All I Can Do Is Drool

When I first started with my photography, I eagerly devoured every magazine on the shelf every month. There were significantly fewer magazines on the shelf at the back end of 2004, so the plethora of options now available at even a modest WH Smith's, such as the one in Barnsley, more or less sums up how much the demand for information from a keen photography enthusiast consumer base has grown in a short time.

That; however, is not the major shift that has shocked me. I, in fact, am rather unsurprised. The difference I find was the speed of the all encompassing digital takeover. In September of 2004, nearly all of the gear reviews and virtually all of the articles on technique revolved around film cameras. Usually Medium Format cameras. They always left me drooling. Beautiful, efficient and built to last 40 years. Usually, I could care less about gear, but these beasts had my attention.

At the time, the Canon EOS 300D (Digital Rebel) was still freshly out of the gate and heralded as the first affordable dSLR and ultimately my first dSLR as well.

Fast forward two years and film had all but disappeared from the magazines. The landscape specific titles still featured them as full frame 35mm sensors were still a way off, but as far as new information and new gear were concerned elsewhere, it was just not to be.

Four years on and we have 50+ Megapixel digital MF cameras. We have gargantuan beasts of cinemagraphic cameras that are capable of billboard resolution stills in every frame of video. We have a very well regarded  publication that always swore off digital as heresy publishing entire issues without a spool in sight. We have dozens of photography titles on the periodical shelves only referring to film in nostalgic pretences.

All I can say is thank God for lomo and JPG in that sense.

For years now, I've been searching Ebay constantly with the slightest hope that one day I might be able to somehow find a deal that would actually let me experience Medium Format Film. It hasn't happened yet.

When I found out about the prospect and ability to use it on this course, the only way I can describe what I did is "squirm". Excited was and is an understatement. So, as I sit here with a Mamiya 645 and 12 rolls of 120 film beside me, believe me when I say I can hardly contain my six years of anticipation!

However, before I go and throw myself in at the deep end: the very first thing I did with the Mamiya was, of course, take photos of it!



All I can do is drool!