I'm Nick Davis. For about 25 years I made television — documentaries mostly, for the BBC, National Geographic, Discovery, that sort of thing. Lots of places, lots of cameras, lots of budgets that had actual numbers on them.
Somewhere along the way I picked up a medium format camera and everything got more interesting. Slower. More deliberate. Also more expensive and considerably more infuriating. I started filming myself working through it — what works, what doesn't, what I cock up on the first try — and that turned into the 120ist on YouTube.
This site is where I write the bits YouTube isn't great for. Longer guides, proper notes, photo sets, and an actual browseable archive of the channel.
What you'll find here
Guides on cameras, films, formats, developing, scanning, and the occasional deep dive into something properly obscure. An archive of the channel, sorted so you can actually find what you want. Photo sets from the projects I'm working on. Not much else.
Other things I do
When I'm not pretending to know what I'm doing with a film camera, I run a few other things: CoMagnify (small-business marketing training), CC3 (content and media services), and delta6 (visual content for the construction industry). Between them they keep me in film and developer.
Get in touch
The easiest way: drop me a line via the channel, or email hello@the120.ist. I'm slow to reply — not rude, just busy — but I do read everything.
If you want to keep up without checking back, there's an RSS feed, or just subscribe on YouTube.