Peripheral Memories

Photographed on 9/3/2023-9/4/2023

Published on 9/26/2023

Upon graduating from college I found myself simultaneously joyful to be in the so-called "real world" and upset that I no longer had access to the knowledge locked behind the walls of academia. To this day my biggest regret in my college career is that I graduated early and didn't spend more time taking art electives.

As I have said in other photo compilations, the intro to photography class I took in my final semester of college was profoundly influential to me. It's what got me into photography as a hobby and the class showed me both the technical and creative aspects of the medium that I would never have considered otherwise. It left me hungry for more photographic knowledge, and a particular area of interest for me was analog photography.

Left without the ability to take a college course on film photography, I decided to learn the process for myself by buying an old 35mm film camera. It was a Minolta SRT-202 from 1975 in incredible condition that I found on Facebook Marketplace. From the moment I first laid my hands on it I fell in love with the tactile feedback of the shutter click and the wind of the film reel.

I photographed two expired color reels and one reel of Ilford HP5 400 black and white film. The two color reels were messy and more so for testing how to use the settings and features of the new camera. I had a few interesting results from those reels which you can see over on my side Instagram. I usually post my photography there, and it's where you can find stuff I don't care to host on this site.

This set is the result of the black and white reel I finished which I felt pretty proud of. It was my first time shooting exclusively in black and white so I had to switch up the way I approached creating an image. Knowing that it was black and white, I wanted to photograph a set about old memories around my hometown. I think it turned out great, and I'm excited to shoot more film. Film photography is still alive and well (if a hell of a lot more expensive than digital).

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