I've been having SO much fun playing with film the past couple months. Film photography is something I've loved since I started on this journey, but I've always been terrified to jump in because (shock) it's way different than digital! I take comfort in being able to look at the back of my camera and know that I nailed a photo … or not. And you just can't do that with film! Film is old school (yes, you actually load a film roll into the back of the camera), BUT you just can't emulate the look with digital … at least not 100%. No matter how you try. And I've tried. :) My style has always lent itself to film--I love bright, clean, light-filled photos--so stylistically it makes sense for me.

And so, after coveting film photography for three years, I decided that it's time to give it a whirl. It might be scary, but scary things push you and make you better, right? I recently bought a Mamiya 645 so that I could start to learn and play with different film stocks. I've had fun testing the camera on inanimate subjects, but I knew that I had to learn to use my Mamiya on people sooner or later.

Enter my little brother, Barry, and his girlfriend, Daralyn. These two were gracious enough to be my first subjects in a four-part mini shoot series. Over the next month, I'll be testing different lighting situations and locations and subjects with my Mamiya. Already I can tell this is going to be the BEST way to learn. Thanks ahead of time to everyone who's agreed to help me out!

What makes film so unbelievably great is that these photos are basically SOOC (straight out of camera). I may have done one or two tweakings (plus changed that right photo to black and white), but compared to the editing I usually do with my digital photos, this took me a fraction of the time. And it just looks so pretty!