What makes photography so fun, interesting, and magical?
Randomness, chance, chaos!
Haptic Industries
The joy or upside of film photography
The joy of film:
You don’t know what you’re gonna get!
For example, the randomness of grain in the photos.
In street photography, the randomness of the people you encounter, how people react to you, and also ultimately how the photo turns out.
Seoul, 2011 “Elegance” – Korea, 2009
Also, the randomness of flash photography:
You cannot know with 100% certainty what the flash will do to your photos.
Hong Kong flash. Money changer Tokyo flash, RICOH GR II. Escalator. Tokyo flash. Cat on man’s shoulder. Flash. Construction workers in Denver, 2019 #RICOHGRII Mumbai, 2011. Leica M9 x Flash Street portrait, woman looking right. NYC, 2015. RICOH GR II x FLASH Long range flash experiment. Trix pushed to 1600. Manchester, 2015 Suits street photography flash Flash suits. NYC. African-american cop cutout. Downtown LA, 2013 #flash #portra400 London. Leica MP and flash. Kodak Portra 400 Sapa, 2019 #flash #ricohgrii Fujifilm XF10 with flash. Espresso machine Dark Skies over Tokyo // RICOH GR II x FLASH Film Leica, 35mm, Kodak Portra 400, flash.
Often I like to shoot with a flash because I wonder:
I wonder what this photo or scene would look like with a flash?
When we see the scene in ‘real life’, it obviously doesn’t look like how it would with a flash. So the random effects of the flash is what makes photography fun — like visual experimentation!
Random shapes, forms, textures
The importance of always having your camera with you and ready to shoot:
You will witness a lot of randomly visually interesting things. Just shoot it!