March 10, 2025 • 24 mins
Capturing memories on film was an art form in the Gen X days. You threw a 24 exposure roll into your Kodak Instamatic and hoped for the best. A trip to the neighborhood Fotomat usually returned 3 usable pics and 21 shots of a fat thumb. Don't forget to order double prints!
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
I'm Tony. I'm Eric. We are the sons of San Fernando.But we've been friends for over 40 years. And
grew up together in the San Fernando Valley.These are the stories of our experiences as
adventurous Gen X latchkey slackers from backin the day. And don't forget to hit the follow
or subscribe button so you don't miss an episode.
(00:30):
I don't really consider him. D-bag vibe? Yeah,no, I just- Listen, he doesn't consider you
either, so, or me. And he shouldn't. But I'lltell you, he was talking about how the cinema
is dead because even if you shoot on film andthen you project it digitally, it's not the
same thing. And he said, Simen, Simena? Simen,Simen. Simena, as I know it, is dead. And I
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was thinking, what? douchebaggery thing to say,douchebagginess. Well, listen to all the douchebagginess.
Right, so just because they like shoot on filmand then you would wanna project it on film,
using, not to digital. They don't wanna digitizeit and then project it digitally. You wanna,
but it's like, okay, nostalgia is, althoughI will say, as you know, I've been getting
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back into film photography. I would say dabbling,but it's beyond dabble. Now it's beyond dabble.
Yeah, what's the next? Not when you have threeSLRs. What's the stage after dabbling? Oh,
I was just gonna say maybe like dunking? No,you go dabble, you go like interest, dabble,
obsession. And I have already- You go rightto obsession, yeah. I'm already in the obsession
phase. I already have three SLRs. And you gotthem all in like a week. Basically, well they're
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so cheap! You can buy cameras for nothing, filmcameras. Because nobody wants them. Because
nobody wants film cameras because they costso much money to use, not to buy. But here's
the thing. The people that, like you, that aregetting them, and the people that, or I should
say, the people that aren't using them, arefucking missing out. I think so. They are missing
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out because we have come into an age where youwhoop out your phone. Excuse me. You just,
excuse me while I whip this out. Yeah, and thenyou take a picture. Which is very nice. And
you get instant satisfaction with your iPhone.And you see if you like the shot, and if you
don't, you take it again. Yeah, and if you dolike it, but then you wanna fuck with it to
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the nth degree, you can like change somebody'shead, or you can change the background, or
you can add sparkles or confetti or whatever.And now you can do all that stuff to it and
you can digitize it until it's dead. And youcan make it perfect to the way, exactly the
way you want it and then you know what it is?It's just not fucking fun anymore. It's just
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too fucking- It's too, I think it's too buttonedup at that point. There's a reason. I think
it's still fun. No, there's a reason, like,okay, oh, you can, you could argue, well, you
can get the perfect, I don't know, wedding photothat way, right? It's perfect, you can see
it on the wall, you see it in the photo album,if anybody has photo, nobody has photo albums.
Maybe for a wedding, people do that, yeah. Right,and it's perfect, but there was something that
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was great about the imperfect photos, becauseyou would look at it and go, hey, there was.
You know one of the groomsmen Johnny, you know,Johnny was always the guy who was making funny
faces Right photos and guess what? He's deadHe's dead, but he makes it he in it even in
death He makes you laugh because he was theone making the goofy photo faces during the
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photos And he can and nobody would know rightand in the old days you couldn't Photoshop
out Johnny's goofy face. Now. Here's the thingI find something else very, this is why I got
so interested again in film photography is becausewhen I took my first experimental roll with
that little camera from 1974 that I bought,the roll eye, when I took a roll of film with
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that and I developed it, I was like, oh, thislooks completely different. And I had forgotten.
what film looked like really. I didn't even,it's so obvious. The colors, the textures.
There's something that looks like, and I'vetold you this, it looks like a memory. It looks
like how you remember the moment. It looks likehow we see things. And you know, we didn't
have the option of digital photography. Whatwas your first camera? Do you remember your,
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did you have a camera? When did you have yourfirst camera that was yours? When I was, I
think, four or five? You had a camera when youwere four or five? Play school. You had a PlaySchool
camera? They had some little, like, I thinkit was PlaySchool. Really? Or Fisher Price.
Really? Yeah. It was probably Fisher Price.Yeah, yeah. One of the old, like, plastic camera
that was a kid's camera. Yeah. And you werefilming it, loaded it, and it worked? No. You
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just had a view. It was fake. I was going toget excited and go on eBay and try to find
one. No, no, no. That would be amazing. Givea kid a little Fisher-Price camera that you
could actually load with film and take picturesif it was totally possible. Actually, you know
what I like? It has nothing to do with kids,but I like when people put those little cameras
or GoPros on their cats. and then you see everythingfrom the cat. And throw the cat out of a fourth
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story window to see how it lands. No, no, Iwouldn't do that, no. Why not? That's what's
interesting. Just the low view, the low grassview. Yeah, I don't give a shit about the low
view. But no, this camera didn't work. It wasjust pretending to like, because what I want
to do is be like my dad. Okay, so what you was-Because my dad always had- He was a camera
guy. He always had his Minolta. He always hadhis camera. Right, right, right. And so it
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was like- He had no SLR, beautiful Minolta.It was a way to be like dad at a young age.
And we like pretend to take pictures. And I'veseen some of your dad's pictures and they're
gorgeous from when you were a kid. Not you inthe picture. I was gorgeous. You're a hideous.
No, no, he made me look good. But the picture'sgorgeous. No, he didn't. That's impossible.
But the photo. is incredible. I was thinkingabout that one photo of you guys in the snow,
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you and Dave in the snow, but I was lookingat that picture because I asked you to send
it back to me because it's a shot on film. Oh,the one where I'm crying hysterically. That's
right! I hadn't zoomed in prior to looking atit, and then I looked at it and I'm like, Dave
is kind of holding you, your aunt's like downon the ground with you, and you're crying hysterically.
