One minute, you’re searching for a “reliable 35mm camera,” and the next you’ve got six saved searches, a bidding war on a half-broken Nikon F3, and a PayPal charge for a Soviet rangefinder shipped from Bulgaria. Why? Because it had character, okay?

And don’t even get me started on the Super 8 and 16mm cameras. All it takes is one Wes Anderson behind-the-scenes clip and suddenly you’re justifying buying a Bolex because “film is timeless, and also I might make a short film someday.”

You won’t. But that camera will look excellent next to your unused enlarger.

📹 YouTube University (Fail Credits Included)

Of course, you watch all the tutorials. How to load film, how to meter, how to develop at home. You watch a guy in Tokyo shoot expired Fuji film with a Leica and somehow you think, “I can totally do that.”

So you try.

You mess up your first roll (because of course you did). Maybe two. Maybe seven.

You forget to engage the take-up spool. You open the back mid-roll. You develop color film in black and white chemicals. Classic hits.

But every fail teaches you something. Usually: slow down.

🖼 The Glory of Getting It Right

And then… it happens.

That one photo. The light is right. The focus is sharp. The grain sings. It’s imperfectly perfect and you made it. On film. No filters, no presets, no instant gratification. Just the process.

That’s when you know you’re hooked.

🧪 Enter: The Darkroom Era

You could’ve stopped there. But no. Now you want to print it.

So what do you do?
You enroll in college — not for the degree, not for the networking — for the darkroom access.
You walk into that red-lit temple of analog with your binder of negatives, a box of Ilford paper, and a caffeine addiction. And then you stay. For hours. For days. You test strips. You dodge. You burn. You go feral.

You emerge hours later with silver-stained fingers, smelling like stop bath, holding a print that took you 4 tries, 2 breakdowns, and 1 moment of pure analog magic.

📸 Why I Keep Doing This

Because it’s real.
Because it matters.
Because it forces you to slow down, think, screw up, learn, and do it again anyway.

Because when you print something with your own hands — from a frame you waited for, shot, developed, enlarged, and watched appear in the tray — it means more than any 10,000 likes ever could.

So yeah… I’m a film addict.

And honestly? I’m fine with that.

If you’re reading this, you’re probably at least film-curious. Welcome. This is a safe space.
We enable. We inspire. We shoot, we fail, we try again.

And we love every second of it.