How many actual manufactuters of S8 were there?

[grant mcphee]

Hi,

 

I know there are/were many different brands of S8 - Prinz, Agfa, Dixons, Boots, Orwo, Fomopan etc.

 

I was thinking recently that it must have been very expensive for a company to design, make and manufacture a film. I can imagine Agfa, Orwo and Kodak being able to do this but could Boots?

 

Did smaller companies like Boots and Dixons really make their own film or did they relabel film made by different companies? And if so, who made this film?

 

Thanks.

[Matthew Buick]

Boots bought from Agfa. I think Dixons did too, either that or Perutz.

[Charles Doran]

I remember seeing this info, or maybe just some of this info on someone's website once ... (yeah, real helpful, I know ;) )...

Maybe Giles (onsuper8.org) has it?

 

I have an old Photography mag from the early 70s I should post...real weird to see all the different companies that sold their own stock...I wonder if the Prinz brand held up at all...

[Jim Carlile]

The big West European film manufacturers back then were Agfa, Perutz and Ferrania, and in the U.S., 3M. They were branded all over the place. Gratispool branded an American company at one time (Dynachrome?) GAF was another big American company that was all over the place.

 

As far as cameras go, Minolta made cameras for Agfa, Chinon for Bell and Howell and Beaulieu and lots of others, Revere for Sears and other America companies, GAF's were also Chinon (I think, at least later on,) later Bolexes were not always Bolex, Sankyo branded others. Bauer made cameras for other European labels. Kodak, Zeiss and Nizo were made and stayed for themselves, on the most part. There were only a few camera companies, and not too many more film manufacturers...

[Mark Dunn]

Perutz was bought by Agfa in the 1960's and I assume Agfa thereafter used the brand for its own film. In the 1970's and 80's Peruchrome super-8 WAS Agfachrome- I used it as it was a bit cheaper. Different packaging, but same lab, spools, edge codes and so on. Unfortunately the fungus has got to it a bit now, so it's like looking through a cracked window.

[Michael Lehnert]

Mark, are you refering to fungus clusters (sponge-like clouds on the film) or vinegar syndrome which is closer to what I would describe as cracked imagery superimposed on the reversal original. Both can be restored at home or at labs for not that much money to very good result and without using chemicals that kills everything around you in a 50 miles radius.

 

Interestingly, Peruchrome sold in Germany was marked as such on the S8 edge and holds well in our archive, while Agfachrome (itched at Agfachrome @ edge code) suffers both from fungus and vinegar, but only one batch from the mid-1980s (covering three films shot as end-to-end film projects that we currently restore here at the PP) indicating more a development process problem or dye issues rather than a fundamental problem with the emulsion or even overall product.

 

Out of an archive of several hundred thousands of meters from the late 1960s up to now, the archivability and readability of S8 film stocks of various age, make and price is formidable and very encouraging. The restorations currently under way are pure vanity, apart from those mid-1980s batch Agfa films which needed attention and might well do so in the future (fungus creeps back in despite heavy bathing).