Film Is Alive!

If you don’t follow Utah Film Photography on Pinterest, you should. I was one of those people early on that complained about Pinterest. Now I see the value to pinning all of my favorite camera brands and types in one area for reference. One of the boards I keep on Pinterest is for Film Camera Clothing & Accessories. This board inspired me to create my own Utah Film Photography shirt last spring. It’s a black button-up Red Kap work shirt, something you’d see a car or motorcycle mechanic wear. I had a company create a custom Utah Film Photography patch, and found the vintage Pentax patch on eBay.

The latest patch additions to my shirt are from ShootFilmCo.com. I discovered these patches while following San Francisco based photographer Mike Padua’s film work on Instagram. Mike has created a new line of patches and stickers that express the humorous and enthusiastic side of film photography.

Mike says, “Growing up as a kid, and being in a number of punk rock bands and also loving photography at the same time, I thought it would be cool to have something that kind of brings both worlds together. I always thought that the artwork on vintage patches and stickers were amazing.” ShootFilmCo.com is where you’ll find Mike, designing, selling and shipping his expanding line of products. Mike’s original item, the In Grain We Trust embroidered patch and sticker was released earlier this year. And just in time for Halloween, ShootFilmCo.com has created two glow-in-the-dark patches. Working with Illustrator, Andrew Denholm in the U.K., one features a skeleton with a TLR camera, and the other, Frankenstein with a large format camera.

Along with the groovy artwork, the vinyl stickers and patches are made from quality materials. These are not cheap items you would buy from a drugstore gumball machine. The patches are worthy of your favorite camera bag, jacket, shirt or hat. And the stickers would make a valuable accessory to your car, laptop or forehead. All of ShootFilmCo.com patches are made in the USA by CustomPatches.net in New York. Mike isn’t afraid to share who he collaborates with and feels that artists should share and support each other as much as possible.

I’ve added the Film Is Not Dead and In Grain We Trust patches to my Utah Film Photography shirt. Instead of sticking the vinyl stickers to something, I decided to cut some flexible magnetic sheets and mount them. This makes them into perfect magnets for the office or my film fridge (also called the kitchen refrigerator by my wife and kids).

Make sure to visit ShootFilmCo.com and pick up some items before they sell out. Mike says, “It’s so much fun and ever since I started this endeavor in March, the absolute most rewarding thing that has happened is that I have talked to, and am now connected to more amazing film photographers than I ever thought possible. So many people are still shooting film, or coming back to it, or discovering it for the first time, and I’m really excited for film and the community to keep growing.”