It was such a score: your father-in-law didn’t even remember leaving that camera bag up in the attic, and he was more than happy for you to give new life to the old Maxxum. The nifty 50 isn’t the sharpest—too bad he didn’t spring for the f/1.4 back in the day, you caught yourself thinking—but why look a gift horse in the mouth? The 200mm macro more than makes up for it, in any case. What a delight to journey into the millions of hidden worlds all around, and without even having to bend over! Of course, you still do, because a dynamic perspective is such an important part of creating images that excite.
And having to wait for those images, strangely enough, is a bigger part of the fun than you might have expected it to be. There’s something so meditative about the film process that you just haven’t found in the digital experience. Carefully tweaking the size of the aperture and duration of exposure feels more real when, at the end of it, you’ve physically imprinted the film with light—light that you’ve chosen to preserve, light which will never again exist in that particular configuration, but which can be viewed perpetually.
So, what on earth are you thinking, only getting scans of your negatives? Sure, they still have that signature, impossible-to-fake film look, but these analog captures are meant for analog presentation. If you really want to bring ephemeral moments as close as possible to immortality, you really owe it to them to print them out! Glossy, matte, whatever—so long as you can hold them in your hands.
Mike’s Camera still offers professional quality photographic prints from film, and for the entire month of May, you can add a full set of 4×6 prints to any “Develop + Scan” order for only $3. Visit any of our stores to get processing today! And, yes: we do sell a wide variety of film, so you can keep the party going.