We as photographers spend 1000’s on fashionable digital sensors, then spend much more hours making them seem like low-cost movie from the 70s and 80s. The irony is thick, however the pattern is actual. Film simulations are in all places, from in-camera profiles to countless Lightroom preset collections promising that elusive “film look.”
Where does this come from? It’s partly Instagram aesthetics, and partly nostalgia for a format most digital photographers by no means obtained to work together with. There’s a real response in opposition to the “digital look” too—that medical sharpness and excellent colour rendition that feels sterile in comparison with movie’s natural qualities. The downside is distinguishing between a authentic artistic software and procrastination theatre.
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In the days of the darkroom, you chose your film to get the final look before you even took a photo. Using film simulations can be a legitimate technique when you understand what characteristics you’re after. Grain structure, color response, highlight rolloff, latitude. Those are technical qualities that serve specific aesthetic goals. But blindly applying presets designed to match someone else’s work most likely under completely different conditions? That’s chasing aesthetics without understanding the whys and hows.
The workflow question matters too. Applying film looks in-camera forces commitment. You’re making creative decisions while shooting, not deferring them to post. In Lightroom, film simulations can become another settings menu to obsess over rather than a tool that serves the work. How much time is spent tweaking grain versus actually shooting and improving?
There’s a deeper issue about what we’re really saying when we add grain and reduce sharpness to perfect digital files. Are modern sensors just too clean and sharp? Or have we just become accustomed to film’s limitations as shorthand for authenticity? When does the film look actually serve your subject matter versus when it’s comfort food for your post-processing?
The biggest trap, though, is chasing someone else’s style instead of developing your own. Your lighting is different. Your subjects are different. Your camera processes color differently. Blindly applying someone else’s recipe rarely produces the results you’re expecting, and stunts your ability to (pardon the pun) develop your own recognisable style.
Film simulations aren’t the problem per se. The problem is treating them as a solution to not knowing what you want your images to look like. They become a substitute for vision rather than a tool to achieve it.
If you consider Ansel Adams’ views on previsualization, you should already know how you want the final photo to look. Yes, there is a creative gap initially, but blindly hoping for a look won’t get you there.
If you shot actual film, you know what’s being simulated. The latitude, the grain, the color shifts. You understand which characteristics matter for your work and which are just nostalgia. If you didn’t, you’re chasing a fantasy version of something you never experienced.
The honest question: does this film simulation serve your image, or are you just uncomfortable with what digital capture actually looks like? Sometimes the answer is the former. But, often it’s the latter.