I have been noticing an interesting trend locally in recent months. It has been the rebirth, so to speak, of medium format photography. To be more specific it has been a surge of the local population shooting 120 film with Holga Cameras.

For those of you not familiar with the Holga, it is a cheap plastic toy camera that is made in China. They do not offer much control over the results, focusing is limited, vignetting is extreme and they all leak light…yet they are getting more popular all the time.

It is said you can shoot the exact same shot with many Holgas and no two will turn out the same and from what I have seen it is true. This would be the results of it’s most endearing and controversial qualities, the light leaks. They all leak but from different spots and with different severity. And everybody that buys them seems to have different ways of dealing with this. Some will wrap the camera with about 4 pounds of duct tape to try and stop the leak while others do nothing to try and prevent it. Some people will actually take their camera and throw it on the floor to cause more light leaks.

While I can already see many of you cringing at the mere mention of cheap, plastic, and light leaks when reading about a camera (I think I heard gasps when I wrote “throw it on the floor”) rest assured I am not trying to endorse or detract from it one way or another. What I am doing is loading film into the one I purchased for myself and am anxiously waiting for lunch time tomorrow when I can go shoot through a roll of 120 film downtown. I have seen the results, I am intrigued and I am launching my Holga career.