Hot take: ruined photos are the whole point of film photography

I had a conversation with a guy at a camera swap meet in Portland last week who said he only shoots film because of the mistakes, like light leaks and accidental double exposures. He said 'perfect digital shots are boring, the flaws are what make it art.' I'm not sure I agree because I just wasted a whole roll of Portra 400 to a light leak and it felt more like a loss than art. What side do you fall on?

2 comments

2 Comments

dakota_fox22d ago

My first roll of film was a Pentax K1000 I bought at a garage sale, and the shutter curtain was busted so every frame had a weird orange stripe down the side. I was pissed about wasting that roll of Fuji Superia until a friend framed one of those shots and called it moody. Now I've got three cameras with known leaks and I just let them do their thing, though I still curse when it happens to a roll I actually cared about. It's a gamble either way, that's the honest part.

iris_stone2824d ago

People act like every light leak is some deep creative statement, but sometimes a ruined roll is just a ruined roll and thirty bucks down the drain. I’d rather nail the shot than hope the camera’s mistakes make it interesting.