Travis Brown's Favorite 35mm Film Photos of 2024: A Year of Creative Exploration

Although most of us are ready to forget last year as soon as our clocks change. I think it’s important to say goodbye to the last 365 (or 66) days we were subjected to. To help me with my annual shake down, I asked a few of my friends if they would tell a story for CAMOUFLAGE about their 2024. The only parameter was that there were none… So I hope you enjoy seeing, reading about, and listening to, some of my super talented friend’s favorite stuff from last year :)

35MM

Shooting without a small monitor on the back of the camera changes everything. There is no immediate preview of what you just captured. You can’t approach a shot with a guess and check plan. Your option is to try your best to line up the shot, adjust the light settings, fire the shutter, and then move the hell on.

That’s what has made me fall in love with this medium. The emphasis is moved earlier in the process - more forethought it required. A few extra seconds up front because after the camera clicks, the shot is done. This essential detail, along with the fact that it costs about a dollar every time I take a picture, puts the importance on being in the moment unlike any other image medium I’ve used.

Years ago, my mother gave me an old film camera that she found at a garage sale in Nashville. I never used it until my fancy Canon digital was stolen. I had recently switched to shooting fully manual on that camera, which made my transition into shooting on the Canon A1 35mm film body eerily seamless.

I started shooting film in March of 2021, two black and white rolls, and I smashed it. Just about 70/70 shots came out exactly as I had blindly intended. After that I was sold, and for the last (soon to be) four years it has been my weapon of choice for capturing moments as I see them.

My style of film photography is slow, I typically take close to a month to shoot all 36 exposures on a roll.

I dislike taking multiple photos from the same spot, and I resent retaking any photo. With the exception of a family photo, more often than not there is ample chance to capture in one try.

The photo isn’t intended to be inclusive, capturing everything or everyone, it is meant to cleanly provide an article from that moment that can catalyst a more vibrant memory. That’s how I would describe my style. I find myself going for a few different types of shots to capture moments, these methods develop over time. In this article I will breakdown some of my common techniques and showcase some personal favorites from 2024.

DOUBLE EXPOSURES

Quite possibly my favorite technique with film is the double exposure. This is a natural phenomenon that can only happen organically with film.

Simply put, you take a picture, then just take another picture on top of it. With film when you shoot a photo you are exposing a piece of light sensitive material, effectively burning the image onto something physical.

After taking that photo you wind the camera which pulls the reel of film along to a fresh section for your next shot. But what if the film never advances, and you now take the second picture directly on top of the first. Bang, double exposure. The blending of the images happens 100% naturally inside the camera – that’s the beauty of it! No post work touch ups ever in these doubles.

‘Falcon Jerry’ at Unique Photo’s annual exhibition — 2024

Even though doubles can be achieved on most film cameras, rarely do I see photographers intentionally going for this.

Often it will happen by accident, sometimes during development, and the result will be pretty cool, but the images will be completely unrelated and the result will look accidental.

I discovered this technique early in my film journey and started using it very intentionally. I’m going to get into two double exposure styles that I have discovered through trial. The first I call “IMBEDDED HEADLINE,” the second (which gradually came about this year) I call “FLIPPED DOUBLES.”

DOUBLE EXPOSURES: “IMBEDDED HEADLINE”

In Imbedded Headline - one image will be busier, showing the actual scene. The other image, typically taken second, would be some sort of bold marquee, often wording and often a neon sign. Going to let the images do the rest of the talking here. Enjoy.

Montreal, Summer 2024

COPA America and 2024 EURO, Summer 2024

Music City Vintage, Summer 2024

33rd Street PATH, Winter 2024

Brooklyn, October 2024

‘3300’ - Bonnie Flo and her engine, Spring 2024

DOUBLE EXPOSURES: “FLIPPED DOUBLES”

I’ve always been into framing. Landscape vs portrait: the orientation battle. In that last double exposure, I did both, the car was portrait and the engine was landscape, a nice segway into this section.