My aunt's smiling, she's smiling, yeah. She'ssmiling, Dave's like holding you back. It's
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a very, once you zoom in, it gets very sinister.It does, but if you took that with, you know,
let's say digital. Existed back then it justwouldn't look the same. It doesn't have the
same Texture it doesn't have the same green.It's just completely different Why because
now we've gotten to the point with digital wellfirst when we first had digital cameras in
the 90s into the early Well, I'm going backto like a point and shoot. Well, the point
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and shoots were still film but like oh, yes,right Yeah, they're really the early point.
Yeah, the early point shoots were and then laterwe had later We had digital cameras, but they
were ass They were so bad and then they slowlygot better and better and better and better
and now They are better than reality. And that'snot necessarily good. It just, I don't know,
there's something about it that- No, it's definitelynot good if you look like me, for example,
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and then you get a picture where it's like,it's reality of what I look like. I don't wanna
see, look, nobody wants to see that. You wannasee- the way we view things in our minds with
all of the character and personality of theperson, not the actual way they look. You know,
it reminds me of when, like, when, okay, whenHDTV first came out, it was mind-blowing because
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we went from, you know, regular old shit. Yeah,and we didn't want to see those fucking broadcasters
so close up. Right, in HD, so many things lookedgreat. Everybody got fired. Until you, right.
So it was, it was good for, like, nature shows.Yeah. like you know you could see a shark close
up and that was awesome but you didn't wantto see the newscasters then they went to 4k
right and now it's like okay again for somethings the clarity is amazing it's like looking
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through a window it's gorgeous but for too manythings it's just not good and i feel like photography
digital photography is that same way yes youget all the comforts and security of i took
the photo and i know what it looks like i gotit i captured it but the glory of you have
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24 exposures or 36 exposures in your old NikonF series and that's what you get and you got
to take time to make sure you make sure you'reexposure You need your f-stop right. You gotta
get it all right. This is the beauty of it.What I've learned since I started taking pictures
with a film camera again is that I can't wastethis exposure, so you take so much time composing
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the shot and getting the exposure right thatyou end up with so many, like per shot, per
times I pull the trigger on a digital cameraversus the film camera, the percentage is so
much higher that it's a good picture in thefilm camera than it is with my digital camera.
And people will say, and I understand this withdigital, But with digital, you will never miss
the shot. You can sit there and go brrrr andburst and take. And then you get that like
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killer shot. Whereas with something like film,you did like, you're gonna miss a lot of those
shots. You just didn't, you just weren't gonnabe able to get it. Yeah, maybe. I'm not sure
that's necessarily true. But I think becauseyou had to take time to compose and really
think about it and know your stuff. Yeah. Youjust like. So you get a better photo. Well,
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I mean, I think it's possible to. It makes youthink about it more. You can still waste the
whole roll and be like, ge ge, but then yougotta pay another 10 whatever dollars for a
roll of film. And you wanna develop. And developingit, yeah. If you wanna develop film and get
scans back, now it's 20 bucks for one roll offilm. So that's why I started developing my
own pictures. But okay, so what would, did youhave a camera? What was your first actual camera
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that was your camera? When we were teenagers,we had cameras. But I think I think I would
just maybe would have used whatever my brotherhad. So I can't I can't answer. No no when
we were kids I think by the time my brothergot to be a teenager I want to say he had if
I'm not mistaken it was a Kodak an Instamaticlike the 110. It looked like it was a size
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like a no no. The, it wasn't poor. The Instamaticwas still, you had to go develop it, right?
Yeah, you said I had to go. It looked like alittle chocolate bar. Ice cream sandwich. Yeah,
an ice cream sandwich, exactly. It was an icecream sandwich, and you could put the flash
tree in it. That went, boom! Yeah, you couldhear the boom. And then they burnt. Yeah, they
burnt. They burnt that immediately. So you hadlike a tree of what, four? Four, five? That
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was so weird. What a bizarre thing of thoseflashes. But it was just like holding a little
ice cream sandwich and then you, the shutter,it was a, keek! What? It was the worst little.
Yeah, it was a snake. It was so un- It was achick. Satisfying. It was like, okay. Completely
unsatisfying. It's not like the SLR. And thenyou're like. Chicka clack. And then you got
your film advance, right? Right. Was there anadvance or was it automatic? No, it wasn't
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automatic. I know, this was film. This was film.No, I know it was film, but I mean, it wasn't
an auto advance. It was a manual. It was manual.Shoot, shoot, shoot. Yeah, those were garbage.
They were garbage. They were easy to stick inyour pocket. I can't imagine. I kinda wanna
look up online pictures from Instamatics andsee if there's like a litany of people who
have scanned those and put them up to see whatthey used to look like. But Oh yeah, okay,
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so early Polaroids. Cause Polaroid, didn't youtell me they're coming back or they're bad,
they've been back with a vengeance? Yeah, Ithink they're making new Polaroid cameras and
then people who have vintage Polaroid camerasare refurbing them and selling them for like
$350. Let me ask you something, did you evershake it, shake it, shake it like a Polaroid
picture? Absolutely, I shook every goddamn Polaroidthat came out of the camera. always shook a
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Polaroid. You always want to shake a Polaroid.I don't know if it works or doesn't. They say
actually not to. Yeah, it's the worst idea probably.But you always wanted to shake a Polaroid.
There was something about the southern fan oflike being an Easter Sunday like garb with
a hat in a hot church in the south fanning yourselfwith your Polaroid picture. I don't know why
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we did that. Like the extra 10 seconds you wouldhave had to wait if you didn't. if you didn't
shake it. Did it make it develop faster? Didyou look into this? I think that was the idea.
