Embrace the Shadows

October 14, 2017 by Phil Kneen Photography

They’re everywhere – peachy coloured, backlit portraits of redheads and brides, shot on Kodak Portra 400, over-exposed by 5 stops and metered for the shadows. These images have become, in analogue photography, what HDR is to digital… I don’t even know the word? What’s so hackneyed and worn-out that it goes beyond cliché? This method of shooting colour negative film has become so prevalent that it now seems to be the default, photographers ‘shooting at box speed’ has become the minority. […]

Categories: film photography • Tags: 6x7, analogue, colour, film, film camera, film photography, fuji pro 400H, I shoot film, isle of man, kodak portra 400, negative, pentax 67, personal project, portrait

Maximum Exposure

March 18, 2017 by Phil Kneen Photography

A friend of mine bought a new sofa – it looks like leather, it feels like leather, and it even smells like leather – but it’s not. It’s plastic. Internationally-renowned photojournalist, Sebastião Salgado, up until a few years ago, shot all of his work on film; he’d carry two all manual Leica cameras, a couple of lenses and bag full of Kodak black and white film. Whenever he got the chance, the Brazilian would have his film developed and printed. […]

Categories: film photography, Photography, woman • Tags: film camera, film photography, I shoot film, kodak, kodak ultramax, negative, nikon, nikon f100, nikon f4, portrait, VSCO, VSCO FILM

A little bit X-TRA

February 23, 2017 by Phil Kneen Photography

For the last couple of weeks I’ve been having a bit of a photography documentary feast; have a search around Amazon Prime and Netflix, and you’ll find loads. Last night I watched, ‘Time Zero: The Last Year of Polaroid Film’; the movie documents the…well, the clue’s in the title. I don’t want to give away the plot, but it’s a bit like any movie about the Titanic – it always hits an iceberg and sinks at the end. Polaroid sails […]

Categories: film photography, Photography • Tags: 35mm, colour, film, film camera, film photography, fuji film, fuji superia 400, personal project, portrait

Two and a quarter square.

February 13, 2017 by Phil Kneen Photography

I have to confess; I came close to selling my Hasselblad last week. I got another batch of films back, and there were a lot of disappointingly mediocre shots, in my opinion. But then I looked again – I think to go from years of shooting in the rectangular ratio back to square has confused my compositional mind, and I’m just not used to seeing my images that way. So I’m going to persevere – I’ve set myself a challenge; […]

Categories: film photography, Photography • Tags: 501cm, film camera, hasselblad, I shoot film, isle of man, kodak, kodak portra 400, negative, personal project, portrait, square

Just make it up.

January 25, 2017 by Phil Kneen Photography

My two primary fields as a photographer are portraiture and photojournalism; a lot of my images are straight, natural, environmental portraits, such as those I shot in the migrant camps of northern France and for my project last year in Spain. Other times I get an idea into my head as to how I’d like someone to look or a situation I’d like a person to inhabit. However, that person or place may not be available, or even exist. For […]

Categories: film photography, photojournalism • Tags: film camera, film photography, fine art, fuji film, fuji superia 400, makeup, negative, nikkor 35mm 1.4, Olympus mju II, personal project, portrait

That was 2016…

January 1, 2017 by Phil Kneen Photography

My yearly review got a bit delayed this year, I’ve had it ready to go for about three weeks, but the included images have changed on an almost daily basis. For the first time, all the images were shot on film – I’ve returned to using analogue, almost exclusively, for all of my personal work. I’m currently working on the final project for a Master’s degree in photojournalism and documentary photography, so I’ve shot very little in the way of […]

Categories: film photography, Photography • Tags: 6x6, 6x7, film, film camera, film photography, fine art, fuji pro 400H, isle of man, kodak portra 400, Olympus mju II, peel, personal project, phil kneen, portrait

Take the High Road

November 10, 2015 by Phil Kneen Photography

Monday 9th November, Ullapool, Scotland – It’s a good job I enjoy driving, because I’ve done a lot of it during the last 6 weeks, over 6,000 miles so far. In the 4 days since I left Calais, I have driven almost the entire length of England and Scotland, a distance of about 700 miles on the road. After leaving France late on Thursday, I dropped my friend/assistant off at her home in South London in the early hours of […]

Categories: Photography • Tags: film, film camera, I shoot film, kodak portra 400, london, pentax 67, scotland, VSCO

The things I saw #6

October 28, 2015 by Phil Kneen Photography

More random visual meanderings and scribbles with the pen and the camera. All images made using an Olympus MjuII 35mm compact and Kodak Portra 160 film. Today I’ve realised that I get as anxious about my equipment as I do every other aspect of my life… I love the Olympus MjuII… I’m actually starting to wonder if I should just shoot everything, all my projects, using this one camera? I have two of these little compacts now – one I […]

Categories: film photography, Photography, photojournalism, travel • Tags: 35mm, 35mm film, compact, film, film camera, film photography, france, I shoot film, kodak portra 160, negative, Olympus mju II, passport, pentax 67, personal project, phil kneen, portrait, spain, tree

The things I saw #3

October 26, 2015 by Phil Kneen Photography

More random visual meanderings and scribbles with the pen and the camera. All images made using an Olympus MjuII 35mm compact and Kodak Portra 160 film. Film was developed and scanned at UK Film Lab. Oh, a tip for anyone driving and using the French toll roads – they don’t accept MasterCard Prepaid… ‘Saturday 17th October, somewhere between Andorra and Chamonix – I’m covered in bites – all over my legs, arms and back. I’d assumed they were mosquito bites from […]

Categories: Photography, photojournalism, travel • Tags: 35mm, camper van, film, film camera, film is not dead, film photography, fine art, fleas, I shoot film, kodak portra 160, kodak portra 400, motor home, negative, olympus mju2, personal project, phil kneen, portra 160, portrait, road trip, UK Film Lab, ukfl, vitamin c

The things I saw #2

October 25, 2015 by Phil Kneen Photography

I thought I’d add an entry from my travel log with this, the second ‘The things I saw’ article. All the images here were made using an Olympus MjuII and various 35mm film, including Kodak Portra, Agfa Vista, Fuji Superia and expired Kodak Tri-X 400. This images are my analogue notebook, visual sketches of my travels. ‘Sunday 18th October, Calais, France – I never, for one moment, realised that the migrant situation was so dire. Arriving in Calais is like […]

Categories: film photography, Photography, photojournalism, travel • Tags: 35mm, 35mm film, analogue, art, colour, compact, film camera, film photography, fine art, france, fuji film, fuji pro 400H, I shoot film, inventive, kodak portra 400, legs, Olympus mju II, personal project, phil kneen, portra 160, spain