable: mailing the film itself. We have all experienced lost or damaged mail. With a digital file, there is no physical original traveling through the postal system. With film, the roll itself is the original. Once I put it in the mail, I have to trust that it will make its way safely to the lab and back.
Then there is another important step that didn't exist in quite the same way during the film era: how the film is digitized.
Today, developing the negative is only part of the process. The film must also be scanned and converted into a digital image. This step can have a significant influence on the final photograph. The person operating the scanner makes decisions about exposure, color, contrast, density, and sometimes even how much of the film's character should be preserved or corrected. Their technical judgment—and to some extent their artistic taste—can influence the direction of the final image.
This made me realize that returning to film in the digital age is not simply a matter of putting film into an old camera and pressing the shutter.
I needed to close the gaps between the traditional analog process and the digital workflow that exists today.
So I began experimenting with each stage of the process, from choosing the film and shooting it alongside my digital cameras, to developing, scanning, and finally working with the digital file.
Here is the journey of how an analog film image becomes a finished photograph in the digital age:
Fortunately, I already have a tool called the Lab-Box, which allows me to develop film without a traditional darkroom. When working with a small number of rolls, I can develop them conveniently while maintaining precise control over the developing time and temperature.
However, during the first few months of this experiment, I gradually realized something important: what brings out the potential of film is not only how it is developed, but also how it is presented. In the digital age, that means how it is digitized.
Fortunately, I still have a professional film scanner, the Microtek ArtixScan 120tf, along with its original operating system and scanning software, which I kept from about 20 years ago. The setup includes a 2001 iMac, which connects to the scanner through FireWire—a connection that modern computers no longer commonly support. Keeping this old system was not exactly a practical decision at the time, but perhaps a part of me knew that film might one day find its way back into my life!
What I appreciate most about analog photography is its distinctive color palette and the way film responds to light. These qualities are not easily replicated simply by applying a digital filter or adjusting colors in post-processing.
Have you ever noticed how skin in portraits from the film era can appear to glow, with a smoother, more luminous quality? Some people attribute this entirely to film's lower sharpness. I only partially agree.
It is true that traditional 35mm film generally has less resolving power than many modern digital cameras with 20 megapixels or more, although the actual comparison depends on the film, lens, exposure, and scanning process. Film records an image through light-sensitive layers of emulsion, while digital sensors use an array of photosites to capture light. These different recording methods contribute to different image characteristics. Medium-format and larger film formats can also capture considerable detail, narrowing or even reversing the resolution gap in some comparisons.
But resolution is only part of the story. To me, the more distinctive differences lie in film's color palette, tonal transitions, and response to light.
Film and digital sensors handle highlights and shadows differently. Many film stocks, particularly color negative films, can retain considerable detail in bright areas when properly exposed, while digital sensors often offer excellent shadow recovery. The actual results depend on the film stock, sensor, exposure, and processing, but the difference can be especially noticeable in portraits.
This may help explain why skin in some film portraits looks so gentle and luminous. The effect is not simply a matter of reduced sharpness. Film's highlight rendering, color response, and gradual tonal transitions can contribute to a softer visual impression. Skin imperfections often appear most prominent through local contrast and shadow, so the way these tonal differences are rendered can influence how skin looks in the final image.
To preserve as much of this character as possible, I need to scan my negatives carefully. Resolution is important, but it is not the only consideration. Color depth, tonal range, subtle variations in hue, and the distinction between highlights and shadows all matter. Even small differences in scanning exposure, color balance, and contrast can change the appearance of the final photograph.
My goal is not simply to turn a film negative into a digital file. It is to preserve as much of the information and character recorded on the film as possible, so I can make my own artistic decisions afterward.
Sometimes, what I need is not a razor-sharp image. Instead, film grain that feels like mist, or warm, diffused light that gently wraps around the subject, can tell a story better than perfect sharpness ever could.
Pictures by Nikon FM2 / 50mm f1.2@f2
This experiment taught me how important the digitization process is to the final appearance of a film photograph.
The images on the left show two different interpretations of the same negative, produced at two stages of my scanning process.
The top image was how I initially scanned my film, using the scanner's preset to convert the negative directly into a JPEG file. The bottom image represents my revised approach: I turned off the adjustments in the scanning software and scanned the negative as a 48-bit TIFF file instead. I then brought the TIFF file into Photoshop to make the final adjustments before saving it as a JPEG.
To my eyes, the top image looks brighter, but its colors feel more digitally processed and artificial. The bottom image retains more subtle details and color variations. Its tones feel more nuanced, and the colors have a character that I find closer to what attracted me to film photography in the first place.
A 48-bit TIFF scan is not exactly the same as a camera RAW file, but it serves a similar purpose in my workflow. It preserves a large amount of color information and gives me greater flexibility to adjust the image afterward. Although these TIFF files take up considerable storage space, I don't necessarily need to keep every large working file once I have finished editing and exported the final JPEG. The original negative remains my physical source, allowing me to scan it again in the future if needed.
