Photo Tip #429- Making Images Look Old

A good way to to produce an "old" looking picture is to start with an old camera.

Step one: I had scrounged a "Cerio Firenze", an Italian 35mm Leica wanna-be, from a camera store which was glad to be rid of it. It was a dreadful thing— a piece of iron bent to form the body, a 50mm f8 (!) lens in a crude brass barrel containing a flip-flop spring shutter, a simple advance knob and a top and bottom plate covered in black paint.

Step two: Use grainy, outdated film, preferably manufactured in an Eastern European country.

Step three: Find some decrepit thing to take a picture of, in this case a building that housed the machinery to pump caustic lime into a holding pond.

Step four: Develop the film in a hap-hazard way, using over-agitation to enhance the grain structure.

Step five: Print the image using a cheap enlarger.

Step six: Put the print in a box and leave it, undisturbed, for forty years. Don't be tempted to shorten this step!

Step seven: Scan the print, sharpening the grain even more.

Step eight: Publish on your blog!