Leica are still selling loads of analogue cameras
Photographers are rediscovering the joys of crafting images by hand.
The Leica M6 is an analogue film camera that even in 2023 the company say they are selling a lot of.
In fact, Leica are selling 10 times as many film cameras as they were ten years ago and this year, film cameras will make up 40% of the company's total sales.
40%?
To get our heads around that - consider for a second what this choice means in practicality. Instead of just shooting digitally, easily accessing images on a laptop and uploading shots at will; photographers are instead choosing to buy film, develop film, print images in a dark room etc etc.
This is time consuming work. More art than science.
Perhaps though this is a useful signal indicating that there is growing value in craft. That painstakingly creating something authentically is the new luxury.
It's not that film cameras will ever overtake digital, but increasingly in a world of effortless convenience; making things by hand still carries significant weight.
Hannes Brecher
Nancy Olson