End of Velvia for LF

[wentbackward]

See this announcement on BJP (http://www.bjp-online.com/british-journal-of-photography/news/2193030/fujifilm-discontinues-two-professional-films)

:(:mad:

[Brian C. Miller]

So Provia is still available, and Velvia 100 is OK, too.

No more Velvia 100-F at all, and Velvia 50 in roll films only.

At least they're still making E-6.

[dave_whatever]

I can't imagine provia and v100 sell better than good old RVP, but that just shows what I know. Pretty glad I splashed out on those 120 backs now.

[EOTS]

Aaaaaaaarhlghlglghlg!

Hope that's a joke ...

Otherwise I'll hang myself (metaphorically speaking)!

:mad:

[vinny]

That's old news.
http://www.largeformatphotography.info/forum/showthread.php?93031-Fuji-Velvia-50-and-100F-4x5-film-officially-discontinued

[tgtaylor]

Actually that makes a lot of sense from both the manufacturing and users standpoint: Provia is unsaturated and Velvia 100 is the saturated version. Personally I prefer Provia as I do Kodak Porta 160.

Thomas

[adam satushek]

I agree that it makes sense to dump the more saturated version (I also prefer Portra 160) because you can always add saturation in Photoshop. But it still makes me cringe everytime a popular LF film is discontinued....even if I never used it...

[dave_whatever]

What velvia brings to the table is a lot more than just saturation, and you'd be hard pressed to replicate any of it in post on either other emulsions or digital, despite what some people claim.

[EOTS]

What velvia brings to the table is a lot more than just saturation, and you'd be hard pressed to replicate any of it in post on either other emulsions or digital, despite what some people claim.

+1

That's exactly what I feel ... Velvia 50 nails 100% the colors what I like ...
I also find it hard to replicate that.

Hmmm, the Velvia 100 seems to look different, more contrasty and I guess less magenta?!
Judging from Tims tests:
http://www.onlandscape.co.uk/2011/06/colour-film-comparison-pt-3/ (100 seems to close up the shadows more, but perhaps it's just underexposed a bit)
http://www.onlandscape.co.uk/2011/02/colour-film-comparison-pt-two/ (here I don't observe the closing shadows)

Best,
Martin

[adam satushek]

What velvia brings to the table is a lot more than just saturation, and you'd be hard pressed to replicate any of it in post on either other emulsions or digital, despite what some people claim.

Yeah, I'm sure that is true. I have never used the stuff so I didnt mean to sound like I dont care that it is gone. I was just agreeing with what EOTS said about how its not suprising. It's like how the New Portra is very similar to NC and VC is now gone (though of course there is Ektar i guess). It seems like they are more willing to discontinue the more saturated line. I'm not agreeing that is was a good choice.

Its always sad to see a film go that many people love.

[Boinzo]

I posted this in the other thread (http://www.largeformatphotography.info/forum/showthread.php?93031-Fuji-Velvia-50-and-100F-4x5-film-officially-discontinued) on this topic as well. If we want to stop this stuff we need to get active. Sign my petition to Fujifilm!
http://www.change.org/petitions/fujifilm-continue-manufacture-of-velvia-50-sheet-film

[RJC]

I posted this in the other thread (http://www.largeformatphotography.info/forum/showthread.php?93031-Fuji-Velvia-50-and-100F-4x5-film-officially-discontinued) on this topic as well. If we want to stop this stuff we need to get active. Sign my petition to Fujifilm!
http://www.change.org/petitions/fujifilm-continue-manufacture-of-velvia-50-sheet-film

I have not seen the discontinuation of Velvia 50 announcement on any official Fujifilm website outside of the UK, it is certainly not on the Aus site (or US, or any other European Fuji site). Seems a bit odd that such an epoch-ending announcement regarding LF film has only been announced in the UK (which is rarely the first place such news emerges).

Rob

[Heroique]

It all seems a bit mysterious to me too, but whatever the facts, a petition may help close the barn doors before more war horses are stolen.

[Boinzo]

It all seems a bit mysterious to me too, but whatever the facts, a petition may help close the barn doors before more horses are stolen.

That was my thought as well. And I understand there is no official announcement - but I think as a community we need to be proactive about these things.
"First they came for ... When they came for me ... " and all that.

[cosmicexplosion]

I posted this in the other thread (http://www.largeformatphotography.info/forum/showthread.php?93031-Fuji-Velvia-50-and-100F-4x5-film-officially-discontinued) on this topic as well. If we want to stop this stuff we need to get active. Sign my petition to Fujifilm!
http://www.change.org/petitions/fujifilm-continue-manufacture-of-velvia-50-sheet-film



hi stef, thanks for creating petition
i tried to send to my contacts list, but could not as it would not read my pass word, has this been a problem with any one else?

[Brian C. Miller]

... close the barn doors before more horses are stolen.

Uh, after the horses have bolted.