So I know what I need to know. That was theidea. That was the idea, but I don't know if
it made it develop. Let's look it up while we'retalking. I'm like, we have a computer here,
I'll look it up. I always shook my Polaroid.But that was, okay, so the thing about the
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Polaroid was that, you know. It was before digital,you had the instant, that was it. You knew
right away if you had it. You knew right awaywhat you got. That was the first time it was
sort of like a digital camera of today. Yeah,and you know what you do? You get like- And
they were garbagey looking too. Oh, the resolutionon those. Oh, God. And again, they had like
that little flash bar at the top that fuckingsucked. The original ones, didn't they fold
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down? Some did, like the old, old ones. Theywould fold down and they had the little accordion
leather on the sides. And then they'd boop andthey'd flip up. Those are rad, now see, that's
what I want to find. And it had the strap youcarry around your old Polaroid. But then you
had to buy Polaroid film. Special film, whichwasn't cheap. It had a specific amount of exposures
on it. It was like 12 or 24, some of them reallysmall, yeah. I don't remember, I have no idea.
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And then you wind up taking like 12 of the samephotos. You're like, nope, that one sucked,
take it again. And they were huge. It was abig, I mean, it looked very old-timey. Even
in that time, it looked old. And what I'm learningis fun too, is not only taking pictures with
the film camera, but then developing them yourselfis very satisfying. I love sucking in toxic
fumes and exposing myself to chemicals thatwill kill me quicker. Who doesn't? Who doesn't?
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I mean... I think there are people that don't,but I think they're missing out. Because I
think, you know, life is to be lived. I'm gonnastart smoking while I do it, and I think that's
gonna benefit the quality of the photos I produce.You know what I'm thinking about doing? I want
to see if you're in with me on this. I wantto open a photo mat. Oh, nice! And get a little
kiosk! In a mini mall? Yes. Dude! Those wereamazing! They're amazing, but I wanna take
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it up a notch. Because developing photos inthat, I wanna develop photos in that kiosk,
so I wanna have a little dark room area thathas a lot of chemicals. But then since it's
a little kiosk, I also wanna sell cigarettes.See, I'm gonna do that and then sell hard drugs.
Okay, no, I could be down for that too. Yeah,I'm like, yeah. Because if you're gonna, I
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mean, that's where you're really gonna makeyour money. Any snacks? Maybe, I mean, because
you've dropped it off the film. Like chips?Like Doritos? Yeah, some salty. What is your
favorite Dorito flavor?
Peanut butter and banana. Were you a fan ofthe chili cheese Fritos? Chili cheese Fritos?
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No. I was a flaming hot guy.
I like the original crunchy Cheetos and thenI went I like the hot ones but are you interested
in a puff or a hard Cheeto? I like the hardCheeto. The family, growing up, the family,
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my mom bought the puffs. You were not puffs?No, my mom bought the puffs. Oh, your mom bought
cheese puffs? Yeah, but I was the rebel. I wasone of the crunchy. You wanted the crunchy,
you were not into a puff. Here's the thing abouta puff. I would never sell a puff at my photo
mat fucking kiosk. I would sell a puff and letme tell you why. Well, a puff or a puff? You
can gum a puff. Yeah, you can gum a puff. Youcan put the puffs in your mouth and just suck
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them down to nothing. And they just sort ofdisappear into cheese powder, wet cheese powder
in your mouth without ever masticating. I'mjust gonna sell wet cheese powder. as my snack
in my photo booth. That's a good idea. Alongwith hard drugs. And then you can just pour
it in like you did with Fundip. Like Fundip.I love Fundip. The fact that we both went to
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Fundip at the exact same time. New Fundip, chilicheese flavor. That's a good episode, by the
way, is it was candy. Candy, oh yeah. We gottago back to candy. Okay, but, but. The kiosk
was a genius thing. And they were in every singlemini mall in the Sanford goddamn Mando Valley.
Because it was an easy way to drop off yourfilm and go back. So it was in, the kiosk would
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be where there would be a supermarket or, youknow. Or super cuts is more where there would
be than a supermarket. You would have a supercuts, a donut in, a print shop. Or donut out.
Nails. Nail salon, yeah. Nail salon, right?Which was a front. And Alan Ed's. For something
else. Autosound. And then a kiosk. Alan Ed'sautosound. Or there was maybe a federated group
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in there somewhere. And then at the kiosk, youwould drive by, you didn't have to get out
of your car. No, you could drive up to the window.You didn't have to get out of the car. Yeah.
and you would hand them your roll of film ormultiple rolls of film, they would put it in
a bag, put your name on it and a telephone numberand you'd come back a week later and get your
film. Not a cell phone number, your landlinebecause there was no cell phone. Did you opt
for double prints back in the day or singleprints? I was double printing. You always wanted
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double prints. You know what? Because what ifsomebody wanted one of the prints? Yeah, you'd
have to be able to wing it. You're not goingto take the goddamn negatives and go back and
get them reprinted. And they made it price.They made it price. You made it affordable,
is that what you're saying? Yeah. Affordable?Yeah, but I like the way I said it better.
Price effective. They made it price effective.Yes. It was, because it was like up-sizing.
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It was like, you know, you're not gonna getthe medium Coke at McDonald's when the large
is ten cents more. Yeah. Even though it's 65ounces more that I don't need of Coke, it's
only ten cents. That was the great thing aboutdouble prints too, is you get double prints...
And again, it was film, so you didn't know whatyou were getting. You didn't know what you
were getting. And so you got, you know, 36 exposures,you got, you know, 72 photos. And of those,
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you generally only gave out like four or fivedouble prints. Cause all the rest of them sucked.
All the rest of them sucked. So you'd have thispile of double prints. Crappy photos. And they
were like all black, all white. A leave. A thumb.A thumb. Something that looked like a thumb
that wasn't a thumb because if somebody tookyour camera. And that brings up the real question
is that if you were working in a film lab backin the day, what must you have seen on, because
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there was no digital photography. So eitheryou were developing at home if you were a pornographer.
I wonder how many times they called the cops.Well, there's that too. Yeah, like mutilated.
People, the serial killers are taking picturesof, I mean just imagine in the 70s when serial
killers were running wild in the San FernandoValley and you had Richard Ramirez and people,
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people like that, they used cameras. And youknow what, that's why you couldn't get a job
as a photo mad employee because nobody everwanted to quit because they saw all the stuff.
Dude, they saw it. They saw it. The drugs thatthey saw. The pornography. The dead bodies.