Of course, preserving color and detail is only part of the challenge. Dust on film is almost unavoidable, and even careful handling cannot eliminate every speck. Removing dust manually from each image would be tedious, especially when working through an entire roll.
I eventually found a software tool called Dustomat that can detect and remove dust spots from scanned images in batch process. It offers another way to streamline the process while allowing me to focus more of my time on the photographs themselves.
A walk along a swamp trail with my compact, lightweight Zeiss Ikon Super Ikonta medium-format camera.
Some people love film grain because it offers an organic, random, and artistic texture. Others appreciate film's distinctive colors, which can evoke a nostalgic atmosphere or even make an image feel as though it belongs to another world. On the other hand, I've also heard people criticize film for one obvious reason: it cannot always deliver the razor-sharp images that modern digital cameras can produce.
Personally, I enjoy digital photography, not only because it is convenient, allows me to react quickly, and costs relatively little per exposure, but also because modern digital cameras have evolved to offer an incredible dynamic range.
I can photograph a high-contrast scene in which part of the image looks almost completely dark on the camera's monitor, then recover a surprising amount of shadow detail during post-processing. This flexibility has made many dramatic and surreal photographic styles possible. The freedom to capture a wide range of tones in a single exposure is something I truly appreciate about digital photography.
Film, however, doesn't always offer the same flexibility. I remember photographing sunsets in the film era. To capture both the bright sky and the foreground, I often had to wait until the sun had descended to just the right point, when the brightness of the foreground was as close as possible to that of the sky. The window of opportunity could be only a few minutes long. If I missed it, there might be no way to recover the details in the finished image. It was a matter of understanding the light, anticipating the moment, and getting the exposure right in camera.
But the limitations of film go beyond its response to light. Film is expensive, and this brings me to another important difference between film and digital photography: the cost of each exposure changes the way I photograph.
With digital photography, taking a picture costs almost nothing once I have the equipment. I tend to shoot quickly, and the number of images accumulates before I even realize it. I usually photograph in RAW format because I want to preserve the full potential of each image and satisfy my desire for the best possible image quality. But every RAW file may require post-processing, and the more I shoot, the more work awaits me when I get home.
Over time, this endless cycle of capturing and editing became exhausting. There were periods when I didn't even feel like taking a camera out with me.
Film introduces a different rhythm. A 35mm roll typically gives me 36 exposures, while a roll of 120 film usually yields around 11 or 12 frames in 6×6 format, or fewer depending on the camera's image format. Every exposure has a cost, and changing rolls takes time and effort. These small inconveniences encourage me to slow down, observe more carefully, and think before pressing the shutter.
I become more deliberate about composition, light, and the moment itself. Instead of taking several frames and deciding later which one works best, I try to make each exposure count.
And surprisingly, this restraint makes me want to take pictures more often again. Photography becomes less about accumulating images and managing files, and more about the experience of seeing and capturing something meaningful.
Of course, film has its own costs, limitations, and frustrations. It doesn't replace the speed, flexibility, or technical capabilities of digital photography. But the discipline it demands has brought something valuable back into my photographic life.
And then there is the much-celebrated medium-format look: the distinctive rendering that can come from a larger negative, combined with the lens, depth of field, and tonal characteristics of the camera and film. It is not something exclusive to film, nor is it guaranteed simply by using a medium-format camera.
Ultimately, I am not returning to film because I believe it is better than digital. I am returning because its limitations encourage me to photograph differently—and sometimes, photographing differently is exactly what I need.
A trip of cranberry harvest:
The photographs on the left were taken with my Mamiya M645 medium-format film camera, while those on the right were captured with my Fujifilm digital camera.
My Mamiya is equipped with standard and wide-angle lenses, but photographing a cranberry harvest presents a different challenge. Much of the activity takes place at a distance, so a telephoto lens is essential for capturing the details. I mounted a telephoto lens on my digital camera, allowing me to frame the scene more tightly and explore the harvest from different perspectives.
This is a good example of how film and digital can complement each other in my workflow. With a wide-angle lens, I tend to slow down, study the overall composition, and carefully frame the scene. I don't need to take many pictures if I can get the composition right. Telephoto photography, on the other hand, often requires me to react quickly, follow changing activity, and explore different details. That naturally leads me to take more pictures.
For this trip, each camera had its own role. My Mamiya helped me capture the broader scene with the distinctive character of medium-format film, while my Fujifilm gave me the flexibility to get closer to the action and capture fleeting details.
What fascinated me most was the color of the cranberry harvest. Deep blue water and sky, brilliant red cranberries, and vivid green trees in the distance came together like colors painted across a canvas. The contrast was phenomenal. It was a wonderful opportunity to experience how two different photographic systems could interpret the same landscape in their own ways.