Anyways, Fuji is making the decision based on something quite simple: sales. No buyers means no product, at least for LF. If you have a roll film back, then of course Velvia 50 is still available.

As for Fuji press releases, the global site (http://www.fujifilm.com/news/) was last updated on July 11th, the US site (http://www.fujifilmusa.com/press/news/recent_news) was last updated on July 18th, and the EU site (http://www.fujifilm.eu/uk/news/) was last updated on July 19th with the announcement of the discontinuations. It's a general announcement, and I don't know if it means that the film is only discontinued for the U.K., Europe in general, or the rest of the planet.

I didn't see anything that said, "Keep calm." (Oh, that was the Kodak blog about Tri-X.)

[Boinzo]

hi stef, thanks for creating petition
i tried to send to my contacts list, but could not as it would not read my pass word, has this been a problem with any one else?

No worries. Not sure what your sharing problem is. I just shared it via Facebook with no issues. The site is a bit clunky though!

[DolphinDan]

Check out this blog/comment from Japan Camera Hunter on FUJI's discontinuing slide films:

http://japancamerahunter.com/2012/07/why-does-fujifilm-hate-its-customers/#more-4737

FUJI seems to be slowly phasing out slide film period due to cost and declining market...

Namaste
Daniel

[douglas gove]

Pooh...No...Double Pooh-Pooh...Say it isn't so

[timparkin]

Anyways, Fuji is making the decision based on something quite simple: sales. No buyers means no product, at least for LF. If you have a roll film back, then of course Velvia 50 is still available.


If that were so they could make a short run once every year or two and still make a reasonable amount of money guaranteed

[Brian C. Miller]

Did you ever use Konica film?

Once upon a time, Konica made IR film once a year. You had to get up bright and early on the day it came out to get your bricks of 120 for the year. (Slight exageration, but not by much.) I suppose they made one master roll, and then, poof, it would be all gone for the year. Then Ilford came out with SFX200, and they basically gave it up. And now, Konica is gone, along with their color ISO3200 film.

Yes, a run of film can be done once a year. The thing is, the run is part of an on-going film production operation, not "OK, let's start the machine up for a month." I have no idea what goes on inside Fujifilm, but I doubt that it's that dissimilar to Kodak.

The problem is with a master roll not selling in a year. There just aren't enough buyers for the product, and so the film becomes too expensive for the consumer. At what price point does someone stop purchasing the product? A fellow on APUG posted that 35mm Portra was too expensive for him at £6 ($9.30 US). Then what? The product doesn't sell. So at some point, the film still sells, and at another point, it's no longer economical to produce. That's what happened with Kodak, and due to their financial troubles, they decided to drop the whole product line.

I'm guessing that there is a whole staff devoted to each type of emulsion, and the staff has to be kept on standby even if the emulsion isn't being made. Just a guess. So Fujifilm decided to drop an emulsion, along with its attendant staff. I seriously doubt that either Kodak or Fujifilm are doing any research beyond maintaining current emulsion production. After all, Acros 400 120 was dropped because revising the formula wasn't cost effective, i.e., it was predicted to fail its return on investment. And that's for something that was somewhat popular!

Though I'll happily stand up and cry out how much I love film and what it gives me, I do realize that quite soon (2013) there might not be any slide film, and then a bit after that, no LF color film. Kodak is now only doing custom cuttings of 8x10 film in any emulsion, and Kodak is a responsive company. Fujifilm is not known as a responsive company.

One of the things that I wonder about is all of the hoarded film. Somebody posted that they have a 30-year supply in a freezer. OK, how about chemicals to develop that film? I've found a few formulas for E6, so I suppose that Photographer's Formulary will produce a kit once the big guys don't produce it. And film ages, even in deep freeze. So now, unless they've gotten good at developing color without a Jobo, they might be getting Hola results from their hoard. I doubt that there will be commercial processing to meet the demand of a few ultra-long-term hoarders. Such is the future.

[alexn]

I am glad I shoot mostly 120 roll film in 612 and 617 backs for the 4x5. Velvia 50 is for the people who use it, irreplaceable.. Velvia 100 is great, I love it, its my favorite ISO100 film, and second favorite film overall. Its grain is finer than Velvia 50, (Which when you're shooting 4x5 or 612/617 isn't much of a concern) The saturation difference is easy enough to replicate. that said, RVP50 just has a certain look. I have hundreds and hundreds of RVP50 slides and comparing to my Velvia 100 slides the 50's just exude a certain... something... You can easily see it. My old man can tell the difference and he has not shot slide film in 20 years. but when I show him two slides he can pick 50 vs 100 velvia.


Regardless of if you shoot rvp50 in 4x5 or not, I think we should all be signing the partition. As has been said, seeing any LF emulsion die out is a sad event and reminds us all that its just a matter of time before manufacturers give up the ghost on us all.

[Brian Ellis]

I agree that it makes sense to dump the more saturated version (I also prefer Portra 160) because you can always add saturation in Photoshop. But it still makes me cringe everytime a popular LF film is discontinued....even if I never used it...