They were solving crimes left and right. Yeah.At the photo mat. Is the photo mat an actual
name of an actual photo lab? No, no, it wasthe photo mat. That was the place, the- I only
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remember ever going- Kiosk. The kiosk were calledphoto mat? The kiosk, yeah. And now all those
kiosks are cigarette and- Or they're raisedto the ground. Or they, yeah, but the ones
that are still around are like, they eithermake keys- Right, keys. Actually- A lot of
them turned, and there's one right over here.Yeah, they still, and that's the thing, the
photo mat probably made keys at the same day.There is a key making kiosk that I'm sure-
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was a photo mat back in the day. And you know,I just remember it was Eastman Kodak. And I
remember reading an article way, way long agoabout they're just, they're like, no. Way,
way long ago? Way, way long ago. Way, way longago was a great bass player. Yeah, and what
band did he play in? Did Jigsaw Puzzles? Yes,that's exactly right. Yes, they put out that
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record. Why can't we stop eating our own toes?Uh, you, that wasn't the one I was thinking
of, but that was a good record too. That wasthe follow up. Yeah. That was the follow up
to, uh, to, uh, these pieces aren't made forputting together. These pieces are stuck in
my asshole was the one I really liked. Thatwas the original title. No, they, yeah, the,
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uh, the label wouldn't let them keep gettingstuck in my asshole. You know, it's funny because
There's that Seinfeld where Frank Costanza getsFusili Jerry stuck in his butthole and it was
an accident because he fell on it and they haveto release it and he keeps saying million to
one shot doc. But I guess that's based on thereality because Zoe was telling me that somebody
that she knows works in an emergency room wassaying that happens all the time. That people
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come in, don't know how this happened, totalaccident. Total accident, my ass. I don't know
how this happened but I have these giganticreels of film stuck up my butthole. I tripped.
They need like surgery to get them out. Well,what did they think was gonna happen? They
were either gonna show a movie out their ass.That's probably what they want. But Eastman
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Kodak, I remember saying, they said somethinglike, you know, digital's not, like everybody's,
film's not gonna go away. And film hasn't goneaway. Well, it went away. It did for a while.
And now it's coming back. And they, well, didn'tthey go bankrupt because of that? Oh yeah,
well Kodak, yeah. I mean, well yeah, I mean,it was a weird, you know. But now it is, I
think it's coming back, just like vinyl hascome back. Yeah, like that. That's how it's
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coming back as a niche thing. Yeah. It's notcoming back as a major commercial. Which is
why you can go out and you bought. Because I'mniche. Yeah, you're niche. You're niche. You
know what I am? I'm you-niche. Like unique,but with a little twist. Did you just make
a new word? I'm you-niche. Yeah, I'm you-niche.Oh my god. I think you need to call Webster
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right fucking now. I've invented many words.That's one of many words and other inventions
that I've come up with that other people haveused. I invented the little thing that you
put on your keys that will, if you leave thebutton on your refrigerator, it's like a magnet,
you leave it on your refrigerator, and thenyou put a little hook thing on your keys that
has a little transmitter in it, and when youlose your keys, you go to your refrigerator.
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and you press the button on your refrigeratorand your keys will beep wherever they are.
They'll start beeping. It's now called, findyour iPhone. Yeah, right. But I invented it!
Okay, it was yours first, but you can't proveit. But to that point, now that's the thing.
I'm not making any money off find my iPhone.No, not a bit. You got zero. Yeah, I got zero.
I got zero and you like it. I think that's oneof a million inventions, Eric. One! But that,
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speaking of the iPhone. I fended none of them.And the phone camera, your Galaxy camera and
whatever other, you know, whoever, Huawei, whomakes the phone camera. Huawei? Huawei. Who's
Huawei? You don't know Huawei? He was the guitarplayer in the band, the Jigsaw Puzzles. Yeah,
yeah. But they're also phone manufacturer, orelectronics manufacturer. I did not know that.
(22:15):
They make phones. But that's the phone, if you'renot a professional photographer who is either
shooting film or shooting digital and has likea whatever, what do they make now, the D5,
the decent, whatever, the fancy cameras, everybodyis- I call them fancy cams. Fancy cams. Yeah.
It's like a handy cam but fancier. Fancy cams,yes. Everybody is using their phone. Everybody's
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using their phone. Because they just keep comingout with better and better and better and better
and better. The best selling camera in the entireworld is the iPhone. Yeah. By far and away.
Because it's already there on your device witheverything else. You got it there. It's with
you all the time. And you know what? It's morethan good enough for almost everybody. You
see, that's why everything is documented. Everythingin the world is now documented. They are lying.
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Why are they lying? How about their megapixels?Dude, motherfuckers. Yeah, they say that it's
48 megapixels is 12. Mega pickles? Mega pickles.I love a mega pickle. Who does? Because you
have you know those little tiny cocktail pickles?The really small ones that are like garnishes?
The cornucons! Yeah. So those just annoy mebecause that's not of it. That's just like
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somebody that's like honey I shrunk the pickle.I love a cornucon. It's too small. It's not
enough. It's just a little pickle. You have12 of them! Okay, but then you go up to like
a Kloss and you get like a kosher dill or like...Is that the mega pickle? No, that's a regular
pickle! I'm picturing a megapickle is the sizeof like, I don't know, like a telephone pole.
That's a megapickle. No, that's a monster pickle.Monster pickle, what? Between a Clawson and
(23:49):
a Monster, there's a megapickle. Okay, so whatwould be the equivalent size? And I want a
camera with 48 megapickles. Mega pickles.
Thanks for listening to the Sons of San Fernando.Don't forget to hit that subscribe or follow
button in your favorite podcast app so you don'tmiss an episode. Drop us a review, we'd love
(24:12):
to hear from you. If you'd like to support theSons of San Fernando, the best way is to share
the show. We'll catch you on the next episode.
I'm Tony. I'm Eric. We are the sons of San Fernando.But we've been friends for over 40 years. And
grew up together in the San Fernando Valley.These are the stories of our experiences as
adventurous Gen X latchkey slackers from backin the day. And don't forget to hit the follow
or subscribe button so you don't miss an episode.
