I bought my Holga when I was in university, back in 2009. I don’t remember how I heard about them, but I do remember spending a lot of time on the Lomography website back then and I remember wanting to shoot lots of 120 film but I didn’t have any money to buy a professional medium format camera.
I bought the CYMK version with the multi-coloured flash because of course I did. I was 19 and really, I was buying a plastic camera, I didn’t want it to blend in or look like a proper camera. In fact, it was dubbed the Fisher Price camera by my photography friends. Honestly, it didn’t get a lot of use and eventually ended up on my camera shelf, not because I didn’t enjoy it but because even back then, I had G.A.S. (that is Gear Acquisition Syndrome for the uninitiated).
Anyway, since 2017 I have been moving back into film since burning-out on digital a bit and I decided to take the Holga for a spin at the Abbey Medieval Festival, an annual event held in July in Caboolture by the Abbey Museum of Art and Archaeology. There’s nothing like SE Queensland in winter: cool breeze, clear blue skies and the bright sun – perfect for a fixed aperture, fixed shutter plastic camera. I also decided to shoot Kodak Ektar, which due to it’s high saturation, was the perfect choice to capture the colours of the festival.
Elderflower Ephemera 