The Analog Side of the Biggest Photography Fair in Austria

By Markus Hofstätter

15 January, 2025

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In recent years I have written articles about this event (Photo + Adventure). These articles were always about newest and brightest in the photography industry. What tiny camera spec has changed, what camera could shoot more fps and what autofocus has new tricks up its sleeve. But this year should be different. I was not commissioned to write an article, so I thought to myself, let’s do something fun. Because digital photography isn’t that relevant for my work anymore, or at least the new digital cameras aren’t, I decided to discover the analog parts of the Photo+Adventure this year.

And to make it even more fun, I decided to do a full film roll of portraits of these analog people. Honestly, I was not sure if I will come home much of a story, but boy was I wrong. Scroll down to get an short written overview, or watch my video for more information. For the portraits, scroll down to the end bottom of this page.

What I found interesting was that some of the people I talked with were bored with the new digital cameras. And I couldn’t agree more. I had some discussions and the outcome was that digital cameras are just great now and have been for many years – the new improvements are not important for lots of people now. Not many people need 50+ Megapixel, 120 frames per second or AI in their cameras. Autofocus improvement and longer lasting batteries are always welcome, but some nature photographers I know are still shooting DSLRs because of the longer lasting battery. Or some even shoot on film (check my video).

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Directly at the entrance the work of Horst Stasny was displayed. A great photographer who of course shot a lot of analog
And I had to walk only a few meters more to reach Hahnemühle. They even had their own flyers for alternative printing methods.
The Lightbox Academy did analog workshops some time ago and is open to it to do workshops again if there is the need for it. Robert Pichler, the owner and a friend has a lots of analog knowledge.
I really like the whole place where this photography fair is happening. Big and bright with lots of natural light coming in. Much friendlier than the old location at Messe Wien.
On our way to the first analog “store” we passed Transcontinental who had Billinghamm bags and the smoke ninja/genie, a tool I really enjoyed and would like to try for one of my portraits. It would be great to have some kind of corporation with them – just saying…
All my projects need some kind of “photographic” screws. And they are not so easy to come by.But this shop made my life so much easier. Thats why I was so happy to see the “Fotoschraubenshop” there. It was also nice to meet its owner personally.
Digital Camera Graz showed polaroid cameras and usually has lots of analog cameras in their used department. I met Eva there again, we met before at one of my talks in Graz that year. It’s a tiny little world.
Next stop was Fotoköberl. They have lots of film and one of the biggest used camera departments I have seen so far. I bought many times from them and they always provided a great experience. Great shop!
Cewe Foto had a huge booth at the Photo+Adventure. And of course they also had published some books about analog photography.
Manfred Baumann was signing his calendars at the Cewe booth and Nelly showed me some of his books with portraits that were shot analog back then
Wolfgang Gangl had his own booth with his worldwide awarded and very unique fine arte portraits. It was really nice to see you again.
My next analog stop was Gerhard Zimmert from Naturfoto Zimmert. He specialized in nature and micro photography. He cuts a grass stalk in half and captures a panorama of the surface he just cut. He started with analog back then and still has lots of knowledge about it.
Popp-Hacker Photography had their own booth. These guys are responsible for the huge scanner I renovated and love. And If you check out their website, you will see that most of their Landscape images in the 4×5 format. Because they shoot mostly 4×5 slide film. Check also out their Wiener Wildness project

I also visited the Insta360 booth, because they are responsible for my signature YouTube videos that I used to do when I started my YouTube channel. For future projects I got myself a new camera from them that is now very often mounted on my Leica M2.

As said in the video, when people talk about analog photography, often the camera brand Hasselblad comes up. An that was my next stop at Slach Bildtechnik.

By accident I bumped into Mr. Wolczak, the owner of my lab. He taught me lots of analog photography when I brought my first rolls of film to him.

These revolve tripods are foldable, I have never seen something like this before, thats why I had to cover it as well. I love the idea of a tiny tripod package.

It was nice to meet so many friends there as well. I enjoyed this day a lot and will do something different next time.vAll Black an white Portraits a captured with my trusty Leica M2 and 50mm Summilux on HP5 (developed with HC110)

 

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About The Author

By Markus Hofstätter
My main subject are clearly people. I love all humans because they are all beautiful and this is what I capture with my images. Photographer and artist from Austria. His work is primarily focused on portraits and collodion wet plates. Which he has also received several awards for. He loves taking time for his photography to create special images together with the customer. After years in sports, he specialized in portraiture, weddings (and other events) and virtual tours. He was always amazed about the human variety and started a worldwide street portrait project where he used medium and large format cameras. This deceleration lead him to the wet plate collodion process. Besides magazines and newspapers, you can find his pictures in a book. He writes also articles for a professional journal, has a column in a Magazine and gives workshops. His wet plate collodion work was documented in several TV documentaries, from youtubers and other media.
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loris viotto on The Analog Side of the Biggest Photography Fair in Austria

Comment posted: 15/01/2025

...Bravissimo .....!
......!!
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