(00:30):
I don't really consider him. D-bag vibe? Yeah,no, I just- Listen, he doesn't consider you
either, so, or me. And he shouldn't. But I'lltell you, he was talking about how the cinema
is dead because even if you shoot on film andthen you project it digitally, it's not the
same thing. And he said, Simen, Simena? Simen,Simen. Simena, as I know it, is dead. And I
(00:54):
was thinking, what? douchebaggery thing to say,douchebagginess. Well, listen to all the douchebagginess.
Right, so just because they like shoot on filmand then you would wanna project it on film,
using, not to digital. They don't wanna digitizeit and then project it digitally. You wanna,
but it's like, okay, nostalgia is, althoughI will say, as you know, I've been getting
(01:16):
back into film photography. I would say dabbling,but it's beyond dabble. Now it's beyond dabble.
Yeah, what's the next? Not when you have threeSLRs. What's the stage after dabbling? Oh,
I was just gonna say maybe like dunking? No,you go dabble, you go like interest, dabble,
obsession. And I have already- You go rightto obsession, yeah. I'm already in the obsession
phase. I already have three SLRs. And you gotthem all in like a week. Basically, well they're
(01:42):
so cheap! You can buy cameras for nothing, filmcameras. Because nobody wants them. Because
nobody wants film cameras because they costso much money to use, not to buy. But here's
the thing. The people that, like you, that aregetting them, and the people that, or I should
say, the people that aren't using them, arefucking missing out. I think so. They are missing
(02:02):
out because we have come into an age where youwhoop out your phone. Excuse me. You just,
excuse me while I whip this out. Yeah, and thenyou take a picture. Which is very nice. And
you get instant satisfaction with your iPhone.And you see if you like the shot, and if you
don't, you take it again. Yeah, and if you dolike it, but then you wanna fuck with it to
(02:23):
the nth degree, you can like change somebody'shead, or you can change the background, or
you can add sparkles or confetti or whatever.And now you can do all that stuff to it and
you can digitize it until it's dead. And youcan make it perfect to the way, exactly the
way you want it and then you know what it is?It's just not fucking fun anymore. It's just
(02:46):
too fucking- It's too, I think it's too buttonedup at that point. There's a reason. I think
it's still fun. No, there's a reason, like,okay, oh, you can, you could argue, well, you
can get the perfect, I don't know, wedding photothat way, right? It's perfect, you can see
it on the wall, you see it in the photo album,if anybody has photo, nobody has photo albums.
Maybe for a wedding, people do that, yeah. Right,and it's perfect, but there was something that
(03:07):
was great about the imperfect photos, becauseyou would look at it and go, hey, there was.
You know one of the groomsmen Johnny, you know,Johnny was always the guy who was making funny
faces Right photos and guess what? He's deadHe's dead, but he makes it he in it even in
death He makes you laugh because he was theone making the goofy photo faces during the
(03:30):
photos And he can and nobody would know rightand in the old days you couldn't Photoshop
out Johnny's goofy face. Now. Here's the thingI find something else very, this is why I got
so interested again in film photography is becausewhen I took my first experimental roll with
that little camera from 1974 that I bought,the roll eye, when I took a roll of film with
(03:51):
that and I developed it, I was like, oh, thislooks completely different. And I had forgotten.
what film looked like really. I didn't even,it's so obvious. The colors, the textures.
There's something that looks like, and I'vetold you this, it looks like a memory. It looks
like how you remember the moment. It looks likehow we see things. And you know, we didn't
have the option of digital photography. Whatwas your first camera? Do you remember your,
(04:15):
did you have a camera? When did you have yourfirst camera that was yours? When I was, I
think, four or five? You had a camera when youwere four or five? Play school. You had a PlaySchool
camera? They had some little, like, I thinkit was PlaySchool. Really? Or Fisher Price.
Really? Yeah. It was probably Fisher Price.Yeah, yeah. One of the old, like, plastic camera
that was a kid's camera. Yeah. And you werefilming it, loaded it, and it worked? No. You
(04:40):
just had a view. It was fake. I was going toget excited and go on eBay and try to find
one. No, no, no. That would be amazing. Givea kid a little Fisher-Price camera that you
could actually load with film and take picturesif it was totally possible. Actually, you know
what I like? It has nothing to do with kids,but I like when people put those little cameras
or GoPros on their cats. and then you see everythingfrom the cat. And throw the cat out of a fourth
(05:02):
story window to see how it lands. No, no, Iwouldn't do that, no. Why not? That's what's
interesting. Just the low view, the low grassview. Yeah, I don't give a shit about the low
view. But no, this camera didn't work. It wasjust pretending to like, because what I want
to do is be like my dad. Okay, so what you was-Because my dad always had- He was a camera
guy. He always had his Minolta. He always hadhis camera. Right, right, right. And so it
(05:22):
was like- He had no SLR, beautiful Minolta.It was a way to be like dad at a young age.
And we like pretend to take pictures. And I'veseen some of your dad's pictures and they're
gorgeous from when you were a kid. Not you inthe picture. I was gorgeous. You're a hideous.
No, no, he made me look good. But the picture'sgorgeous. No, he didn't. That's impossible.
But the photo. is incredible. I was thinkingabout that one photo of you guys in the snow,
(05:44):
you and Dave in the snow, but I was lookingat that picture because I asked you to send
it back to me because it's a shot on film. Oh,the one where I'm crying hysterically. That's
right! I hadn't zoomed in prior to looking atit, and then I looked at it and I'm like, Dave
is kind of holding you, your aunt's like downon the ground with you, and you're crying hysterically.
My aunt's smiling, she's smiling, yeah. She'ssmiling, Dave's like holding you back. It's
(06:04):
a very, once you zoom in, it gets very sinister.It does, but if you took that with, you know,
let's say digital. Existed back then it justwouldn't look the same. It doesn't have the
same Texture it doesn't have the same green.It's just completely different Why because
now we've gotten to the point with digital wellfirst when we first had digital cameras in
the 90s into the early Well, I'm going backto like a point and shoot. Well, the point
(06:28):
and shoots were still film but like oh, yes,right Yeah, they're really the early point.
