With countless screens in our face, creators churning out content, and AI creating “art” with the click of a button, I value the tactile elements of film photography. No instant gratification; instead, patience. An image captured by silver on a tactile negative. Creating a one-of-a-kind print in the darkroom.

While I grew up in the era of film photography, I never thought of it as an art: it was simply how I captured images of friends, family, and places. Fast forward to my adult years, when digital photography was taking off, and my father-in-law gifted us his Canon AE1, a classic film camera. Around the same time, my friend Edrenna gave me a gift card to the Light Factory, a Charlotte-based photography nonprofit that offers classes. This serendipitous combination led me to enroll in an introductory photography class, where I was one of the few still shooting film. I purchased a digital camera but kept my film gear, diving into books about film photography and learning to print in a darkroom. This deep passion in me for film photography has only grown stronger.