What if: Kodak and Fuji abandon film

[Eugen Mezei]

Fuji and Kodak has a high profit margin, so they'll continue to manufacture it -- scaling down manufacturing facilities along the way as demand continues to decline -- until factory capacity can no longer be cost-effectively reduced. Then they'll either sell the business to the third party or shut it down and write it off altogether (worst case scenario that they'll try to avoid, as they get no value for their property). But we're still many years away from such an endgame scenario, especially with regards to Fuji.

As we saw with packfilm made by Fuji (FP-100c). They could not be convinced to sold the machinery.

[Drew Wiley]

Sixteen years since this doomsday thread began, and both black and white and color film are still alive and well. Another sixteen years and maybe somebody will be taking group photos at my funeral with real film too.

[SergeyT]

I would rather see you alive and well , film or no film

[Drew Wiley]

Thanks. Hopefully, I'll still be shooting and printing another 16 years from now. 32 years from now, unlikely (I'd be over 100 then).

[Michael_4514]

Allegedly there is a new color film out of Russia. I'm going to order a couple rolls of 120 to see what's what.

https://petapixel.com/2021/05/19/sil...at-color-film/

[Michael_4514]

Allegedly there is a new color film out of Russia. I'm going to order a couple rolls of 120 to see what's what.

https://petapixel.com/2021/05/19/sil...at-color-film/

[Eugen Mezei]

There is a lot of mystery ("we can not disclose where it is coated") and sugarcoating/bullshit ("some photographers compare it to Kodachrome", sure I can compare anything to anything).

Now image film is a hammer (as in film being a tool you use). You bought your hammers from a blacksmith and were satisfied with the quality. He makes good tools, you can do a good work with it. All of the sudden you get offered hammers from another company but you know that there exist no other blacksmith producing them. (No, no film factory miraculously appeared in Russia.)
Now ask you two questions:

1. Why should the new hammer more reliable than the old one? You did know what your old hammer was made (as datasheets for film), your information about the new one is zich. Can the steel be better? Sure, promises are fine, exact data a lot better.
2. If there exist only the same blacksmiths like before, where does the new hammer come from? Could it be the box is new and has a new print on it just for the fact that the blacksmith produced a bad batch of hammers and that is the reason he wont put his name on it?

[ic-racer]

What if: Kodak and Fuji abandon film

It might be years before I realize it. Is Fuji B&W sheet film even available in the US? Is Kodak B&W sheet film even affordable anywhere in the world?

[Drew Wiley]

When the discontinuance of ACROS was announced, I stocked up on a reasonable quantity of 120 rolls at a very low price at the local camera shop. They had case after case of it. But one of the store employees bought an entire case of 4X5 20-sheet packs for his own personal use. I only have one box of 4X5 still in my freezer, and not even a single sheet of 8x10 anymore. And then when Fuji decided to reissue an allegedly improved tweak of ACROS as much higher price, sheets of it became a thing of the past. Fuji is a big company, and their entire production of b&w film might be such a small niche to them by now that the even smaller segment of sheet version would be financially counterproductive to start up again. Odds n' ends of ACROS sheet fllm might still be available from Japanese dealers.

What I really miss are the 4X5 Quickload sleeves of ACROS, which were great for backpacking. But they had no choice in that case. The sleeving process itself was subcontracted, and the needed machinery was wearing out, and not financially rewarding enough to justify replacement cost.

As far as Kodak goes, well, it seems my old age strategy is pretty much in cadence with their own stratospheric price elevation. For me, both cost-wise and weight-wise, 4X5 has become the new 8X10. I have a decent reserve of both 8X10 color Kodak film and 8X10 TMax films in the freezer, which I bought at about a third of today's pricing. That just means that I'll shoot 8x10 more circumspectly, and resort to either 4X5 or 120 film more often. I'd rather pay more than see them go out of the sheet film business. And it seems that they have enough demand not only to keep it going, but now even to increase the volume of production somewhat. In the overall scheme of things, buying another box of Kodak 8x10 from time to time is just a minor nuisance price-wise. Just knocking on the door of the dentist at the end of this pandemic is going to cost me a lot more than any of my annual film expenses.