Yeah, the early point shoots were and then laterwe had later We had digital cameras, but they
were ass They were so bad and then they slowlygot better and better and better and better
and now They are better than reality. And that'snot necessarily good. It just, I don't know,
there's something about it that- No, it's definitelynot good if you look like me, for example,
(06:50):
and then you get a picture where it's like,it's reality of what I look like. I don't wanna
see, look, nobody wants to see that. You wannasee- the way we view things in our minds with
all of the character and personality of theperson, not the actual way they look. You know,
it reminds me of when, like, when, okay, whenHDTV first came out, it was mind-blowing because
(07:12):
we went from, you know, regular old shit. Yeah,and we didn't want to see those fucking broadcasters
so close up. Right, in HD, so many things lookedgreat. Everybody got fired. Until you, right.
So it was, it was good for, like, nature shows.Yeah. like you know you could see a shark close
up and that was awesome but you didn't wantto see the newscasters then they went to 4k
right and now it's like okay again for somethings the clarity is amazing it's like looking
(07:37):
through a window it's gorgeous but for too manythings it's just not good and i feel like photography
digital photography is that same way yes youget all the comforts and security of i took
the photo and i know what it looks like i gotit i captured it but the glory of you have
(07:57):
24 exposures or 36 exposures in your old NikonF series and that's what you get and you got
to take time to make sure you make sure you'reexposure You need your f-stop right. You gotta
get it all right. This is the beauty of it.What I've learned since I started taking pictures
with a film camera again is that I can't wastethis exposure, so you take so much time composing
(08:25):
the shot and getting the exposure right thatyou end up with so many, like per shot, per
times I pull the trigger on a digital cameraversus the film camera, the percentage is so
much higher that it's a good picture in thefilm camera than it is with my digital camera.
And people will say, and I understand this withdigital, But with digital, you will never miss
the shot. You can sit there and go brrrr andburst and take. And then you get that like
(08:49):
killer shot. Whereas with something like film,you did like, you're gonna miss a lot of those
shots. You just didn't, you just weren't gonnabe able to get it. Yeah, maybe. I'm not sure
that's necessarily true. But I think becauseyou had to take time to compose and really
think about it and know your stuff. Yeah. Youjust like. So you get a better photo. Well,
(09:09):
I mean, I think it's possible to. It makes youthink about it more. You can still waste the
whole roll and be like, ge ge, but then yougotta pay another 10 whatever dollars for a
roll of film. And you wanna develop. And developingit, yeah. If you wanna develop film and get
scans back, now it's 20 bucks for one roll offilm. So that's why I started developing my
own pictures. But okay, so what would, did youhave a camera? What was your first actual camera
(09:31):
that was your camera? When we were teenagers,we had cameras. But I think I think I would
just maybe would have used whatever my brotherhad. So I can't I can't answer. No no when
we were kids I think by the time my brothergot to be a teenager I want to say he had if
I'm not mistaken it was a Kodak an Instamaticlike the 110. It looked like it was a size
(09:53):
like a no no. The, it wasn't poor. The Instamaticwas still, you had to go develop it, right?
Yeah, you said I had to go. It looked like alittle chocolate bar. Ice cream sandwich. Yeah,
an ice cream sandwich, exactly. It was an icecream sandwich, and you could put the flash
tree in it. That went, boom! Yeah, you couldhear the boom. And then they burnt. Yeah, they
burnt. They burnt that immediately. So you hadlike a tree of what, four? Four, five? That
(10:13):
was so weird. What a bizarre thing of thoseflashes. But it was just like holding a little
ice cream sandwich and then you, the shutter,it was a, keek! What? It was the worst little.
Yeah, it was a snake. It was so un- It was achick. Satisfying. It was like, okay. Completely
unsatisfying. It's not like the SLR. And thenyou're like. Chicka clack. And then you got
your film advance, right? Right. Was there anadvance or was it automatic? No, it wasn't
(10:35):
automatic. I know, this was film. This was film.No, I know it was film, but I mean, it wasn't
an auto advance. It was a manual. It was manual.Shoot, shoot, shoot. Yeah, those were garbage.
They were garbage. They were easy to stick inyour pocket. I can't imagine. I kinda wanna
look up online pictures from Instamatics andsee if there's like a litany of people who
have scanned those and put them up to see whatthey used to look like. But Oh yeah, okay,
(10:56):
so early Polaroids. Cause Polaroid, didn't youtell me they're coming back or they're bad,
they've been back with a vengeance? Yeah, Ithink they're making new Polaroid cameras and
then people who have vintage Polaroid camerasare refurbing them and selling them for like
$350. Let me ask you something, did you evershake it, shake it, shake it like a Polaroid
picture? Absolutely, I shook every goddamn Polaroidthat came out of the camera. always shook a
(11:17):
Polaroid. You always want to shake a Polaroid.I don't know if it works or doesn't. They say
actually not to. Yeah, it's the worst idea probably.But you always wanted to shake a Polaroid.
There was something about the southern fan oflike being an Easter Sunday like garb with
a hat in a hot church in the south fanning yourselfwith your Polaroid picture. I don't know why
(11:39):
we did that. Like the extra 10 seconds you wouldhave had to wait if you didn't. if you didn't
shake it. Did it make it develop faster? Didyou look into this? I think that was the idea.
