Sandra Coan

Sandra Coan is an award winning newborn and family photographer, industry education, and best-selling author. 

In addition to running her busy Seattle, WA studio, Sandra teaches other photographers from around the world how to create consistency in the work and sustainability

in their brand and business.

I started my business in 1999, and have worked with film

from the beginning. I choose film because my goal is to create timeless images for my clients. 

I want their baby’s photos to have the same sense of nostalgia that their grandparents' baby photos have. 

Film helps me create that.

I also choose film because I know I can trust it.

I don’t know what the future holds. 

I don’t know if we will be able to open and view a CD or a thumb drive or even what will happen to “cloud storage” in ten, twenty or 100 years from now. 



What I do know is that the floppy disks I used in college are obsolete, but the film negatives I have from my own childhood and even from my parent’s childhood are still printable. 

I know that when I shoot a roll of film the lab will scan it and send it to me as a jpeg file that I can then save on my computer and share with my clients. 

But, if (God forbid) something were to cause my computer or my hard drives to crash, there would still be the negatives, and those images would not be lost.

I choose film because shooting film

makes me a better photographer. 

It slows me down. 

It makes me think. 

It allows me to look up from my camera and connect with the people I’m working with. 

Most importantly though,

I choose film because it brings me joy. 

I share that joy with my clients and it comes

through in my images.

It also inspires me, which means I love my job and even after 16 years of doing it, I never feel burned out. 

In fact, I look forward to each and every session I shoot and am looking forward to many more years to come.

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