CUT THE PACE
Our world is fast paced. Things happen by the second and we are pulled along in the hustle and bustle of life in the digital age. It’s time to slow down and live life with some intention. Film photography is an old-school way to take at least one tiny part of our lives and remove our modern instant gratification. Film is imperfect. A digital camera can take photos with orders of magnitude more detail and sharpness. BUT, the beauty of film is in its imperfection.
A fully analogue process, a chemical reaction occurs in a piece of film that (for better or for worse) permanently imprints a memory into a physical media. The resulting image has a kind of depth and warmth that digital photography can often lack. There are a limited number of exposures on a roll so each frame must be composed and exposed with the utmost care as not to waste a portion of film. Where a digital camera can store many dozens, or hundreds, or even thousands of shots and provide an opportunity to take many pictures until the right one is created, film gives you just 36 (or 24, or 15, or 12, or 10, or 8, or even 1!) opportunities to get that perfect snap. There’s no LCD screen on the back of a film camera. You don’t know what you’ve got until it’s been developed. Each roll returned is a learning process which, most importantly, takes time. Time to slow down, carefully compose the next shot, and create art from a singular moment in time.
Matte was born in the analogue age and matured in the digital age. Rapidly approaching middle age, the fast and furious pace of today’s normal daily routines began wearing down on him and he needed an escape from the hurry hurry hurry of city living. He rediscovered film photography in 2021. This ignited a passion for a slower, more deliberate, lifestyle where applicable.
Matte shoots photos exclusively on film, and exclusively on fully manual cameras. No digital screen, no electronic wizardry, no auto-focus, and he is eagerly awaiting the opportunity to take the next best photo.