I started shooting nightlife with film. Truth is, you're going to go through a lot of work just on the off chance a laser beam fries your sensor again.
A few things about that.
- No one's gonna probably call him on it, but he shouldn't be scanning the crowd for any appreciable length with the laser system. Like, a 1/10 second burst of the laser hitting your sensor shouldn't do any damage. It sounds like you kind of set up the shot and let the laser burn into the sensor.
- With that in mind, you could probably safely use your X100 in this environment. The whole lot of us here shoot in clubs with lasers all the time, and as far as I can see, no one is worse for the wear gear-wise. As long as the beam is off-axis of the sensor, and not bombarding it for a long time, you're fine.
- That being said, it is a proven risk to do video with a laser system in operation. There's concrete evidence of people getting their sensors messed up from a laser while doing video. Basically because your sensor heats up, then gets hit by a laser. It kind of makes sense. If you do video, watch the laser and try not to be where a beam hits.
- Basically I'm making an argument against the relative inconvenience of film. Plus, the expense will be pretty high for stock, processing, and digitizing. The cheap "Picture CD" won't cut it. You'll have to either find a film scanner, or go to a pro lab that still offers the service.
However, if you do shoot film, obviously prepare yourself for a few things.
- ISO 400 on film, especially drugstore film is going to be very grainy. Film stock development has largely stopped, so brace yourself for something that would be the equivalent of 1600-3200 ISO on a DSLR.
- If you're gonna do this film style, go to bhphotovideo.com or adorama.com and order something decent, like Fujicolor Press 400 or Kodak 400UC. Or if you shoot chromes, go Fuji Provia 400.
- After you're done, do yourself a favor and get the rolls to a pro lab for processing. Ask for a "clip test" from one roll. That way you can judge how the film looks before committing to a full development run. This is where shooting chromes comes in handy. You can see "easier" how things look. Then you can actually ask the lab to do push processing on the rest. Push processing is basically running the film as if it were a higher ISO. You can push chromes 1 stop, max. Negative film, a little bit more, maybe 2 if you're lucky.
Obviously you can do a lot of work in post, too, after scanning.
Here's some nightlife photos on Fujicolor Press 400.
Bear in mind these images are over a decade old now, but you can see the noise/grain levels.
As for your question about haze/fog? No, not at all. I wouldn't do a lens swap in a fogged-out room, but your gear will be fine.
