i’ve been thinking a lot about photography - film photography, to be specific - and how it makes me feel and what i want out of a camera and my experiences with it. i think as the years have gone on, i’ve become increasingly obsessed with gear and finding the perfect camera for every scenario, losing track of what made shooting film so magical for me in the first place. simply put, there is no perfect camera, there is no magic formula that will make everything seem right, how i feel it should be. and despite this, i continue to search, but in reality, the answer has been in front of me the whole time. kinda.

the olympus om10 was my first, my first film camera, my first love. the way i felt when i first started to shoot film was unlike anything else, it was pure wonder and excitement and joy. nothing else mattered, i didn’t care about other cameras or how big it was or anything like that. i just carried it around, took photos and had a good time. something has been lost, in the mix of growing older (and becoming more and more jaded) and discovering other cameras and subscribing to this lifestyle that having one extra thing on me when i go out is too much, that i need to be flexible and free, at the cost of my own enjoyment (because at the end of the day, i worry more about this now, which sucks). whatever i lost, is still there though, somewhere within me, i think. i think i’ve just overcomplicated things, made everything too difficult. i don’t know why, i wish i knew why. i’m trying to change that. i’m hoping i can change that. i think i need to change that.

i’m getting off topic. this is about the om10. a fantastically simple camera to use, it just works. it makes sense, it’s fun to use, i love how it looks and most importantly, it’s just always been there for me. i have two of them now, and whilst my original needs some work done, i fully plan on getting it back up to scratch and keeping it with me until the end of my days. i’m currently using the second one as it’s in mint condition and working fine, but i feel the soul is the same. when i look through that viewfinder, focus my shot and feel that warm sound of the shutter, i know everything is going to be ok. i know somewhere inside me, that simplicity of it all is inside. i want to make more, enjoy photography for the hobby it is to me. maybe i’ll make a zine. maybe i’ll finally make those photo albums. and maybe i’ll just share some photos here and now. a few that i love, new and old, from my om10(s). god i love this camera. god i love photography, and film photography and the feeling i get when i see the grain, the slightly out of focus shots. how i smile when i look at photos of my friends, the shot wide open because i love how a blurry background draws attention to the faces of the people i love. god i love my friends. god i love to love. i’m going to try and blog more. none of this is coherent and nor does it need to be. this is mostly for me, but if you’re reading this too, i hope you enjoy it. this is all spilling out of my brain here and now in the moment and i don’t think i’m going to change a thing. being human is messy at times, quite like film photography. other times, it’s really quite simple, don’t you think?