It’s fitting that Utah-based photographer Jonathan Canlas and I meet for a long chat at Forty Three Bakery in Salt Lake City, just a stone’s throw from his third theFINDlab location.
The eatery was a coffee warehouse in the 40s, and has a fading mural on its outside bricks as evidence. It became an auto shop, closed, and was revamped into the historic establishment it is today, complete with concrete floors, exposed rafters/ventilation, and plenty of natural light to shoot photos in.
The old-made-new surroundings mirror a message Canlas has long preached: Newer doesn’t always mean better. When the world collectively decided to switch from analog camera shooting to digital photography, he chose otherwise and stayed put, teaching FIND (short for Film Is Not Dead) workshops to those wanting to either learn or better their craft all over the world. The demand for what he offers — quality processing coupled with education — led Canlas to open a film processing lab in Orem in 2011. A second space on a busy corner of Provo’s Center Street followed in 2024, and his Salt Lake City lab opened its doors in early 2025.
“Young kids love finding their parents’ camera and slowing down,” Canlas says. “The difference between shooting film and digital photography is the difference between being present and showing up. With film, you have to think about what you’re doing; you’ve got 10-36 photos available to you. On a digital card, you have 5000. I’m telling you right now, you don’t have 5000 ideas — let alone 5000 thoughts — in a single day.”
As his newest location quickly finds its feet in Salt Lake — receiving over 100 rolls of film from customers some days —it is confirmation that even though digital photography is the easier route, the ongoing trend toward creating tangible keepsakes hasn’t gone away. If anything, it’s growing. Canlas compares it to those who choose buying vinyl or cassette tapes at independent record stores over streaming: convenience is hardly the point.
“Digital photography has its place, but I love the intentionality of shooting with film. It allows people who’ve burned out to get the fire back under their mind again,” Canlas says. “I know a lot of digital photographers who don’t even want to pick their camera back up when they’re done shooting because it feels too much like work. But whether you pay me or not, I’m going to shoot because the act of shooting film is amazing.”
Canlas has shot film photography since 1999, leading him to conduct photography workshops sharing his techniques with others worldwide, in places like Cuba, Australia and Japan — but that’s not how he got started.
A workshop goes worldwide
In the onset, Canlas cut his teeth in the industry in related-but-different ways; shooting weddings was his “bread and butter” for nearly two decades. He shifted to doing family sessions — which is what he mostly does now — and he taught workshops, lots and lots of workshops. In fact, the monthly Film Is Not Dead workshop began in 2008 as a way of promoting film photography through 2015 before he ended it, the final four workshops taking place in Berlin, Mexico, Hawaii and Australia.
Doing his workshops has yielded big results, especially for those who’ve taken his shared knowledge to heart. One workshop affected an attendee so deeply that it proved pivotal in her own career. After Utah-based photographer D’Arcy Benincosa participated, she learned how to better establish her style, and it ultimately allowed her to part ways with school teaching and embrace a new path in photography.
“[Canlas] also took us behind the scenes on how much money he was making and that blew my mind,” Benincosa says. “He was making six figures in print sales, and I didn’t know that was even possible, that you could be an artist and earn that much. If he could do that, I thought, so could I, and I made [photography] my career.”
Part of Canlas’ decision to call it quits on the workshops was because it was taking away from his six children far too often. Being gone for up to two weeks every month caused him to feel like a tourist in his own home. So, he shifted his workshops into an online experience to still allow others the opportunity.
Now that his children have grown older, the winds of change are shifting all over again. After not doing in-person workshops for over a decade, Canlas is bringing it back this year, an experience he’s calling Film Is Not Dead 2.0, with workshops scheduled throughout the rest of 2025 locally in Utah, California, New York City and many others planned worldwide.
Outside of creating opportunities for film enthusiasts to learn how to shoot film better, Canlas is busy creating his footprint in Utah as a way of establishing greater opportunities for photographers locally. Even though he admits he’s doing it backwards — having already taught film workshops on other continents — it’s connected to a larger plan to establish his brand in this state.
“I’m giving people access, that’s it,” Canlas says. “That’s all the FIND lab is, really: it’s a presence. Here’s a cool thing I believe in that’s amazing. Interact with it however you want.”
