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LONG LIVE FILM!!!


Bill DiPietra

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Excellent news! I'm hopeful that these folks will be doing some R&D and eventually offering some cool new film stocks. After all they want to be IN the film business, unlike Kodak who is more or less "stuck with a film business". Another member mentioned that they will be working to improve the grain on their 100ASA reversal, but it would be great if they eventually also offered a 200T reversal film.

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Fuji announced that it was going to stop production of its motion picture products over two years ago, George. And Kodak doesn't WANT to be making film anymore. These guys do. They are coming at this from a completely different mindset, knowing that there is still a large film community out there. And that's exactly what they banked on with the Kickstarter campaign. I anticipate Ferrania to be much more customer-friendly than Kodak. They can take this very far if they play their cards right.

 

That's the big deal.

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Wow, I hadn't heard. Last I saw they're still selling 35mm film. Agfa too. And the LA times says that it's finalized an agreement with the film industry to keep manufacturing 35mm. Heck, I still see 35mm still rolls being processed.

 

I keep hearing "film is dead", and look at these guys who are going to take up the slack and be the new retro-tech firm of the future, but it's like it's still business as usual.

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Well, I'd say that Kodak might want to but their coating facility is way too big to be efficient enough these days. Kodak dismantled smaller coating lines years ago and now they only have too large ones. There is still quite big demand for film globally, but what we are learning from the news is that if there wasn't this deal between the studios and Kodak, Kodak would have plugged the plug. Due to digital projection and projection prints not being made anymore we have been on the edge of film making not being profitable enough for Kodak anymore. And that would have been pretty much the end of color motion picture film.

 

While the new deal does secure Kodak film for some time we really can't be sure for how long it'll last. Not to mention that while 35mm is available, we don't know for how long super-8 or even 16mm will be. Is there enough demand vs. just slitting and perforating 35mm for studios? There will be more Kodak motion picture film products discontinued by the end of this year, no doubt.

 

Ferrania is a new hope. It is more like "film enthusiast to film enthusiast" type of business than "biggest profits to the stock owners". They are here to make film and they hope to be doing it "for the next 100 years". They won't be, however, bringing some Vision3 killing negative film stocks to market anytime soon. Instead the film they will be coating first is color reversal for which there are no motion picture film made anymore. That way it'll be catering first to super-8 and 16mm motion picture users and to still photographers, who understand the risk of losing all color reversal film all too well. Even though Fuji is still selling those film stocks for still photography use, nobody knows how long that'll last -- or whether they are really making new film or just selling film coated years ago and stored under some mountain...

Edited by Heikki Repo
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Wow, I hadn't heard. Last I saw they're still selling 35mm film. Agfa too. And the LA times says that it's finalized an agreement with the film industry to keep manufacturing 35mm. Heck, I still see 35mm still rolls being processed.

 

I keep hearing "film is dead", and look at these guys who are going to take up the slack and be the new retro-tech firm of the future, but it's like it's still business as usual.

 

I think Afga exited the motion picture film business in the early 2000's. Fuji as noted a couple of years ago, and Kodak has been under financial duress for the last 2 years, selling of their 'intellectual property' for peanuts, and most likely the Board of Directors are hiring executives that specialize in shaping up sections of a company for selloff or liquidation.

 

The Film film portion of the business was being maintained apparently by the NFL using thousands of miles of Film film a year, but this year has gone digital. The use of Film film by Hollywood and other filmmaking centers would not sustain a market.

 

What one could 'hope' for would be that some buyer could be found for the Kodak Film division, that could see a 'profit' from continuing the interprise.

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Well, I'd say that Kodak might want to but their coating facility is way too big to be efficient enough these days. Kodak dismantled smaller coating lines years ago and now they only have too large ones. There is still quite big demand for film globally, but what we are learning from the news is that if there wasn't this deal between the studios and Kodak, Kodak would have plugged the plug. Due to digital projection and projection prints not being made anymore we have been on the edge of film making not being profitable enough for Kodak anymore. And that would have been pretty much the end of color motion picture film.

