Hybrid Film Photography: Grinnellians Experiment with How to Capture the World
Working closely with professors is a hallmark of a Grinnell College education, with students participating in all kinds of opportunities, such as Mentored Advanced Projects (MAPs). For students Kelly Banfield ’24, Celia Meagher ’24, Stella Lowery ’24, and Philomena Frasca ’25, summer break was the perfect time to pursue a MAP in film photography. Its curriculum focused on analog medium format cameras using 120 film. (Medium format, known for its higher resolution, refers to images’ media sizes).
Andrew Kaufman, professor of studio art, was inspired to mentor his first summer MAP on hybrid film photography after the COVID-19 lockdown. Kaufman, who has always been interested in film photography, remarked, “Everyone was spending so much time online, and so the thought of doing digital work was out of the question; I wanted to occupy myself with physical work.” Intrigued, he sought YouTube videos to teach himself the basics of film and stumbled upon reviews of medium and large format cameras, which would often be compared to qualities of digital photography.
“After COVID, a student from my ART-111 class brought in an old 35mm camera and we geeked out together,” Kaufman recalled. Their shared love for photography then reinforced Kaufman’s idea to explore hybrids of film and digital photography through different camera types. Once committed to the MAP, he recruited Grinnellians from the Art Department, believing they would pursue this form of physical artwork. “It was often young people teaching me,” he said, referring back to the educational YouTube videos. “There is a real interest in film — because it is hard, archaic, slow…and not digital.”
Kaufman, who purchased an array of cameras on E-Bay for the MAP, introduced students to various historical kinds of cameras, from Fuji rangefinders to Mamiya twin-lens reflex (TLR) cameras. Each camera has unique characteristics, as Kaufman excitedly explained — several cameras, such as the TLR camera, use a viewfinder (which allows you to see, focus, and frame the view of the lens) on the waist level. “It’s a beautiful experience of seeing the world,” says Kaufman. His students also experimented with a Holga, a “cool toy camera” whose cheap, plastic design produces low-quality impressionistic images that photographers prize for their imperfections.
Banfield, who never explored film before, loved the pinhole camera for its ability to facilitate long exposures (the amount of light that is let into the camera sensor). “The pinhole is laid out differently than a regular camera, so something that would be a 30-second exposure would be a 5-hour exposure on the pinhole camera,” he explained. “I liked the long exposures because there was a lack of control; I could simply leave the camera alone for 30 minutes, and it would take the picture for me.” For this part of the MAP, Kaufman provided handcrafted Ondu 6x6 pinhole cameras — produced in Slovenia — that can shoot black-and-white and color negative film.
Developing Images: From Film to Screen
Since film photography does not automatically create digital images, the MAP students reverted to old-school ways of developing images, which included carefully removing film from the camera and rolling it onto a spool. Though the process sounds difficult enough, the MAP students faced an additional twist – rolling the film in complete darkness! The student photographers would then insert their film into light-proof canisters (still in the dark).
“The awesome part was that two weeks later, when I was introducing a new type of film, I said, ‘Go ahead, spool this up and get it in the canister, and I’ll be back in a second,’” said Kaufman, who was expecting his students to need at least 20 minutes. “After a few minutes, I walked back into class because I had forgotten something, maybe my mug or some tea, and the students were all just waiting for me,” Kaufman said, “and I laughed because they were all done! It was amazing.”
For several of the MAP students, the process led to some fun mistakes along the way. Banfield, for instance, experienced several accidental exposures and misloading of film into their camera. “I was very precious with the film at the beginning,” recounted Banfield. “But you’re allowed to make mistakes and that’s what you do in art.” For his final MAP project, Banfield was inspired by French photographer Nadar, who took several self-portraits and arranged them in a grid. Banfield wished to recreate a similar series of images, but in drag.
“With both black-and-white and color film, I stood in one spot and used the pinhole camera, exposing it for 22 seconds. I would take a picture, turn a little bit, take another picture, turn a little bit, and so on.” Because Banfield accidentally dropped their color film out of the developing canister for a few seconds, their photos contained “cool clouds of color that would not have been there originally.” Banfield called the result a “happy accident.”
After developing their film rolls, the students could expose the film to the light and digitally scan its images into Lightroom and Photoshop. Since Grinnell boasts professional printers with the ability to print large images, Kaufman’s students were able to convert their negatives (the raw film rolls) into a digital format. “What was cool about it,” says Kaufman, “is that up until you get the image on the computer, you have no idea what your image looks like since it is still a negative. But once we get it on the computer, it connects the experience of film and digital photography in a beautiful way.”
Kaufman also praised his students’ selection of content and themes. “The whole time they were shooting, they were working through thematic or content experiments, too, like taking the camera home or around town. They would take the camera to different events, taking intimate photos of friends and themselves…they weren’t overly composed and created snapshots exposed over a period of time, which made the students’ pictures so beautiful.”
