Hong Kong Gen Z: Analogue in a Digital Era

This article is the third in a series about Hong Kong’s Generation Z. Born between the late 1990s and early 2010s, this generation accounts for 1.6 million people or 22 percent of the population. In this series researched and written by Gen Z writers, Zolima looks at how this generation is coming of age.

For the generation that came of age with virtual graduation ceremonies and a practically non-existent college life, the Covid-19 pandemic turned out to be the perfect time to divert to their creative streak. Take the film photo dump. You might have come across one when you were doom-scrolling on Instagram, secretly wondering why everyone is hopping on the bandwagon. More than just a trend, however, these lo-fi candids of occasional mahjong gatherings or hiking at 2pm on a Tuesday have added a pop of authenticity to the highly polished Instagram landscape. 

For many, what started as an aesthetic inspiration became a full-fledged frenzy. “I started film photography a few years ago to record memories from my high school graduation,” says Jennifer Tsim, a university student who has since become fascinated by the analogue medium. “There’s no take two. So even if the photo turns out sucks, that moment is still worth capturing to me.” 

It turns out this was not just another pandemic hobby left behind along with Covid restrictions. Film photography is here to stay. As digital natives with built-in social media expertise — people who use AI in their academic essays — Gen Z seems to be an unlikely generation to obsess over analogue trends like their millennial counterparts. In Hong Kong, Instagram remains a popular platform for this generation, with 69 percent glued to the app multiple times a day. A 2024 Forbes study acknowledged the rising popularity of TikTok and other short-form content for businesses, hair and makeup, but found Instagram to be the primary source of lifestyle and aesthetic inspiration. (TikTok is not available in Hong Kong, further cementing Instagram’s dominance.) The photo-sharing nature of Instagram makes it the go-to platform for showcasing creative hobbies and projects. 

On top of that, photography was voted the number one Gen Z hobby according to research by Samsung in 2022. However, contrary to airbrushed, Pinterest-worthy photos with perfect lighting, authenticity is key for Gen Z when it comes to their style and aesthetic. For casual hobbyists, it means photo dump accounts – digital scrapbooks of candid moments with friends at ultra-wide y2k angles, captured on a pre-loved disposable film camera they got for a bargain at the Apliu Street flea market in Sham Shui Po. 

Gen Z — which is made up of people born in the late 1990s and early 2000s — is certainly not the first generation to fall in love with the allure of analogue photography. In the 1990s, the global Lomography movement began when a group of students in Vienna started experimenting with a Soviet-era compact camera, the Lomo LC-A, that yielded unpredictable results. A few decades ahead, the spirit of creative experimentation and individuality through imperfections continues to draw many young people to film photography. 

The growing interest in film photography among Gen Z in Hong Kong is part of a global trend, says Nikki Cheung, digital marketing manager at Lomography Hong Kong. Gen Z benefits from the best of both worlds of digital and analogue technologies. “Their works are characterised by visual storytelling and exploring hybrid art forms by merging analogue and digital mediums,” she says. They enjoy experimenting with different types of films, cameras and techniques, such as using the endangered 120 medium format film and simple-to-operate reusable film cameras. With a renewed interest among younger generations, film photography is clearly not going anywhere soon. Lomography HK currently partners with 18 film developing shops, and while the rise of digital photography has challenged many traditional film developing shops, quite a number of new ones have opened in these years. 

Richin Chin and Celia Chan were in their final year of university in 2020 when they turned their love of film photography into something close to a full-time job. They founded Yatgyun, a community-based film developing shop that doubles as a treasure trove of vintage cameras and film stock. Situated on the steep Hill Road beneath the iconic rollercoaster-esque flyover, the shop is a popular hangout for students from the nearby University of Hong Kong. Their customer base ranges from high school students to recently more middle-aged customers who were inspired to dust off their rusty old film cameras.

Chin says it was a spur-of-the-moment decision to open the shop during Covid in 2020. It was an unforgettable experience juggling their responsibilities as an entrepreneur and college student. “One time I had a Zoom presentation but was on [shop] duty that day. I ended up presenting on Zoom while frantically handling change from my customers,” he recalls. Thankfully Yatgyun’s business started to get on track after that, and despite facing as many challenges as any other young business owner, they have remained a mainstay in Shek Tong Tsui. 

The neighbouring shops on Hill Road have been a close-knit community, organising cultural and creative activities such as the 2022 Po Tuck Fest; Yatgyun was invited to organise photo walks with the other shops. “It really helped us to connect with the community and genuinely interact with everyone,” says Chin. In the photo walk albums in their shop and on their Instagram page, Yatgyun continues to introduce special photo spots in Hong Kong, hoping to share their joy of film photography in Hong Kong. 

Though it may have found a new generation of fans in Gen Z, Hong Kong has a long history with film photography. It has been home to two of the world’s most beloved toy cameras, Diana and Holga, which have developed a global cult following. Stanley Street in Central was known colloquially as Camera Street by many 1980s photography enthusiasts; it was once lined with a dozen photography supply shops, including the old-time favourite Chung Pui Photo Supplies, which closed down in June last year after five decades in operation. Film developing shops in Hong Kong were in their golden age in the 1970s to 1990s, providing efficient film developing services that were in high demand, especially during holiday travel seasons. Then came digital cameras at the end of the 1990s.

Nostalgia has always been ingrained in the zeitgeist of Hong Kong’s urban visual culture. Compared to other places in the world, Hong Kong’s unique nocturnal cityscape of neon lights and busy street life provides an excellent backdrop for shooting “low-light and street photography,” according to Lomography HK. Perhaps that would explain the recurring motif of the city’s streets layered with neon signs and old edifices, essentially a melting pot of nostalgia and futurism when you look up “Hong Kong aesthetic” on Google.

The city has offered endless inspiration to notable photographers and artists based here. From Fan Ho, whose monochrome photos depicted urban life within the light and shadows of mid-century Hong Kong alleys, to Greg Girard’s work chronicling Hong Kong’s neon-saturated 1970s nightlife and the legendary Kowloon Walled City, film photography in Hong Kong often evokes a sense of longing and memory of a bygone era. Even to this day, Gen Z across the globe are obsessed with getting the “Wong Kar-wai look” in their film shots, the lush urban visuals in the auteur’s era-defining 1990s films which shaped much of the global popular imagination of Hong Kong. 

Mementos of old Hong Kong like vanishing tong laus or neon signs are often documented in Gen Z film photography. But it is nothing less than a collective déjà vu. In fact, the resurgent wave of visual nostalgia has swept across many generations of Hongkongers. “In the 2000s, urban redevelopment projects triggered heritage preservation campaigns; people were also taking photographs to document the disappearing urban landscapes,” says Desmond Sham Hok-man, assistant professor at the cultural, media and visual studies department at the University of Nottingham. “In a moment of uncertainty, the common experiences of the past, quite often a romanticised one, can be mobilised to build a collective or cultural identity,” he tells us. 

For Hong Kong’s overseas diaspora, these cultural images of old Hong Kong are “channels to preserve their heritage, express their cultural identity, and dialogue with local communities,” says Sham. For Gen Z, a more personal and spontaneous take on film photography can be observed, with sentimental photos and captions. With social media as a tool for sharing and community building, the vibrant local analogue photography community actively combines nostalgia and creativity, drawing upon elements in Hong Kong’s visual culture to keep it alive, one film photo at a time. 

Zoie Ma wrote this article as part of Zolima CityMag’s summer internship programme.

All photos, except for those by Jennifer Tsim, are provided courtesy of Lomography Asia. The photographers are of various ages.