As is tradition, my wife and her best friend planned a weekend getaway to somewhere in the Northeast to celebrate their birthdays. Been going strong about 4-5 years now and is always somewhere new. So packed my backpack with my Super 8, a Polaroid camera and a 35mm camera (and some clothes) and we set out to the Finger Lakes region in Upstate NY for the weekend. You can see the Super 8 I shot below!

First of all, this AirBnB the 10 of us stayed in was unreal! This beautiful Victorian-esque house that looked like it was from a magazine. Would be a great spot for a photoshoot or small wedding. Not to mention the Airstream in the backyard fully decked out for taking on the road! Oh and a super rad abandoned barn as well.

I brought along some expired Kodak Ektachrome for my Super 8 camera which came out wonderfully and I’m so excited that Ektachrome has now returned to production from Kodak. Projecting color Super 8 film is such a awesome experience. Once I was back in NYC, I hand processed the film with the help of Steve Cossman of MONO NO AWARE at the Gowanus Community Darkroom. Really an incredible feeling to process and then immediately see the color reversal images I shot on the lightbox.

Also brought my Polaroid 110B with some expired Polaroid 669 film which always has amazing blue hues and expired Fujifilm FP-3000B. Fit in my custom CB-70 back for the 110B so I could shoot some Polaroid Originals B&W film. And tucked in my little Olympus XA and some Fuji Pro400H to top it all off. A good spread of film types and formats to play around with. The 669 I used for some landscape and portraits which I was really happy with. It’s such a unique and interesting film to use. It’s got a bit of a reputation for aging like a fine wine. Then the 3000B and Polaroid Originals film I used for some interiors of our awesome place. Pretty faded but it all worked! Below are the prints and the negatives of the FP-3000B film.

While we were there, we had to hit up a farm with a corn maze and eat some cider donuts and hot cider of course. Pet a llama. The usual stuff. Then hung out at our funky home and before heading home, stopped by a little town right off one of the lakes. Upstate NY is definitely a gorgeous area in the fall! Just shot some more Super 8 and film last weekend at this year’s trip and I’m excited to process it!

With film having a somewhat of a resurgence these past few years, it's no surprise that a bit of a community has formed online to share images, films, and banter. Also shops promoting film like Brooklyn Film Camera and Lomography have been doing their part as well.

Kyle Depew of Brooklyn Film Camera @upsidewalkdown

Julien Piscioneri of Brooklyn Film Camera @julsdylan

Frank Dautant of Lomography NYC @frankdtnt

Christian Polt of Lomography NYC @poltone

Last fall in NYC, the two shops organized a picnic for any film and analog lovers to get together and hang out in Prospect Park, Brooklyn. Probably 100+ people showed up and about three times as many cameras! It was a great time and I shot a variety of Polaroids that day as well as a roll of expired Plus-X Super 8 film to remember the event with.

@gramdole

@catherinemcwilliams

@dudemanhouse

@stuzphotography

As far as the variety of cameras, there were Polaroid Land cameras with peelapart film, Polaroid SX-70s, Hasselblads, Contax 645, a Mamiya 7, a WIDELUX, plenty of Lomography cameras, a Hasselblad tintype camera by Kevin Scott, a few odd 35mm cameras, and of course, my Polaroid 110B and my Nizo 801 Macro Super 8 camera. In the 110B I shot with expired Polaroid 669 peelapart film which is really lovely as well as some Impossible Project B&W 600 film.

Geoffrey Berliner of Penumbra Foundation @geoffreyberliner

Curtis Willcocks of ICP @curtiswillcocks

Phil V of @polaroidsofpeople

Cory Marr @therealcorymarr

It was really cool seeing the different cameras and chatting with everyone about film. Dave Bias of Film Ferrania (which is doing their best to recreate color reversal Super 8 film) hosted a small raffle for bags of film goodies from a ton of different film companies like Film Ferrania, BFC, Lomography, Polaroid Originals, Mike Padua, and tons of other little patches and what not. And of course no gathering of film photographers is complete without a group Polaroid from Nick McManus.

Enjoy the Super 8 film from the event below and looking forward to more film meetups in 2018!