Film Musings: course introduction and outline for easy film photography

Welcome to the very first part of the Film Musings course! 👋 First off, I want to thank you for joining me on this journey, this course has been in the works for several years. I am excited to share my guide to easy film photography with you all. So, when I first started shooting film, I made all the mistakes that had detoured me from shooting film and cost me an arm and a leg. 💸 But, when I began to learn this new medium and overcame these mistakes, I fell in love with it, and it shaped me as an artist.

When I started the creation of this course, my goal was for you to be able to learn film photography in a way where you don’t have to make the same mistakes that I made. Instead, I want you to walk down the most straightforward path toward film and fall deeply in love with it as I have! 🥰

Whenever I see online courses, there are always promises of what you’ll achieve after gaining the information the lessons give. I don’t want there to be any confusion, this isn’t that kind of a course, and it’s a part of why I am not charging for it. This course isn’t teaching you how to make seven figures in one year, and this course isn’t going to make you a millionaire or guarantee instant success. Those are things that no one can promise you.

What you’ll learn

What I can promise is that this course will help you feel more confident when it comes to shooting film. I can only assume that you are interested in this course because you love the look of film like so many others. I promise that with this course:

• You’ll create beautiful film images
• Learn how to incorporate film into your workflow as a business owner
• Start trusting in your artistic eye
• Tap into your creative side as a photographer

I am here to cheer you on during your journey. Just think of me as your cheerleader and coach! 🎉 So, if this all sounds good to you, let’s start diving into the lessons on easy film photography and all the magic it brings!

Background

Before we jump into all the excellent film talk, I first want to outline my background so you can see how my journey began and the entire process of how I got where I’m at today.

Let’s go way back to my high school days. When I was a junior in high school, I took a Design & Illustration course where I learned all the ins & outs of multiple different art mediums. I learned everything from still-life sketches to graphic design. One of those art mediums was film photography. We were all given an old Minolta camera and a few rolls of Ilford HP5 to shoot in our class.

After picking our subject and shooting our rolls, we learned to develop and print all our black & white film. It was hands down my absolute favorite subject, and anytime we had free reign to create for a project, I would always choose film photography.

After high school and into my early twenties, I dove into digital photography when I got a fancy DSLR as a birthday gift. Unfortunately, back in early 2010, the ease of shooting film hadn’t taken off yet. My wallet couldn’t handle the cost because I was a poor 20-year-old, so I ended up switching to digital.

Starting my business

At the beginning of 2013, I officially started my business. I photographed families, seniors, kids, commercial work, and weddings. I shot solely on my DSLR, and it wasn’t until around 2015 that I started to notice film photography becoming more popular with photographers like Jose Villa and Jen Huang.

One of my biggest struggles was finding the specific brand and style for my photos as a photographer. In addition, I struggled with creating consistent work, especially when using a digital camera. So for me, the most exciting aspect of learning film photography was knowing that I would always have a consistent look and feel to my images. Plus, my time editing images would be cut in half!

And so, this is where my journey into learning film photography started! It started a bit slow as I struggled through the entire learning process. One of my biggest complaints about the photography industry is that it can be pretty competitive. Because of this, some photographers aren’t as willing to share their insight with newcomers. Because of this, during early 2015, there was little to no information or tutorials about shooting film on the internet. So I learned the good old-fashioned way, through trial and error and paying a shit ton of money to buy courses and attend retreats.

Start of my film journey

It did not go well when I started learning about film photography and actively shooting. I had bought a cheap film camera on eBay to begin testing, and when my first roll of film came back, it was utter trash. Every image was terrible. This little mistake led me to set aside film for a while and feel defeated. It turns out it was because the camera I bought on eBay broke, so there’s that.

During that time, even though I wasn’t actively learning or shooting film, I was still in love with how it looked. So in early 2016, I decided to pick it back up and learn again, and I started throwing a ton of money at courses and workshops and purchased my first medium format camera.

My first couple of rolls with a camera that worked were the absolute highlight of my business. When I got my first few film scans back from my film lab, I remember sitting at my computer and sobbing because I had finally discovered how I would photograph from there on out. Not to sound cheesy, but it was like a piece of a puzzle in my soul was put into place.

And the rest is history, and I’ve been shooting film ever since. I stopped actively taking clients around the end of 2019, but I still shoot film even though I don’t photograph weddings or take on clients anymore. Whenever I travel or go to an event, my film cameras always follow along with me. I even have a film camera in my home that always has a fresh roll of film whenever I need to document and capture my life.

Program Outline

Now you know about my history and journey as a business owner, let’s jump into the outline of this course. As I’ve stated previously, this whole idea was to be an online course available for purchase. Still, as I started building it, I remembered what a pain it was to learn the basics initially. I don’t want to put someone through that because film photography can be a tremendously fulfilling hobby, even if you don’t own a business. Everyone deserves to learn regardless of their financial situation!

Where and how to access this course

I came from a very privileged place where I could strategically save up money to pay for extensive fancy courses, workshops, and books to start this journey. Still, I understand that not everyone has those kinds of resources available, and there needs to be room at the table for everyone regardless of what season you are in life. So please save your money and use it wisely to buy fun film cameras and rolls.

Also, I’ve found that when you tie money to something, there is an expectation for what the buyer is receiving, and I didn’t want to let people down. The last thing that I want is for someone to spend their hard-earned money on something I created and walk away disappointed. So I decided to toss out all my knowledge, and if people learned from it, fantastic, and if they didn’t, then no harm, no foul.

This entire course is going to be in a few different places. I plan to create a blog post for each section that includes a YouTube video of the audio, a transcript, and example images. The audios will also be on a Playlist on my YouTube channel. Finally, there will always be a link in the description box of each video that will take you to the entire playlist and a link to my website, where the whole course outline is written up and laid out for you! So whether you prefer listening or reading, I want this course to be accessible to you and whatever way you learn best.

Course modules

I decided to set up this course in three different modules or sections, the first being the fundamentals of film. (I cannot think of that word without automatically thinking of Michael Scott, lol) This module will cover, you guessed it, all the foundations of shooting film. This course will include everything from specific film stocks to my favorite cameras and shooting in lighting situations will be included in this course. This first section will help jump-start your journey with film!

The second module of this course will dive into the business part of shooting film. I owned a photography business for over seven years, and by the end of my wedding career, I was shooting film 100% of the time. So this course is going to help walk you through how to photograph clients on film, what to carry in your bag during shoots, and the entire outline of capturing a wedding while shooting hybrid (using both film and digital). By the end of this section, you should feel more confident to start using film with your clients and incorporating it into your business!

The third and final section will focus on using film personally. Shooting film isn’t just for weddings because I took some of my favorite images in my home with my kids. This module will go through the aspects of traveling with film, fun cameras, and experimental film stocks and how to develop and scan your film. This module will be great for my creative artistic friends who want to experiment and get out of their comfort zone when it comes to film.

And there you have it, my friends, now you have all the back story and information to get you started on this course. Once again, I am so happy that you are interested in film, and I hope you are excited to jump into learning with me. Thank you for sticking with me, and I’ll see you in module one!