If you love film photography and want to break into some new creative and experimental techniques, we collected over 40 resources to help you out!
You’ll see the tutorials organized below into four general topics: Experimental Techniques, Experimental Film Stocks, Experimental Cameras, and Experimental Developing Techniques.
Dive into all the techniques below and be sure to bookmark this post for the next time you need a little inspiration to get that creativity flowing.
Experimental Film Photography Techniques:
This will be our biggest category covering techniques such as double exposures, film soup, creating your own light leaks, and more. These techniques are not camera or film stock specific, and you can do many of them no matter what film camera you have.
We’ve broken these up into subcategories, just to keep everything organized for you!
Film Soup
Film soup is the process of soaking your film in different household chemicals to create colorful and destructive effects on your negatives.
Here are a few tutorials and resources to get you started:
- Film Soup Tutorial
- 7 Awesome Film Soup Recipes
- Film Soup, but at What Cost? Breaking Down the Costs of Film Soup
- Experimenting with Film Soup and Black and White Film
- Film Soup and Polaroids
Double Exposures
Double exposures are when you layer two images on top of each other by exposing the frame twice, and they are such a wonderful and fun part of film photography.
Here are some tips on how to capture those amazing doubles:
- 5 Tips for Shooting Double Exposures on Film
- Using Movement and Long Exposures for Your Double Exposures
- Using a DIY Image Splitzer for Double Exposures
- Alternate Ways to Create Double Exposures with Film
Long Exposures
Long exposures involve keeping your shutter open for a long amount of time to introduce movement and blur into your image.
Here are some helpful tutorials to get you started shooting long exposure on film:
- Long Exposure Film Photography Tutorial
- Photographing Star Trails on B&W Film
- Photographing Star Trails on Color Film
- Capturing Moon Trails
- Long Exposures on the Holga 120N
Polaroid and Instant Film
If you’d like to try some experimental techniques with your Polaroid or Instax film, check out these resources:
- How to Do Polaroid Emulsion Lifts and Transfers
- How to Make Instax Transparencies
- How to Hack Your Medium Format Camera to Shoot Instax Mini Film
Miscellaneous
Here are a few more experimental film photography techniques that you will definitely want to try.
- Exposing Both Sides of Your Film: This technique allows you take any roll of film and use it to shoot redscale, specifically creating double exposures with one normal exposure and one redscale exposure.
- Freelensing Photography: Detach your lens from your camera and use if for tilt-shift and macro effects.
- Trichromatic Photography: Trichromatic film photography is the process of using filters with b&w film to create color images. A very cool technique!
- Create Light Leaks: Have you ever tried adding light leaks to your film images on purpose? It’s a fantastic way to add beautiful washes of color to your images.
- Intentional Camera Movement: Enhance your images by using intentional camera movement to create blur and movement.
- Using Prisms: Add creative effects to your film photography by incorporating prisms into your work.
Experimental Film Stocks:
Trying an experimental film stock is a super easy way to dip your toe into the experimental film photography world and see if it is for you.
Here are a few guides and reviews for shooting experimental films:
- 5 Unique and Experimental Film Stock You Need to Try!
- Experiments in Shooting Expired Film
- Lomochrome Metropolis Film Review: This film has subtle color shifts with muted and pink tones.
- LomoChrome Turquoise Review: This film from Lomography has bold turquoise and orange color shifts.
- How to Shoot Psychedelic Blues Film: Psychedelic Blues film is filled with light leak type effects.
- How to Shoot Lomochrome Purple: You’ll see fun and bold color shifts with this film where greens look purple and blues look teal.
- How to Shoot Color Infrared Film: If you want even funkier color shifts, try infrared film, and your images will be filled with reds, pinks, and purples.
Experimental Film Cameras:
You can also try an experimental camera! These film cameras will definitely be a fun addition to your camera bag.
- 3D Film Cameras
- Underwater Film Cameras
- Pinhole Cameras
- Olympus Pen F Half-Frame Film Camera Review
- Experiments in Modifying Film Cameras
Experimental Film Developing Techniques:
The darkroom is another place where you can experiment with your film. Here are different experimental techniques you can try when you are developing or printing your film:
- An Introduction to Cross-Processing Film
- How to Develop Color Film in B&W Chemicals
- How to Develop Film with Coffee: A Caffenol Tutorial
- How to Develop Film with Beer
- How to Make Cyanotype Prints
- An Overview of Alternative Photography Processes
We hope this collection of experimental film photography resources has been helpful and inspired you to try out some new creative techniques!
Leave any questions about experimental film photography below in the comments!
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Blog Comments
Jerry
November 21, 2022 at 6:25 pm
I started shooting in 1959 and processing in 1960. From 1962 to 1975 I worked for Polaroid Corp. In 1978 I bought my first full frame Camera, an Olympus OM-1n.
From 1986 to 1995, I processed my own black & white, color negative and color slides. I processed and printed all formats. During that time O ownes 8 different Olympus cameras.
In 1996 I started with digital cameras. Since then I have ownes 12 different Olympus digital cameras. Recently I bought an Olympus OM-4 film camera, I am getting back to analog photography.I will be processing and scanning my own film.
Jerry Littlefield