Emily Ratajkowski (@emrata) at the Cult Gaia opening on 8x10 Polaroid film

8x10 Polaroids

January 31, 2024

Last February, I was hired to shoot some large format 8x10 Polaroids at a store opening party for the fashion brand, Cult Gaia, in SoHo. The event was packed and had some notable guests including Emily Ratajkowski.

I was shooting for Brooklyn Film Camera and had my buddy Sam Dole assist me. Sam previously did some assisting for the 1923 shoot I also assisted on and is well-versed in all things large format. We set up outside the store right next to their red carpet and after a test shot we were ready for action.

@weworewhat

@wuzg00d

@yoventura

@sandrashehab

@katyatolstova

I ended up shooting over 50 8x10 Polaroids that evening. A lot of cool fits and some familiar faces of the NYC Fashion world but the highlight was definitely Emily Ratajkowski stopping by to get a couple portraits of her and the owner of the store, Jasmin Larian. Given the chilly temps outside, they came out absolutely stunning and everyone loved seeing their Polaroid.

Hoping to do more 8x10 work this year. It’s quite the process but the results are next level, especially in person.

Jasmin Larian (@jasminlarian), owner of Cult Gaia, at the store opening on 8x10 Polaroid

NYFW Inherent show BTS // Large Format + 35mm + Polaroids

October 20, 2023

I love shooting NYFW. It’s fun. It’s exhausting. The outfits are insane. You meet cool people. The energy is fantastic. So when my friend, Burke, asked me to shoot some BTS alongside him at the Inherent fashion show at NYFW back in February and said “bring whatever cameras you want”, I was in.

So with that much flexibility... I’ll share a bit about the cameras I ended up bringing for those interested…

I’m always up for a challenge, so I brought my Graflex Super D large format SLR camera with some BW film pushed to 1600 since I figured NYFW isn’t often captured on large format these days and now is the time to make it happen. Then I had my Canon AE-1P with the Lomography 85mm Petzval lens with CineStill 800T and as a silly last thing, I brought a Polaroid Passport 2-lens camera and some very expired Polaroid 669 peelapart film for some diptychs.

Unfortunately, I could only stay for the setup as I had plans that evening but it was great just capturing the models and the show BTS in those moments.

I posted most of on my instagram already but with NYFW having just happened again at the beginning of September, figured I’d get these up on the blog.

**Rosario Dawson on expired Polaroid 669 film**

NYFW SS2022 on Large Format Film // 4x5 + Polaroid

September 28, 2021

Been a little while since I’ve written here but that definitely doesn’t mean I haven’t been shooting. I’ve been burning through film like mad! I just happened to get back a newly modified antique (or vintage should I say) large format camera the week of New York Fashion Week so figured it was a good opportunity to test it out!

A little more background on the camera (or skip this for the cool photos!)... it is a late 1940s Graflex Super D 3x4 large format SLR camera. Not your average SLR as it’s about 10x as big and with film to match and you look down to focus it. A great guy and amazing photographer, Jonathan Canlas, who runs The FIND Lab in Utah gave it to me when I briefly stopped by his studio space last fall on a roadtrip and chatted all things film. He said it was just collecting dust on his shelf and he felt like I’d put it to good use and I’d wager he was right! Unfortunately, it uses a rare film size and is hard to find, so I sent it to Graham at Graflex Parts who specializes in repairing these in order to use more readily available 4x5 film and allows me to shoot my favorite Polaroid peel-apart film! Anyways, onto the photos! Be sure to click them for the full screen viewing!

So met up with my guy, Naeem, who is a fellow film shooter and hit Spring Studios in SoHo which generally serves as the hub for New York Fashion Week and is always a good spot for street style photos as people come and go to the runway shows. The large format camera definitely attracted quite a lot of looks from the people attending the shows as well as the other photographers shooting. If you’re curious to see some of the BTS of me shooting, there’s a story highlight on my instagram of NYFW that shows me using it, peeling some Polaroids and developing the negatives in my “darkroom” aka bathroom. Jostling for people’s attention and to tell them this would take a minute wasn’t always easy but the results speak for themselves. I only took one shot of each person so had to make it count! No digital burst mode on this thing. The shots above are a few of my favorite portraits.

But as far as outfits go… lots of patterns throughout the weekend which personally I’m a huge fan of.

And the guys were bringing the vibes as well.

Definitely a highlight was unexpectedly seeing Rosario Dawson and getting a couple shots of her in a stunning, patterned dress from Studio 189 and shot my first Polaroid of NYFW with her. Luckily it came out fantastic!

Also spotted my friend and model, Sarah Jane Nader, and her sister, Brooks Nader, and snagged a couple portraits as they ran in and out of the building.

And of course, shot some Polaroids with the camera as well. All on expired Polaroid 669 film from around 2006. The peels always get crazy reactions which are hilarious but I love hearing the reactions each time. Rosario actually thanked the “Graflex” in her video.

Here’s a few other random shots from the weekend of various people I managed to stop for a portrait.

Ending with a couple portraits of Naeem and my wife, Halla, who both were servin for the NYFW weekend! And a portrait Naeem took of me looking disheveled holding the camera and my FW fit on his medium format Yashica 124G TLR camera.

NYFW SS2020 Street Style + Kid Super // Super 8 + Polaroids + 120

March 21, 2020

Last fall, had some time to finally check out NYFW a bit and capture it on film. Definitely a small handful of photographers out there during fashion week shooting film and even smaller shooting Super 8 and Polaroids so figured it’d be something a bit outside of the standard. Even managed to get backstage at the Kid Super show to shoot some Super 8!

Spring Street Studios in SoHo is the main location for many of the fashion shows since it split up it’s single location shows that used to be held in Lincoln Center. This makes for a variety of strange and interesting locations like the COACH show I went to on the highline and the Kid Super fashion show inside an under construction building in Williamsburg.

Like my friend and fashion street style photographer, Dan Bassini, I didn’t have an invite to any of the shows (until a last minute favor from a friend for the Kid Super show) so I primarily strolled around the areas where the shows were to grab some portraits. I primarily shot with my Polaroid 110B which definitely drew a lot of surprised looks as well as a Mamiya C330 medium format camera, also a looker. Without autofocus and all manual, it required some waving of the cameras and polite requests to get portraits but in the end, was worth it. The Super 8 I shot outside of Spring was a casual but fun avenue to get “moving portraits” of the models.

The COACH show at the highline was truly a mass of big names and people attending and the crowd showed. Anna Wintor and a variety of other larger names outside of my knowledge passed through the crowd to attend the show.

With Kid Super, an NYC friend happened to be producing the show and managed to get me backstage of the show featuring the hip-hop artist, Action Bronson, to shoot some Super 8 and 35mm BTS. Was a dope show featuring garments made entirely out of recycled fabrics. It was a weekend highlight. Shot some quick 35mm shots during and after the show of the people and outfits at that show and there were some real standouts.

Was just at it again this year, with a few custom Instax cameras and 35mm cameras so hopefully posting those soon!

Super 8mm and Polaroid work featured on

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