So I know what I need to know. That was theidea. That was the idea, but I don't know if
it made it develop. Let's look it up while we'retalking. I'm like, we have a computer here,
I'll look it up. I always shook my Polaroid.But that was, okay, so the thing about the
(12:00):
Polaroid was that, you know. It was before digital,you had the instant, that was it. You knew
right away if you had it. You knew right awaywhat you got. That was the first time it was
sort of like a digital camera of today. Yeah,and you know what you do? You get like- And
they were garbagey looking too. Oh, the resolutionon those. Oh, God. And again, they had like
that little flash bar at the top that fuckingsucked. The original ones, didn't they fold
(12:23):
down? Some did, like the old, old ones. Theywould fold down and they had the little accordion
leather on the sides. And then they'd boop andthey'd flip up. Those are rad, now see, that's
what I want to find. And it had the strap youcarry around your old Polaroid. But then you
had to buy Polaroid film. Special film, whichwasn't cheap. It had a specific amount of exposures
on it. It was like 12 or 24, some of them reallysmall, yeah. I don't remember, I have no idea.
(12:44):
And then you wind up taking like 12 of the samephotos. You're like, nope, that one sucked,
take it again. And they were huge. It was abig, I mean, it looked very old-timey. Even
in that time, it looked old. And what I'm learningis fun too, is not only taking pictures with
the film camera, but then developing them yourselfis very satisfying. I love sucking in toxic
fumes and exposing myself to chemicals thatwill kill me quicker. Who doesn't? Who doesn't?
(13:06):
I mean... I think there are people that don't,but I think they're missing out. Because I
think, you know, life is to be lived. I'm gonnastart smoking while I do it, and I think that's
gonna benefit the quality of the photos I produce.You know what I'm thinking about doing? I want
to see if you're in with me on this. I wantto open a photo mat. Oh, nice! And get a little
kiosk! In a mini mall? Yes. Dude! Those wereamazing! They're amazing, but I wanna take
(13:28):
it up a notch. Because developing photos inthat, I wanna develop photos in that kiosk,
so I wanna have a little dark room area thathas a lot of chemicals. But then since it's
a little kiosk, I also wanna sell cigarettes.See, I'm gonna do that and then sell hard drugs.
Okay, no, I could be down for that too. Yeah,I'm like, yeah. Because if you're gonna, I
(13:51):
mean, that's where you're really gonna makeyour money. Any snacks? Maybe, I mean, because
you've dropped it off the film. Like chips?Like Doritos? Yeah, some salty. What is your
favorite Dorito flavor?
Peanut butter and banana. Were you a fan ofthe chili cheese Fritos? Chili cheese Fritos?
(14:12):
No. I was a flaming hot guy.
I like the original crunchy Cheetos and thenI went I like the hot ones but are you interested
in a puff or a hard Cheeto? I like the hardCheeto. The family, growing up, the family,
(14:40):
my mom bought the puffs. You were not puffs?No, my mom bought the puffs. Oh, your mom bought
cheese puffs? Yeah, but I was the rebel. I wasone of the crunchy. You wanted the crunchy,
you were not into a puff. Here's the thing abouta puff. I would never sell a puff at my photo
mat fucking kiosk. I would sell a puff and letme tell you why. Well, a puff or a puff? You
can gum a puff. Yeah, you can gum a puff. Youcan put the puffs in your mouth and just suck
(15:01):
them down to nothing. And they just sort ofdisappear into cheese powder, wet cheese powder
in your mouth without ever masticating. I'mjust gonna sell wet cheese powder. as my snack
in my photo booth. That's a good idea. Alongwith hard drugs. And then you can just pour
it in like you did with Fundip. Like Fundip.I love Fundip. The fact that we both went to
(15:21):
Fundip at the exact same time. New Fundip, chilicheese flavor. That's a good episode, by the
way, is it was candy. Candy, oh yeah. We gottago back to candy. Okay, but, but. The kiosk
was a genius thing. And they were in every singlemini mall in the Sanford goddamn Mando Valley.
Because it was an easy way to drop off yourfilm and go back. So it was in, the kiosk would
(15:44):
be where there would be a supermarket or, youknow. Or super cuts is more where there would
be than a supermarket. You would have a supercuts, a donut in, a print shop. Or donut out.
Nails. Nail salon, yeah. Nail salon, right?Which was a front. And Alan Ed's. For something
else. Autosound. And then a kiosk. Alan Ed'sautosound. Or there was maybe a federated group
(16:07):
in there somewhere. And then at the kiosk, youwould drive by, you didn't have to get out
of your car. No, you could drive up to the window.You didn't have to get out of the car. Yeah.
and you would hand them your roll of film ormultiple rolls of film, they would put it in
a bag, put your name on it and a telephone numberand you'd come back a week later and get your
film. Not a cell phone number, your landlinebecause there was no cell phone. Did you opt
for double prints back in the day or singleprints? I was double printing. You always wanted
(16:30):
double prints. You know what? Because what ifsomebody wanted one of the prints? Yeah, you'd
have to be able to wing it. You're not goingto take the goddamn negatives and go back and
get them reprinted. And they made it price.They made it price. You made it affordable,
is that what you're saying? Yeah. Affordable?Yeah, but I like the way I said it better.
Price effective. They made it price effective.Yes. It was, because it was like up-sizing.
(16:53):
It was like, you know, you're not gonna getthe medium Coke at McDonald's when the large
is ten cents more. Yeah. Even though it's 65ounces more that I don't need of Coke, it's
only ten cents. That was the great thing aboutdouble prints too, is you get double prints...
And again, it was film, so you didn't know whatyou were getting. You didn't know what you
were getting. And so you got, you know, 36 exposures,you got, you know, 72 photos. And of those,
(17:17):
you generally only gave out like four or fivedouble prints. Cause all the rest of them sucked.
All the rest of them sucked. So you'd have thispile of double prints. Crappy photos. And they
were like all black, all white. A leave. A thumb.A thumb. Something that looked like a thumb
that wasn't a thumb because if somebody tookyour camera. And that brings up the real question
is that if you were working in a film lab backin the day, what must you have seen on, because
(17:42):
there was no digital photography. So eitheryou were developing at home if you were a pornographer.
I wonder how many times they called the cops.Well, there's that too. Yeah, like mutilated.
People, the serial killers are taking picturesof, I mean just imagine in the 70s when serial
killers were running wild in the San FernandoValley and you had Richard Ramirez and people,
(18:05):
people like that, they used cameras. And youknow what, that's why you couldn't get a job
as a photo mad employee because nobody everwanted to quit because they saw all the stuff.
