Bryan Chernick

I have 8mm home movies from 1937 that are still in great condition. If you keep it in a cool dry place like a closet in an air conditioned home you will do great. If you put it in your garage where it is exposed to heat, cold, humidity etc it wont last near as long. Here is a great article on film preservation: The Library of Congress Unlocks The Ultimate Archive System Some more information: Preservation Research of the National Film Preservation Board

If you're flying you can have TSA hand inspect your film rather than x-ray it, just ask them when you get to the metal detector. Have your film out and ready for them. They will swab the can and run it through and explosives sniffer. I have done that traveling through several customs checks both domestic and international. On a recent trip I noticed that customs in Japan still have a warning sign about running film through the x-ray. After you shoot your film mail it to the lab or have it hand inspected on the way back.

As part of the bankruptcy Kodak could be broken up into several smaller businesses including a smaller film company. That scenario may be ideal for those of us that want to continue to use film. We'll just have to wait to see what comes out in the wash. All those chemists and engineers that built their careers around film are going to want to do something if Kodak stops making film. Maybe they start their own business. There are a lot of ways that film can survive.

This was floating around on several forums back in March: I just attended (last night) a SMPTE meeting of the Hollywood Chapter. The subject was "The Technology and History of Film, presented by Beverly Pasterczyk of Eastman Kodak Co." Ms. Pasterczyk is a chemist with film R & D at Kodak, and she mentioned that Kodak Research is currently engaged in the continuing design and implementation of new emulsions, such as the new version of the Vision III product. Regarding consumer films, she said that they are considering restructuring a new approach aimed at producing these at a reasonable cost in much smaller volumes than in the past. She said that new technology will permit them to continue to produce these in "boutique quantities" using single coating machines rather than the huge multiple coaters of the past. She said that basically, as long as they had sufficient orders for a minimum of a single master roll "54 inches (almost 1-1/2 meters) wide by whatever length - no minimum stated", they would consider examining production in terms of the economics involved. Future production would primarily be on an "on demand" basis. This would include the infrastructure for processing, probably at a single lab, either in Rochester NY, or sub-contracted. "On demand" could conceivably include any film that Kodak has ever manufactured. Someone in the audience asked the inevitable question: "Including Kodachrome?" Her answer: "Yes, including Kodachrome". She added that while small runs of Kodachrome were unlikely, it was not out of the question, since they have had numerous inquiries. To the question "How could this be made possible?" her answer was intriguing. "Volume is the answer. Consumer groups of large numbers of individuals could petition for the return of a specific film. This would include not only large companies, but also individuals banded together such as camera clubs, especially those with a large enough base such that they could collectively join on a national or even international basis".

All this talk of film going away got me thinking, is there any other art medium that has gone away? We still paint on canvas, sculpt with clay and stone, etc. Many of these have been around for thousands of years. The only problem I see with film is that it's existence is in the hands of a profit driven industry. If the desire for film is great enough will we find a way to keep it? I think so.

The Pan Cinor 10/30 takes a series VI drop-in filter. You need the lens hood to hold it in. I'm not sure what the thread size for the lens hood is but if you knew that you may be able to get a screw-in filter that fits it.