FLIPPED doubles, quite self explanatorily, have two images in different orientations. This year I started shooting doubles fully upside-down, which actually requires me to hold the camera upside-down and fire the shutter with my left thumb instead of my right index.

Below was the first FLIPPED I took. I was waiting to pick up my buddy Mully for soccer practice. He was living in this beautiful apartment building right by the water, but I couldn’t get the skyline and him emerging from the building in the same shot. I thought screw it, flip the skyline.

This shot turned out awesome, so I started looking for other opportunities for FLIPPED doubles.

A few months later, I went with Mully and other lads to the shore, and I took a few other upside -downs. Starting to get the feel for it. The double ocean with the surfer was a great step in the right direction, and became one of my favorites of the year.

‘Seagull feet’ Sea Girt, NJ, Summer 2024

You can see the momentum was building. The next time I found myself trying for a FLIPPED double was another few months later at sunset at the Nashville Airport. Airports are a great place for photos, more on that in the next section. The practice of the previous shots and a bit of luck culminated this evening in July, where I captured this image - a personal favorite of the year, and my favorite FLIPPED double to date.

PLAYING AROUND WITH THE UPSIDE-DOWN

In lieu of getting used to shooting with the camera upside-down, some playful upside-down reflection images started to appear in my rolls. You see how the inspiration trail paves itself. Here’s a few from the year.

AIR AND SPACE

Window Seat, Solar Eclipses, and Lunar-Sight make up this section of the 2024 highlights entitled Air and Space. We’ll get right into it.

WINDOW SEAT

The best seat on an airline for someone with a keen eye is any window seat on the correct side of the airplane. Unless you’re really involved and know the direction you are taking off from/landing at in that particular city, any old window seat will do. I’ve gotten in the habit of making sure I have my camera with lens at my seat for takeoff. Here’s some lucky moments I captured from an airline seat.

Percy Priest Lake via Southwest, Nashville, 2024

SOLAR ECLIPSES

In 2024 there were numerous opportunities to see a solar eclipse. Lucky for the hive-sight peeps, I’ve captured two. We will start man made and then go divine.

I told you airports are unreal for photos. This next shot is another personal favorite from the year.

From the window I was at I could see the planes taking off, and noticed a few of them flew directly in front of the sun. If I turned the light way down on the camera, I knew the only way the plane would be visible is if I could snipe it directly in front of the sun. Sunglasses on the face and another pair held in front of the lens, this shot was immensely lucky.

On April 8th, for the first time since 2017, the moon fully eclipsed the sun visible from continental U.S. I missed totality in 2017, so this year I took off a day from work and drove up to Mexico, NY, just in the line of totality, to watch the earth go dark for three minutes.

It was eerie and incredible. On the beach of Lake Ontario with a few hundred other people, here’s some definite favorites of 2024.

LUNAR-SIGHT

Few lunar shots I captured this year. The moon changes every night. 1 moon, 2 moons, many moons… Double and quadruple exposures here.

HONORABLE MENTIONS

HIVESIGHT X INK’d!

My absolute mate, Aedan, was working on his tattoo sleeve this year and asked me to capture a photo for it. This photo was taken in Sea Girt and not long after was put on his arm.

HIVESIGHT for MERCI BEAUCOUP

Merci Beaucoup highlight! Your creative director himself, Eli, and his business partner, my brother, Clark. Posted in front of a beautiful El Dorado. Go get you some MB!

Thank you CAMOFLAGE for the feature.

We are excited for the launch of HIVESIGHT’S website. Stay tuned in 2025.

HIVESIGHT for CAMOFLAUGE

@hivesight.main

HIVESIGHT

CONTENTS:

35MM

DOUBLE EXPOSURES

DOUBLE EXPOSURES: “FLIPPED DOUBLES”

AIR AND SPACE

HONORABLE MENTIONS

What's the meaning of it all anyways?

Archer Vintage: Top 10 of 2024