Returning to Photography, a new Camera, and a Shopping trip.

December 29, 2024

Returning to Photography, a new Camera, and a Shopping trip.

It has been 16 years since I bought my first DSLR and 3 years since I gave all my equipment away, although a lot longer since I had used any of it. For the last five years, I have still taken photographs, but mostly on a phone, and in the last 8 years I have only posted 16 photos.

Photography was once a truly passionate activity for me. But like a lot of things people are passionate about, I pushed it too far, and my enjoyable hobby became a chore as I didn't more paid for jobs, weddings, events, personal portraits, and club competitions, it all ate away at the activity of taking and enjoying photos.

Recently I have started to consider becoming more active again, mainly because I am walking a lot with my dog and cycling a lot in beautiful countryside, the photo just doesn't do these activities justice. So I have invested in a new camera, a Fujifilm XM5, rather than a DSLR it is mirrorless, and it reminds me a lot of my old Fujifilm X20 pocket camera. It's only been a few days, and there is a learning curve getting back into this, for example, there's Bluetooth and wi-fi and an app, all features that never existed on my old Canon kit, but already I can feel my old spark starting to relight.

Today I had my first outing to give it a test, a shopping trip to Costco.

The exciting thing about the Fujifilm range is the customisable "recipes" - the feature of charging a host of settings to recreate vintage or retro film simulations. This means that you can do most of the editing at the time of shotting, and no longer need to spend a significant amount of time in post edit infornt of photoshop, that really appeals to me. For this trip I set the camera up with a bleached theme which I found on Fuji weekly

I feel the film simulation really brings out the depressing and sometimes chaotic feel that you get when venturing on a trip to a large store like this, especially in a cold dark, damp December. You notice that no one ever smiles in costco, there is a tense, on-edge atmosphere as customers struggle to steer oversized trolleys along no-thrill aisles, standing in queues that stretch the length of the store, before exiting through a security check into a carpark with traffic that matches a busy City Centre.

This isn't the first time I have taken photos in a supermarket, but the first time I have used it for a purposeful project. I have to say, it made the experience of shopping much more enjoyable, if a little risky. Im not sure the legality of photographing a commercial environment like this without permission, and with most of the customers giving off a fairly tense vibe, the chances of being accosted must be high. Thanks fully the Fujifilm XM5 is tiny, for an interchangeable lense camera I doubt there is much smaller. There is no viewfinder, its a point and hope type set up with a fairly good quality rear screen that flips and rotates into a variety of positions.

As a first outing I am really pleased with the results, the film simulation is of a really high standard and none of the photos I have posted here have had any post editing, everything has been taken directly off the camera, and keep in mind that I am very rusty, its been a while since I have shot anything in manual and have to consider ISO or exposure compensation.