Filmneverdie Shooters - An interview with Jorge Rebello

So, where do you come from & what do you do for a living?

I am from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. I have a daily job as a FM-jock on a local station; also do voice-overs and dubbing sessions independently - so I am a narrator/voice-over talent, got a home studio and stuff. I am not a pro photog.

How young are you? Even if you are old in age we believe you are young in heart, because you still want to shoot film :D

59. And, yes, I feel very young at heart and very happy to have photography as one of my passions for live - the other are music (I play the piano, love ELP, - will miss Emerson and Lake forever) and motorcycles (just sold a H-D to buy a Boneville, a dream since my early teens)

How did you become inspired to shoot on film?

Film was my starting point. My first camera was a BW-only, 127-film jewel called Kodak Rio-400; this was in 1966, I was a little kid, whose father loved photography and owned a Nikon F and a home lab; I'm proud to say that I still use it.

What format do you shoot? 35mm, Polaroid, 8 x 10 etc

I shoot 35mm, half-frame, 120, 127, 126, 110 and Polaroid integral and peel-apart. I have about 60 cameras, 20 lenses and a ton of gear - and I think the Nikon F2 is the best all-mechanical camera ever made.

Why do you like this format?

I use all this because I like experimenting; I like portraits, nudes... to try to tell a story in a single image; to spark the viewer's imagination; to develop different formats, something I do regularly. I also like to respool and reload modern film to old formats, like 127, rapid, 126... I love, just L-O-V-E , to shoot Instamatics with flashcubes. Part of my goal is to get good images using very basic equipment and adverse conditions, like 50-year-old-films, develop color with BW chemistry and so on.

Where do you see the future of analogue photography?

Unfortunally, I see most people too anxious, maybe a reflex of today's technology madness - they don't look closely to what's being offered to them. I think you should try to understand the reasons behind "the new", but people seems to never have the time.

Digital imaging is useful, alright. But, the very action of taking a film picture shows why it is so more human and artful: you take your shot and think, plan about the next; with digital you take a shot and go look at the camera's back... anxiety.

So, I pray for analogue heaven to be kept on, because I believe there are angels enough around... Maybe something like what happens to the record industry, which have many new releases on vinyl, can also happen to us... C'mon Fuji, make an instant camera and keep peel-apart film living !

What is a dream project that you want to work on?

I have a pictorial book in mind, shot, developed and scanned at home. I have been shooting my wife - a former model - for the last 7 or 8 years, employing all the stuff I have: Polaroid, 110, 126, medium-format... I've recorded tech data, so it is going to be both art and tech-minded. And I truly like the idea of having this produced on a real husband-wife basis, over the years.

Where can we find out more about your work?

I have a Flickr page (who doesn't ?) -www.flickr.com/photos/roger-r/- where I post some of my informal work. Most images are film-made, as I shot digital too, but not with the passion I have for film

Maybe my mind works better for film, my eyes see better BW than color... My D-7100 sits in the cabinet much more than my F's, or Instamatics, or Pens. My Flickr top-ten are all analogue.