The 7. District is probably one of our favourite districts in Vienna. We mostly visit it when we are out to grab some food or search for new camera gear. Nowadays, the district is known for its students’ popularity, which reflects in the shops and the people you will find roaming the area. It offers whatever the heart desires, from small passages over a large shopping street to a great variety of camera shops.

We are especially keen on visiting the “Neubau” given the multiple camera shops in the “Westbahnstraße”. Here you can find anything from film over digital to analogue cameras. To us, this street is truly precious, given that it is a place where dreams become true or die. While we might have been lucky enough to acquire our grail cameras here, we simultaneously had to give up on our hopes of being financially stable for the next decade. All jokes aside, the street offers a great choice of camera shops where you could potentially make a good deal. We even got lucky and found some Fuji Pro 400H for 12€ a roll which seems reasonable when looking at current market prices.

You should also consider visiting Vienna’s 7. District as the “Neubaugasse” offers excellent lighting, producing clear reflections in the windows of the storefronts, making it the perfect place to get some nice shots. Given its popularity with students, it is also a place to find more exciting subjects to do street photography. Usually, people are in a rush, but it still shouldn’t prevent you from capturing compelling stories or sights. Just watch out for your camera because the sidewalk is quite narrow and usually crowded. You should also visit this place if you are into vintage clothing and affordable food. Especially the streets around the “Neubaugasse” offer a great variety of restaurants with delicious meals.

Furthermore, we advise you to visit the “Museumsquartier”, which in our experience is mostly crowded on sunny afternoons with either students or tourists and in the evenings with people enjoying their drink after work. As the name already reveals, the “Museumsquartier” is a quarter with a variety of museums and exhibition halls. Those museums offer great versatility of art pieces from a set of different genres and exhibitions with extraordinary framings so that any art lover should find something they like. We also suggest visiting the “MQ” as the rooftop of the “Leopold Museum” lends itself perfectly to shooting portraits and taking pictures of the city from above.

The film we shot in The 7. District Neubau

For the pictures used in this blog, we relied on three different film stocks in most of our work. We have been especially keen on using Kodak Gold, Kodak Tri-X and Agfa 400 APX for reasons that will be explained in the following paragraphs.

Starting with Kodak Gold, we use it partially because it allows for a more upfront approach while photographing. Given its price point and its characteristic soft and light look, the film enables us to take pictures without worrying about the financial aspect of film photography. It also allows us to frame more colourful and cheerful stories. We also use this film stock for much personal photography as it lends itself perfectly to enjoying the art of analogue photography and creating meaningful memories. The warm colours and the characteristic grain of a 200-speed film make it the perfect medium to create seemingly timeless shots filled with emotion and the play of light.

We already stated many advantages of Agfa APX 400, which wins us over with its milky and ´silver´ look.  Its characteristic features give pictures a timeless feel and aura while not lacking in depth or diversity. We truly appreciate the ability of this film just to present a variety of interesting and seemingly ´flowing´ greyscales. Also, given its price point, it can be shot freely without having to worry that one’s financial stability is at stake. While we only tested this film with a Leica M2 with a Summarit f/1,5 50mm lens as well as a Rollei 35TE with a 40mm Tessar lens, we do think that it doesn´t get the credit it deserves. It primarily performs well in everyday street photography and works perfectly fine with vintage glass without rendering pictures too unsharp.

The very last film we wanted to mention here is Tri-X. While many things we already pointed out don´t hold for Tri-X, we still believe that it is a film every analogue photographer should at least try once. Affordability might not be the strength of this Kodak Professional film stock, but this doesn´t really mean that we don´t enjoy using it. Its sharp grain and strong contrast are diametrically opposed to the qualities of Agfa 400 APX but still hold their own charm. The film provides pictures in bright lighting conditions with pure whites and dark blacks making it a perfect allrounder for all types of film photography. From street over the landscape to portrait photography, it provides a great base for exciting pictures. The only thing we always saw as a kind of hurdle when using this film was its price. While we cannot really blame the film for it but only ourselves, we always felt inhibited when using it. This is mostly linked to the fact that we used it when we both started photography and burned through rolls that just came out badly. We probably never recovered from this trauma, so that might also explain our more reserved view on Tri-X.

We hope that you enjoyed this small tour through the 7. District and hope that you will find an opportunity to visit soon. If you haven’t seen our previous posts, check out the series.

About us: We are Joe (@jb__shoots) and Christophe (@victoshot), two students at Vienna University who started photography in 2019/2020 and share a passion for showing the beauty of our go-to city.

Also, check out:

http://fotoleutner.at (our lab of choice located in the 7. District)

https://www.wien.info/en/lifestyle-scene/trendy/neubaugasse-shopping-353766

https://www.neubaugasse.at