Lomography Partners: Zontiga of Selangor, Malaysia

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Come one, come all. Lomography has partners all over the world to help serve your analogue needs. If you're from Malaysia then it's your lucky day! We're featuring our Selangor-based stockist Zontiga in today's installment of Lomography Partners.

© Zontiga

Can you introduce yourself to the Lomography community?

Zontiga was born out of a love for photography in its tangible form.

Curated by a small team of photography specialists, we are a quaint studio space that offers a selection of limited edition photobooks, magazines, and merchandise from independent publishers and creators, featuring Asian photographers and regional perspectives.

Situated in Petaling Jaya’s nostalgic district of Taman Paramount, our space is a haven for photography in its physical form. Inside, you’ll find a bookshop, a library of rare, out-of-print, and signed photography books, an event space for creative gatherings and showcase, a film lab, and a darkroom where we work closely with photographers to hand-process film stock to bring their visions to life.

What does analogue mean to you?

There are infinite possibilities with analogue photography. In a way, there's no such thing as a mistake in analogue. Every "mistake" is just a variation that's never been explored before.

What does Lomography mean to you?

Lomography represents a brave experimentative way of photography. They are challenging the status quo with unconventional means.

© Zontiga

Why do you choose to work with Lomography?

Lomography displayed great passion for photography and is part and parcel of the support of the photography community—actively promoting the medium from various aspects. The values that they hold align with ours and we are honored to work with a team like Lomography.

What is your favorite Lomography product and why?

I especially like LomoChrome Metropolis for the colors. It's like in between black & white and colored films. Generally, colors are information. The colors in LomoChrome Metropolis are slightly muted, which makes it less distracting. They take the eyes off loud colors and more into a deeper sense of emotion, without eliminating information entirely.

Are you doing any creative projects right now in the store or personally? Please tell us more about them.

Zontiga is launching photography workshops to spread the love for photography, whether it is mainstream or alternative photography. Through our workshops, we hope to cultivate the beauty and love for photography, as well as build a community with like-minded people.

We also initiated a Photobook Grant Award and we're looking forward to seeing our awardee's work come to life.

© Zontiga

What does the future of analogue photography look like to you? How do you think this will impact your store in the next ten years?

There is a fair share of challenges, especially with supplies becoming more scarce, affecting the economic aspect. Because at this age, analogue photography is not the mainstream medium. But just like any other non-mainstream industry, they prevailed, and we are hopeful that so will we.

What hardship did your shop/lab have to face during the lockdowns and what kept you going through these hard times?

Through hard times, it is evidenced that we as humans are always able to find a way out of our struggles. Despite the lockdown, while shops were closed and people were forced to stay home, we saw that many people continued shooting at home. When our shop opened, we saw the results of their continuous efforts in doing things they love and are passionate about. That was very motivating.

Quick Questions

What's the most annoying thing about running an analogue lab?

Sadly, not many people care to take their negatives back. We hope people would see the importance of keeping their negatives as their main archival pieces.

What's your favorite memory from the lab so far?

Moving to this new location and retiring our old Fujifilm processor and replacing it with the Noritsu.

© Zontiga

What's the weirdest thing you have received when developing films?

Nothing in particular, occasionally we receive a huge load of films (4x5, slides, etc) for projects which require us to hand-process and work through the nights to complete them within the dateline. We try to be supportive whenever we can, so we encourage customers to approach us for any of their needs.

What would you do if you didn’t run a photo lab?

Most likely something that's photography-related still. Running a photobook shop and library, which we've started doing and will continue to expand.

Vital Information

Official Name: Zontiga
Began Accepting Film for Developing: 2020
Address: No.21A, Jalan 20/13, Taman Paramount, 46300 Petaling Jaya, Selangor
Services offered: C41 and B&W film processing and scanning. Films retail. Printing (photo and art papers), photography workshops
Film lab staff: 8


Want to see your favorite store featured in our magazine? Please send us an email at wholesaleinquiries@lomography.com and we will check them out!

written by cheeo on 2022-05-17 #people #places #partners #film-lab #zontiga #stockists #lomography-partners

3 Comments

  1. hervinsyah
    hervinsyah ·

    Lovely film lab & that classic jukebox 💕

  2. hervinsyah
    hervinsyah ·

    @klawe OMG, you was lived at that era, sir 😁✌

  3. pe4ce_dude
    pe4ce_dude ·

    I love the film vending machine!! I showed it to a older co-worker and he said those were once quite common to see. 👍👍

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