Why Analogue Portrait, Wedding, and Event Studios Are Rare in the UK: Infrastructure, Craft, and the Global Landscape

Analogue film photography is a working professional medium in cities such as Los Angeles, Berlin, Tokyo, and New York. Portrait studios, wedding photographers, and event specialists in those places continue to work on film because the infrastructure that supports analogue workflows never disappeared. Labs stayed open, cinematographers kept shooting on film, universities continued teaching it, and creative industries carried on commissioning it as part of their normal practice. Film remained part of the working vocabulary rather than becoming a curiosity. I’ve worked throughout the UK, USA and Europe over the decades, and since the late 1990’s the differences have grown between countries and continents for very different reasons.