Film Photography: Q&A with photographer and cinematographer Ben Ward
Ben Ward is a Fort Collins-based documentary style photographer. His work seeks to capture the human experience and changing social and environmental landscape of the American West. Ward shoots a lot of his photos on film and has gained a large social media following because of his outstanding work.
Film photography has made a major comeback in recent years, becoming a trend among youth and a new medium for photographers to dip into. In an increasingly digital world, the use of film seems to be a stretch for a professional photographer to justify. This interview with Ben Ward seeks to answer the question, why film?
Who are you and what do you do?
I work at Colorado State University, I do quite a bit for the video communication team. Outside of that, a lot of freelance film production, photo work when I can find it, some local brands and some random stuff, trying to get more into the editorial and journalism world. For fun, I do more photography, mostly documentary style work which is the route I am trying to take most of my work down.
What do you hope to accomplish with your work, what story are you trying to tell? Is it one big narrative or each one individual?
I would say each work is a different narrative, but I look at stories that are similar in terms of their themes. I think that a lot of my work I have been making and want to make is about America and change, whether that is climate change or societal change. For the past couple of years I have been working on a project in Eastern Colorado, taking a lot of photos of rural areas, portraits of people and this landscape that feels like you went back fifty years. Hoping to capture those feelings of change and people who are resistant to change, I think those things always try to come out in my work in someway.
How did you get into film photography?
That started early on in college, I had a few friends who messed around with 35mm. My friend Matt Wade and I went to a thrift store in Fort Collins one time just for fun and we ended up both getting some 35mm cameras for like fifteen dollars. At that time there was a lab in Fort Collins right by campus that developed and scanned, they didn’t do the best job, but it was convenient and cheap. I just messed around with that for quite a while and then started getting a little more serious, investing in money in cameras and moving up to medium format.
Why is it relevant to shoot on film in a digital world?
For me there is probably two different reasons. One is that technically there is things about film that are just different. I think there are a lot of presets out there that try to replicate film and they do a great job, but you are always surprised when you shoot film. There are technical things about the chemical reactions and this unpredictability that results in some really interesting stuff. The colors and dynamic range, it is why you still have some of the top cinematographers in Hollywood still shoot on film, not because it is convenient but because they like the colors and it just does things better than digital in some ways.
The second reason for me is, I think it is sort of a cliche at this point, but there is something true about physical stuff and connecting with your work, having to put in work for it and pay for every shot. I develop my own black and white so it is another step in the process that I have complete control over. That also means that you can mess it up and learn from it, it is just connecting more with the medium versus having your really nice digital camera shooting twenty photos in one second and then choosing the best one. Which, that is fine for some stuff but it is nice to slow down and think more about it.
What is your favorite camera and film to use?
I have a Hasselblad 500C, which I love. It is a classic, beautiful camera and fun to use. I think it is the model that they took to the moon. It is super durable and doesn’t use any batteries, it has really stood the test of time. I have a large format too, a 4x5 field camera which is taking it to the extreme with slowing down and really being intentional because it costs a lot of money for each shot you expose.
For film, lately I have been on a black and white kick so a lot of Ilford 400, HP5 and then FP4 is a 120 speed film that I really like.
Which format do you prefer (35mm, large, medium)?
I think they’re all well suited for different styles. If I’m doing something that is run and gun and there is a lot of movement, then 35mm would be great. Since I have been on a kick of really wanting to take my time on things, large format is best suited for that.
You shot a music video on film…
Yeah, for a friend of mine, Logan Farmer’s Rome Through a Fog.
What camera and film did you use for that?
It was on a 16mm Bolex, I’m not sure the exact model, but I used Kodak Motion Picture Film. I used some 500T which is a tungsten balance film, then the rest of it was on 50D, so a lot of the daylight stuff was shot on that.
Why did you choose to shoot it on film?
I had always wanted to shoot on film for motion picture stuff, but never had the budget or the reason. Especially for commercial stuff, in Fort Collins you’re not going to find some client who is down to throw in an extra thousand dollars just to let you shoot on film. But this was for a friend of mine, and he really likes my work and I really like his work so he was very down to shoot on film and that is kind of where all of the budget went. It was myself, Matt Wade and Matt’s coworker Trevor McKenna and we were all cool with spending our money on film because for us that was exciting. Content wise, it was about this rancher in Eastern Colorado and thematically it fit well.
Do you have any big projects you are working on now?
I am actually publishing a book of my work from Eastern Colorado within the next couple of months hopefully. A lot of black and white, a lot of large format photos. So I have been working with the publisher and hopefully it will be ready in springtime, which I am really stoked on. I have been wanting to do a book for a long time and I have been working on this project for about two years now.
Any closing remarks?
It’s really hard for me to talk about film and not sound cliche, because there is a lot of stuff out there about people wanting to slow down their process and work with their hands, you know just because it sounds cliche doesn’t mean it’s not true. I think there is always going to be something special about film. Whatever medium you talk about whether its MP3 players and people still listening to records, there is always going to be some push and pull as technology advances. Technology is always trying to make things more convenient for people.
