How capital ($) intensive to make color film?

[David A. Goldfarb]

From Ron Mowrey's posts on APUG, one gets the impression that color would be difficult to make economical on a small scale. He does speak of having a small coating machine for research purposes in the Kodak research labs but issues of scaling up to retail quantities are so complex as to make it difficult for a startup to do. He does say that something like Cibachrome would be easier to make on a small scale than E-6, C-41, or RA-4 materials.

Regarding cine film, I've been thinking about experimenting with Super 8 and have been exploring the discussion boards and such, and the news there seems actually pretty encouraging. Even if Kodak has cut back offerings, there are other companies cutting down 35mm stocks, packaging it in Super 8 cartridges, and processing it. It seems to be having a real revival like ULF, in part thanks to the possibility of hybrid technology. Now on a student budget one can shoot Super 8mm color neg stock, have it processed and dubbed to digital for editing, saving the costs of intermediate prints, time in an editing suite, and such.

[CXC]

Who goes to the movies anymore? Don't count on THAT revenue stream.

Some years back I saw an old silent movie that was one of the first shot in color, shot with TWO-strip process (Technicolor?), just red and green. Produced a lovely, unearthly soft, faded, muted image, and you didn't particularly notice any gaps in the spectrum. That's the color film I would make in MY basement...

[bglick]

Bill, I do shoot 8x10 color film. But I get your drift, digital capture is stunning in many ways.

Bruce, this is the best (or maybe for me, the worst) description I have learned about color photographic film, and its future. Thank you for the post. I was not aware how capital intensive this process is, and how the production is geared to such large volume. The fact that the film divisions can unlikely be sold off to smaller companies, as the equipment is designed for high production, is, well, depressing...... but, this is the reality of the situation and I appreciate you offering "the facts". It's information like this that helps us make more informed decisions. Of course, anything can happen in the future, but your description further enforces the possiblities of color film simply dissappearing in the not too distant future. Well, at least the emulsions as we know them today. Possibly a small company will offer a color chrome and color neg film in one or two sizes.

Paddy, I guess the cinema film carried us to this point, and if digital cinema distribution is soon a reality, it may be the single biggest nail in the color photographic film coffin. I am guessing the big dollar volume of film sales was in reproducing the film which went to the movie theaters throughout the world. Sheeesh, there is a ton of film on a reel for one movie, x the number of theaters it goes to......enough where it probably equals the use of all still photographers volume for one year! I never realized how long photographic film road the coat tails of cinema film.

CXC, wouldn't it be ironic if in 10 years we are forced to use color film equal to that of 1930's vintage film as this will be the best of the homebrew, low volume films? Sheeeesh, quite depressing.

IMO, it's information like this which is healthy for the LF community. We are only spectators, barely participants....our film consumption is so low, we will have zero effect on the big companies decisions regarding film. This thread has put the film issue in perspective for me. Much worse then I previous thought. I hope this thread doesn't get labeled, the doomsayers thread by the film cheerleaders on this forum. No one loves film more then me, and yes, I am an optimist, but a realist first. It's hard for me to ignore sensible information such as this.

Well, such is life, things will move forward.....

[Stephen Willard]

Correct me if I am wrong, but the reason why the movie industry shoots C41 color negative film in the first place is because of its extraordinary latitude. I believe the dynamic range of C41 is around 10 to 11 stops. Digital has a dynamic range of around 4 stops. Having the dynamic range of C41 save lots of money and time on the set that I suspect can ad up to tens of millions of dollars.

So tell me again why the movie guys want to shoot in digital with a 4 stop dynamic range?

[David Luttmann]

Stephen,

Where in the world have you tested digital at 4 stops. Even a basic program like Imatest shows most DSLRs to be between 8.8 and 10.4 stops. This 4 stops you mention is simply false.

[Mark Woods]

I disagree with the posts that say the movie industry fuels the LF community and the amateur users. As I mentioned in a previous post, the Motion Picture Imageing division is the smallest divison at Kodak. The Amateur Divison is the largest (I believe) followed by Hospital and Professional Divisons (not necessarily in that order). The MP Division has benefited from the other divisions more than they have (in terms of R&D) benefited from MP division. You can see why Kodak is worried when it's main cash cow is gored with digital -- the amateur market. And another cash cow is gored by digital, the professional division. The MP market can't carry them in the structure that exists today, I think that's clear to everyone. Besides, the EN2 negative process isn't even close to C41. And the Internegs and Interpos processes have nothing to do with LF or amateur films. Quite honestly, to distribute digitally is inviting piracy. I remember a SMPTE forum I was at where the Miramax rep said he wanted a digital distribution like the Mission Impossible note -- the file would destroy itself and only be keyed to the one projector at the theatre. That's not the case. The digital upgrade is $85K/theatre (LA Times today) -- it was just over a $100K 2 years ago. If it gets much cheaper, one could buy the equipment and put it in the den and bypass the "theatre" experience. ;-) Times are changing, but lets keep our eye on the ball of what's driving the business. Kodak could spin off building 19 and there is a complete factory to coat color or b&w (the foundation of the building is on bedrock and the city of Rochester has to contact Kodak before doing street work within a mile since the vibrations disturb the coating process!). I see things like that happening since the current top weighted management can't justify thier salaries in the current environment and only know how to spin off and spin in general until they run the company to the ground and take their golden parachutes out. Those guys not only don't get it, they don't care.

MW

[paulr]

one of the things slowing down digital movie distribution is the question of who pays for the new gear. predictably, the theaters think the studios should pay, and vice versa.

on another note, has Kodak suggested that it will abandon black and white film by 2007?

[bglick]

Mark, very interesting information! I had no idea making color film was this sensitive (street work a mile away?). Of course, this does not fair well with small companies trying to take over such a complex process. Although there is current "chaoatic state of affairs" in the future of MP media, i.e. film vs. digital, I am curious, since you feel the photographic sales have not been riding the coat tails of MP as previous posters, then what is your prediction on the future of photographic film for LF? I realize you don't have a crystal ball, but I would love to hear your take on this.......

Also, does anyone know in the LF market how much color film Kodak sells vs. Fuji? Are they about equal?

[robc]

There seems to be a lot of assumptions that if Kodak were to stop making film it will gladly sell off its film making components to someone else. If I'm not mistaken, Kodak has closely guarded patents on all its technologies on which it has spent hundreds of millions in R&D. If or when it gives it up film, why would it sell off those patents when, by not doing so, it could force more people to go digital and buy its new digital products? Why would it want to feed its competition with the ability to compete? Which companies are going to invest the R&D necessary to produce film as good as fuji or kodak with the market in its current state?

[bglick]

Rob, it is interesting that Kodak is positioned in such a way, that if they sold off their film division, they would create a competitor to there digital products. Not a good scenario for us film users.

Add to this, these film making facilities could probably never be operated by small companies due to the extreme investments required in a declining film sales market, leads me to beleive, as others have mentioned, these big companies will probably never sell off fheir film divisions. Not good. One day they will bolt the doors shut, and it's game over.

Possibly, the best thing that could happen to save film is one of the big two stop now, so the other one can pick up there sales and hopefully it will remain profitable enough to keep the machinery running.

Fuji film sales is down 80% in past 5 years. That is massive, shocking, and I bet this even caught Fuji execs by surprise. Many businesses in times like this will raise prices dramaticaly to compensate for the low volume, that has not happened in this field. I am quite surprised at this, as the best way to gain profitability is to raise prices. I assume the Execs feel that 4x5 film at $5 per sheet would not work, and just further the push users to digital. In some ways, they are between a rock, and a hard place.....