Should all beginning photographers start out with a film camera to learn how to shoot? Here's 10 reasons why this may be true.

1. It’s so old-fashioned, it makes you look cool. Enough said.

2. Film is unforgiving – it demands hard work, as well as some trial and error, to get a good exposure.

3. No automatic settings. You must become familiar with the principles of exposure, or suffer blank frames.

4. Exposure – If your camera is of an age before light meters were invented, you may have to use the “Sunny 16″ rule of thumb to gauge what settings you should be using (in full sun, your exposure will be f/16 at a
shutter speed equivalent to your ISO – 1/100th sec at 100 ISO, 1/400th sec at 400 ISO, etc).

5. Manual focus – you must consider which part of the picture should be in focus, rather than letting the camera hook on to some random spot.

6. Nobody will steal it. Even previously high-end film cameras aren’t worth much anymore.

7. The ISO isn’t auto. With digital, the effect of ISO has been largely forgotten by many, but because you have to use the same ISO throughout a roll, you have to come to understand its role in your exposure.

8. Slow you down. Manual settings, as well as the consumption of valuable film, forces you to put more thought into each shot, which has obvious positive effects on the learning process.

9. Cheap gear – everyone thinks film is dead, so you can pick up your equipment for a song, or sometimes for nothing at all.

10. No need to upgrade – there are very few film cameras in production anymore (though there are some), leaving you to think about your photographs instead of your equipment. Not to mention that in the days of
film, cameras were built to last a lifetime, rather than the short wait until the company’s next release.

It seems that nearly all the people who recommend learning to shoot using a film camera are not recommending it because of any perceived advantage of the mechanical device itself, but because of the nostalgic smell of developer. I find this odd.

No one has yet demonstrated any real, concrete advantage of a manual film camera over a manual digital camera in terms of the learning experience.

No one has yet produced one specific feature of a manual film camera that should be learned by a beginner that can not be duplicated with a digital camera.


OK - Explain to me ho to make a multi-exposure image with my Nikon P500 the way I could with my Nikormat FTn. NO PP allowed!

Emotional and olfactory memories are not admissible evidence in this particular case.

Those of you who claim to be able to tell the difference between an image taken on film and an image captured by a light sensor are delusional.