You can also reduce saturation in Photoshop.

[EOTS]

Yeah folx,

doomsday olé!

I've ordered a freezer load Velvia 50 in 4x5 ...
still have to order the 8x10's ...
will sell some more equipment to finance that :(

Hehe, now I only have to tattoo "RVP50" on my upper arm,
like some of the more insane Slayer fans ;-9

Best regards,
Martin

[dave_whatever]

Forgive the shameless plug, but I tried to put some thoughts down on "paper" about the Velvia discontinuation having sat on it for a few days: http://bit.ly/Pu0mK5

[cosmicexplosion]

thanks dave, good plug, selfless not shameless, well altruistically selfless, i just wrote fuji a few letters, inc one to Shigetaka Komori, lets see...

[Boinzo]

Hi All. I thought I would post that after several months and many letters to Fujifilm HQ I have finally had a response from Fujifilm to the petition I started at change.org concerning Velvia 50 sheet film. It is great to see that they have at least acknowledged the request and that we now actually have the name and address of the correct person to contact at the company. I am going to respond to this letter in due course but also wanted to encourage anyone who feels strongly about it to also write to Mr/s Sakata. The address is below.
I'd also like to thank everyone that has supported the petition so far - I haven't given up yet!


Thank you for your constant patronage.

I am Norihiko Sakata from Photo Imaging Products Division, responsible for photographic film products.

I am writing in reply to your letter of September 5, 2012 sent to our management including the CEO. We again realized how much photographers supported and loved “Velvia 50 sheet film” after receiving numbers of petition for continuation of the product.

Until today, we have made our best effort to keep our production to supply regularly. However, the demand of “Velvia 50 sheet film” has drastically dropped which is only a few percent compared to peak usage period. Therefore, we had to reduce the variety of photographic films including Velvia50 sheet film in order to sustain the film supply over the future.

We will try our best to examine what we can do based on your petition, but please understand that we will not be able to guarantee whether we can fully meet your expectation or not under this severe situation.

Once again, thank you very much for your continuous support.

Norihiko Sakata
Senior Operations Manager
Imaging material & Camera solution group
Photo Imaging Products Division
FUJIFILM Corporation
7-3, AKASAKA 9-CHOME, MINATO-KU
TOKYO 107-0052, JAPAN

[Sylvester Graham]

That was a polite letter with some sad but very true facts. Unless you have $500,000 to buy up their coating machines, perhaps its time to lay down the sword.

[dave_whatever]

Maybe they can be encouraged to move to an annual run (or pre-order only) of sheet film like Ilford do or ULF and oddball sizes? That would seem to be a reasonable request and doable.

[Boinzo]

Maybe they can be encouraged to move to an annual run (or pre-order only) of sheet film like Ilford do or ULF and oddball sizes? That would seem to be a reasonable request and doable.

That's certainly something I will be asking them to consider Dave. Hopefully they'll listen.

[Oren Grad]

Maybe they can be encouraged to move to an annual run (or pre-order only) of sheet film like Ilford do or ULF and oddball sizes? That would seem to be a reasonable request and doable.

What Harman/Ilford is doing is different. Their sheet films are all in regular production. All that they are doing in the special order period is changing the cutting masks to allow them to cut different sheet sizes from the master rolls that they are already producing.

Restarting coating of an emulsion that has been out of production is a more difficult and expensive proposition. That doesn't mean it's impossible, but at the least the logistical and cost hurdles are going to be higher.

[EOTS]

Well, according to the annoucements of Fujifilm UK, the RVP50 emulsion is not going out of production
(whereas the 100F version does go out of production).

RVP50 will only be discontinued in sheet film.
The emulsion itself won't be stopped in the roll film formats...

So I guess perhaps it's not so different from the Ilford case?!

Best regards,
Martin

[Oren Grad]

Well, according to the annoucements of Fujifilm UK, the RVP50 emulsion is not going out of production
(whereas the 100F version does go out of production).

RVP50 will only be discontinued in sheet film.
The emulsion itself won't be stopped in the roll film formats...

So I guess perhaps it's not so different from the Ilford case?!

Not really. Sheet film and roll film are coated on different bases, which require separate R&D/QC/testing programs to assure quality. Harman/Ilford has emulsions that are available on acetate roll film base but are no longer or never were coated on polyester sheet film base - for example, Delta 400 and Delta 3200. They do not offer these as sheet film even to special order, though I suppose if you were rich enough to pay for the R&D they might consider it. Even then there are no guarantees, because at this point overall sales are so low that (re)introduction of an additional emulsion is likely to cannibalize sales of remaining products, potentially resulting in a net economic loss across the product portfolio overall.

[EOTS]

OK, that explains it!

[pdmoylan]

Frustrating turn of events. I love the greens of Velvia 50. At least Velvia 100 will still be made. It is far too magenta but that can be fixed.
Haven't been succesful in matching the greens in PS using 100 though. Oh well.