Dude, they saw it. They saw it. The drugs thatthey saw. The pornography. The dead bodies.
They were solving crimes left and right. Yeah.At the photo mat. Is the photo mat an actual
name of an actual photo lab? No, no, it wasthe photo mat. That was the place, the- I only
(18:29):
remember ever going- Kiosk. The kiosk were calledphoto mat? The kiosk, yeah. And now all those
kiosks are cigarette and- Or they're raisedto the ground. Or they, yeah, but the ones
that are still around are like, they eithermake keys- Right, keys. Actually- A lot of
them turned, and there's one right over here.Yeah, they still, and that's the thing, the
photo mat probably made keys at the same day.There is a key making kiosk that I'm sure-
(18:52):
was a photo mat back in the day. And you know,I just remember it was Eastman Kodak. And I
remember reading an article way, way long agoabout they're just, they're like, no. Way,
way long ago? Way, way long ago. Way, way longago was a great bass player. Yeah, and what
band did he play in? Did Jigsaw Puzzles? Yes,that's exactly right. Yes, they put out that
(19:15):
record. Why can't we stop eating our own toes?Uh, you, that wasn't the one I was thinking
of, but that was a good record too. That wasthe follow up. Yeah. That was the follow up
to, uh, to, uh, these pieces aren't made forputting together. These pieces are stuck in
my asshole was the one I really liked. Thatwas the original title. No, they, yeah, the,
(19:36):
uh, the label wouldn't let them keep gettingstuck in my asshole. You know, it's funny because
There's that Seinfeld where Frank Costanza getsFusili Jerry stuck in his butthole and it was
an accident because he fell on it and they haveto release it and he keeps saying million to
one shot doc. But I guess that's based on thereality because Zoe was telling me that somebody
that she knows works in an emergency room wassaying that happens all the time. That people
(20:00):
come in, don't know how this happened, totalaccident. Total accident, my ass. I don't know
how this happened but I have these giganticreels of film stuck up my butthole. I tripped.
They need like surgery to get them out. Well,what did they think was gonna happen? They
were either gonna show a movie out their ass.That's probably what they want. But Eastman
(20:20):
Kodak, I remember saying, they said somethinglike, you know, digital's not, like everybody's,
film's not gonna go away. And film hasn't goneaway. Well, it went away. It did for a while.
And now it's coming back. And they, well, didn'tthey go bankrupt because of that? Oh yeah,
well Kodak, yeah. I mean, well yeah, I mean,it was a weird, you know. But now it is, I
think it's coming back, just like vinyl hascome back. Yeah, like that. That's how it's
(20:41):
coming back as a niche thing. Yeah. It's notcoming back as a major commercial. Which is
why you can go out and you bought. Because I'mniche. Yeah, you're niche. You're niche. You
know what I am? I'm you-niche. Like unique,but with a little twist. Did you just make
a new word? I'm you-niche. Yeah, I'm you-niche.Oh my god. I think you need to call Webster
(21:06):
right fucking now. I've invented many words.That's one of many words and other inventions
that I've come up with that other people haveused. I invented the little thing that you
put on your keys that will, if you leave thebutton on your refrigerator, it's like a magnet,
you leave it on your refrigerator, and thenyou put a little hook thing on your keys that
has a little transmitter in it, and when youlose your keys, you go to your refrigerator.
(21:29):
and you press the button on your refrigeratorand your keys will beep wherever they are.
They'll start beeping. It's now called, findyour iPhone. Yeah, right. But I invented it!
Okay, it was yours first, but you can't proveit. But to that point, now that's the thing.
I'm not making any money off find my iPhone.No, not a bit. You got zero. Yeah, I got zero.
I got zero and you like it. I think that's oneof a million inventions, Eric. One! But that,
(21:54):
speaking of the iPhone. I fended none of them.And the phone camera, your Galaxy camera and
whatever other, you know, whoever, Huawei, whomakes the phone camera. Huawei? Huawei. Who's
Huawei? You don't know Huawei? He was the guitarplayer in the band, the Jigsaw Puzzles. Yeah,
yeah. But they're also phone manufacturer, orelectronics manufacturer. I did not know that.
(22:15):
They make phones. But that's the phone, if you'renot a professional photographer who is either
shooting film or shooting digital and has likea whatever, what do they make now, the D5,
the decent, whatever, the fancy cameras, everybodyis- I call them fancy cams. Fancy cams. Yeah.
It's like a handy cam but fancier. Fancy cams,yes. Everybody is using their phone. Everybody's
(22:37):
using their phone. Because they just keep comingout with better and better and better and better
and better. The best selling camera in the entireworld is the iPhone. Yeah. By far and away.
Because it's already there on your device witheverything else. You got it there. It's with
you all the time. And you know what? It's morethan good enough for almost everybody. You
see, that's why everything is documented. Everythingin the world is now documented. They are lying.
(23:00):
Why are they lying? How about their megapixels?Dude, motherfuckers. Yeah, they say that it's
48 megapixels is 12. Mega pickles? Mega pickles.I love a mega pickle. Who does? Because you
have you know those little tiny cocktail pickles?The really small ones that are like garnishes?
The cornucons! Yeah. So those just annoy mebecause that's not of it. That's just like
(23:24):
somebody that's like honey I shrunk the pickle.I love a cornucon. It's too small. It's not
enough. It's just a little pickle. You have12 of them! Okay, but then you go up to like
a Kloss and you get like a kosher dill or like...Is that the mega pickle? No, that's a regular
pickle! I'm picturing a megapickle is the sizeof like, I don't know, like a telephone pole.
That's a megapickle. No, that's a monster pickle.Monster pickle, what? Between a Clawson and
(23:49):
a Monster, there's a megapickle. Okay, so whatwould be the equivalent size? And I want a
camera with 48 megapickles. Mega pickles.
Thanks for listening to the Sons of San Fernando.Don't forget to hit that subscribe or follow
button in your favorite podcast app so you don'tmiss an episode. Drop us a review, we'd love
(24:12):
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