I bought a Nikon D3200 in 2012 or 2013 because I thought I wanted to get into photography since some of my friends were taking photos. Over the years I realized I didn't take photos as much as I thought I would and even tried getting a simpler setup with the Nikor 35mm f/1.8 but that didn't help as much as I thought it would. When I went to my friends wedding in the summer of 2017 they had guestbook that was a photobook, it had slots for instax mini film. They provided us with fujifilm intsax mini 9 cameras. After taking some photos with new friends I realized I wanted to buy an instant film camera because they are so simple. Once I got home I went online and ordered the leica sofort camera in orange. Since then I have been shooting a lot more than I ever did when I had a DLSR.
Have you ever taken 4 or 5 photos of the same scene thinking to yourself, is this in focus? Let me take one more, this is looks horrible after looking at the digital preview. When I took digital photos I ended up getting caught up in the settings and the outcome of the photo before I sat down and saw the entire composition. This would lead me to take 10 photos of a scene that were probably not even good. I get home I download the 10 files only to open them and think "wow, these are all garbage let me delete them". Since I ended up taking several photos of the same scene it has lost all its meaning. I have no connection to the photo I took because I actually took 10 of them and hate them. I don't remember any memories of taking the photo or what was happening in that moment that I wanted to capture. This fast paced method is destructive instead of accepting. Instead of embracing or enjoying the failures you create when shooting, it because a negative feedback loop to take the perfect picture. Lastly, I don't have an instagram, twitter, or post photos on social media so taking digital photos end up sitting on my harddrive taking up space. I don't want hundred of gigabytes of meaningless photos on my harddrive.
I started shooting on my leica sofort and enjoyed every photo I took. It was simple and rewarding. I didn't care if a photo turned out to be a blurry mess. I had a photo I created right in front of me with a memory that I wanted to capture. Now I have over 200 intstant photos with memories and moments I can look back on and share with friends. I started to use my camera as a way to log moments in my life I wanted to share with others. With every photo I took I would write down the time, day, location, who, and what was happening in the photo on the back of the film. Now I have a way to remember and enjoy that moment again at another time.
If you are shooting digital, great! Keep it up and keep on creating photos! If you are shooting analog, awesome!
I don't think i'll shoot digital again anytime soon. I recently got into 35mm film photography with my Contax RTS and Nikon F4. I haven't developed any of my shots yet but I am excited to see what I can make with 35mm film cameras.