As workshops and physical locations increase, so do opportunities to discover, ask questions about and explore the world of film photography.
“Slowing down cleans up my edits, allowing me to be exactly where I want to be: behind the camera. I don’t consider myself an artist. Artists come up with concepts. I’m able to show up and see beauty.”
— Jonathan Canlas
Location, location, location
But initially, building a photo lab was a way to save money.
The genesis story goes like this: Canlas used a photo lab in Provo called Campus Photo, right up until it went out of business. He bought their scanner and developer as a way to cut costs, as he wanted to do away with needing to pay $15 per roll hundreds of times over to have them developed. After that, he hired employees to scan and develop for him.
In 2011, photo labs were going away altogether, and it was becoming increasingly difficult to get film developed. Costco was getting rid of that service, as was Walgreens and CVS. A select few larger labs were available, but amateur photographers just starting out couldn’t always afford to pay for their services, Canlas says.
According to the company’s site, theFINDlab began as an extension of the FIND workshop to create as much opportunity for attendees to shoot as much film as possible. While the lab’s services were only available to attendees of the FIND workshop at first, demand led Canlas in a new direction, and services were opened up to all film shooters.
“I was a trusted person in the industry at the time,” Canlas says, mentioning that he was sponsored by Fuji and Kodak then. “I was the film guy. The workshop grew, and a lot of current established shooters got their start coming to my workshop.”
The Provo location didn’t open until 2024, and it was a personal choice to put roots down there. Canlas spent seven-and-a-half years at Brigham Young University, and he wanted to provide a chance for university students and other locals to learn what he wasn’t able to when he was their age.
Now he’s able to actively provide opportunities by creating a community of photographers, showcasing art shows every 45 days, taking photo walks, and doing free events. Sometimes it’s as simple as handing someone an analog camera, just to see how they react to it.
“I don’t know if they’ll be into it or not. Maybe they’ll like it and maybe they won’t. But if those kinds of opportunities don’t exist, they’d never know one way or the other,” Canlas says. “Film is super niche, but if amateur photographers can get aligned with the right opportunity, they can also learn the basics, and have the chance to go their own way.”
Caleb Clark, who manages Salt Lake’s theFINDlab location, echoes Canlas’ sentiments. He also sees the rise in the next generation’s hunger for shooting film, reverting to film over digital photography. He agrees the timing was just right and that the location has only added to the success of the company they are seeing.
“If a place like what we have created in Provo existed while I was there, it would have changed my trajectory. I tell my kids the reason you go to college is to network. Unless you’re becoming a doctor or learning a trade, you’re there for the experience,” Canlas says. “No one ever hired me because they looked at my degree first. It’s because they saw my photos.”
Slowing down for beauty
With three successful locations, Canlas is considering a fourth store. Adding a spot in Ogden would allow him to provide educational opportunities to university students in nearby Weber State University, also making it close enough for students in Logan attending Utah State University to visit.
Nothing will take place until 2026, but securing a large studio space — perhaps near the train station on 25th street — would be a solid addition to that community.
For now, Canlas is largely considering his Provo location, where he plans to bring in a slew of used digital cameras, including camcorders and Super 8s. After being in that space for more than a year, they’ve learned what their clientele wants. Because other nearby stores aren’t catering to those needs, he’s going to.
“What we offer doesn’t have to be just film, though film will always be the base of it. That’s the start of the creative process that will allow our customers to branch off and do whatever they feel appropriate,” Canlas says. “I don’t want to change anyone. I want you to come in and I’m going to present this idea to you. Take a look and react however you want.”
If nothing else, he hopes to get people to slow down, shoot more and edit less. Period. Going out and taking photos is always the end goal, and it amounts to a lot of people watching.
That’s just how Canlas likes it, and he believes others will, too.
“I never signed up to be a photographer to sit in a chair in front of a computer. Film, when exposed, developed, and scanned correctly, requires little to no effort on the back end,” Canlas says. “Slowing down cleans up my edits, allowing me to be exactly where I want to be: behind the camera. I don’t consider myself an artist. Artists come up with concepts. I’m able to show up and see beauty.”