The Revenge of Analog Photography

The advent of digital technologies, between the end of the 1990s and the first decade of the new millennium, seemed to have decreed the definitive disappearance of the old analog technologies.

For some of them, in fact, the much-announced end has never really arrived: it is the case of the printed press and above all of books; for others, like vinyl records, the collapse of sales was progressive but slower than expected; while in the case of photography, death seemed to have come unexpectedly and suddenly.

Most of us, after downloading to our PC the first series of photos taken with a 5-megapixel digital camera, simply forgot in the old “analog” camera our last roll of film, found by chance 20 years later, still partially exposed.

The quality, the immediacy of the result and the ease of post-production with the new digital medium had by then made the old film obsolete, and it seemed there really was no longer any reason to continue using analog processes — with all due respect to nostalgics of the darkroom.

Companies like Kodak, which was already preparing for the transition to digital, were caught unprepared. The collapse of sales was so sudden that historic brands like Ilford and the Italian Ferrania — which at the time produced in Liguria all the films with minor brands for half the world — followed Kodak and opened their respective bankruptcy procedures.

If until today you have lost interest in photographic film, and like many you think that analog photography is by now a historical discipline complete with museum exhibits, perhaps what we are about to tell you will surprise you.

If you are sceptical, know that since the beginning of 2018 all our Workshops, where you live first-hand the entire process of Analog photography, have sold out and are among the most requested in our catalogue.

See the programme of our workshops in the Academy section.

It is just a few days ago that Kodak (yes indeed, it still exists!) announced the reintroduction on the market of the famous black-and-white film TMax P3200, one of the fastest and most versatile monochromatic emulsions in vogue in the 1990s. It is a technologically improved product compared to the original, following the reintroduction on the market of the historic TriX 400, TMax 100 and TMax 400, and of the colour films of the Portra and Ektar series.

In the press release for the launch of the reborn P3200, it is specified that this is a marketing choice to complete the product portfolio in the face of a market that is by now undoubtedly in clear growth.

That’s right: the analog film market is experiencing a phase of clear and significant expansion, and the most interesting thing is that it is not old nostalgics who have returned to practising the old photographic art with rolls and chemical development, but the new consumers are mainly young people, born in the digital era, who experience analog photography for the first time in their lives.

There are many testimonies in this sense; just think of the great success of Roman company Ars-Imago, a dynamic firm composed exclusively of young people that has made analog photography — and exclusively analog — its core business. In their shop in the Prati district of Rome you can practically find most of the new products, often by companies like the French Bergger, born when the end of analog already seemed in the air.

The positive trend in sales is surprising even those who had bet on this element, with entrepreneurial initiatives like that of the two Florentines who have brought back to life the Ferrania brand. Try to look for a roll of Ferrania P30 — by now black-market stuff at exorbitant prices. Every new batch coming off the small-scale production lines reactivated in Liguria, in the historic site of the Research and Development Laboratory of the former great Ferrania, is sold out in minutes on the US e-commerce site. We don’t know whether it will arrive again in Europe.

Even the aforementioned Bergger is no different: it seems that the next roll of Pancro400 will be available for purchase only from July 2018. At Spazio Chirale we still have one in 120 format, but we are afraid to use it. For now we keep it in the vault together with the collection of 19th-century cameras.

But what is the reason for this phenomenon?

The American journalist and essayist David Sax provides a convincing answer based on careful market analysis in his 2016 book The Revenge of Analog, where in addition to photography he also carefully analyses the music market, paper production and other industries linked to analog technologies.

In a few words, Sax’s thesis is simple. We buy analog products because they simply satisfy needs that are not covered by digital products, even if they are analogous. Sax defines our era as the “post-digital era”. Having sobered up from the binge of digitisation in every aspect of our free time, modern society is simply rediscovering analog products — most of which allow the fruition of an experience that engages almost all our senses, and in many situations this is more rewarding.

In all the cases analysed, the typical consumers and their needs are identified. When and why do we use photography?

Photography freezes and keeps our memories: for snapshots, the smartphone and the digital photo are the optimal solution. Photography is used by reporters, advertising photographers, commercial and event photographers: the digital workflow is more effective, practical, has the best quality and is therefore the ideal solution.

We practise photography for artistic enjoyment, we are passionate about the creative process, we are visual artists: analog photography allows you to express your creativity with a craft process, unique and unrepeatable, that often involves all the senses. In this case, analog photography is the ideal product.

The students who have taken part in our workshops know it well: one of the recurring concepts in end-of-course comments is the pleasure of losing track of time. The Darkroom has its times, its rhythms, its smells and stenches, the liquid drips, the dark is an ally and in the dark the other senses sharpen. But the experience started even earlier, with the rustle of the film passing from the loader to the cartridge; the click of an analog reflex camera is more complex than that of a digital one. You cannot see the images straight away — you shoot, and what you think you have captured is only in your head until the next day, when finally, after a chain of actions in which every single error can compromise the final result forever, the image appears on the paper in the amniotic liquid of the developing bath. In the Darkroom there is no “undo” key and no “Save” key either. What you have hung up to dry on the line at the end of the day is a unique, unrepeatable work. You can redo the whole procedure, but it will never be the same. Man is not a machine.

Coming out of the experience of the entire analog photography process, from the shot to the alchemy of development and printing, it becomes clear that the market for film and darkroom products can only remain vital for a long time. Technological progress will be a progress that improves — as it is already improving — analog products.

Thinking the opposite is like thinking that there will no longer be a market for paints, tempera, canvases and brushes because painters will work only with Photoshop or Illustrator — and we already know that this is not true.

Discover our Workshops in the Academy section.