 

While the new deal does secure Kodak film for some time we really can't be sure for how long it'll last. Not to mention that while 35mm is available, we don't know for how long super-8 or even 16mm will be. Is there enough demand vs. just slitting and perforating 35mm for studios? There will be more Kodak motion picture film products discontinued by the end of this year, no doubt.

 

Ferrania is a new hope. It is more like "film enthusiast to film enthusiast" type of business than "biggest profits to the stock owners". They are here to make film and they hope to be doing it "for the next 100 years". They won't be, however, bringing some Vision3 killing negative film stocks to market anytime soon. Instead the film they will be coating first is color reversal for which there are no motion picture film made anymore. That way it'll be catering first to super-8 and 16mm motion picture users and to still photographers, who understand the risk of losing all color reversal film all too well. Even though Fuji is still selling those film stocks for still photography use, nobody knows how long that'll last -- or whether they are really making new film or just selling film coated years ago and stored under some mountain...

 

Disposable 35mm cameras, particularly those with underwater casings, are all the rage. Their sales are bigger than ever. I don't think regular rolls of 35mm sell like they used to, but the disposable camera market is massive. I think Fuji has a sizable interest in it too, so I really don't see them getting out of the film business altogether at all. In fact they just came out with a new 35mm camera last month. I think they stopped supporting slide processing, but not film altogether.

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Disposable 35mm cameras - really?

 

I would have said those were about 10 years ago - maybe 5... and I only found them as I was collecting the flash bulbs out of them for a project.

 

Haven't seen them since.

 

Anyway, it's a wee bit off topic...

 

Let alone cine products it's nice to see 120 stills on the list

 

:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

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Agfa stopped selling motion picture color negative in 1994 -- I remember it was interesting that David Watkin, a big Agfa 320T user, managed to scrap up enough of the stock to shoot part of Zeffirelli's "Jane Eyre" on it in 1995. After that, he switched to Kodak's copy of Agfa, 200T 5287, which was updated into Vision 320T 5277 in 1996.

 

I shot my first feature in 1992 on Agfa XT-100 and XTS-400, and then my third feature in 1993 on the new XTR-250 stock that replaced their famous XT-320 stock. I never shot the XT-320 stock except a little in 16mm in 1990.

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Bill,

 

thanks for starting a great post. Trust me, I was not so sure that there will be so many backers for Ferrania's kickstarted campaign. Quarter million dollar mark was reached in less than a fortnight. This is amazing. There are so many photographers and cinematographers who want to use film. Film is far from dead. I guess a lot of people who went digital saw the truth and came back to analog (or want to).

 

Now I am eagerly watching how the response will be towards Nolan's and Quentin T's IMAX, 70mm, and 35mm print run releases. Hope people see the beauty of print projection and hope this trend catches on.

 

cheers

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Disposable 35mm cameras - really?

 

I would have said those were about 10 years ago - maybe 5... and I only found them as I was collecting the flash bulbs out of them for a project.

 

Haven't seen them since.

 

Anyway, it's a wee bit off topic...

 

Let alone cine products it's nice to see 120 stills on the list

 

:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

 

The ones with underwater housing sell well. I think because few people want to risk their phones underwater regardless of what housing is available for them.

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Bill,

 

thanks for starting a great post. Trust me, I was not so sure that there will be so many backers for Ferrania's kickstarted campaign. Quarter million dollar mark was reached in less than a fortnight. This is amazing. There are so many photographers and cinematographers who want to use film. Film is far from dead. I guess a lot of people who went digital saw the truth and came back to analog (or want to).

 

Now I am eagerly watching how the response will be towards Nolan's and Quentin T's IMAX, 70mm, and 35mm print run releases. Hope people see the beauty of print projection and hope this trend catches on.

 

cheers

 

I was watching that campaign constantly. I too was afraid it might die with only twenty or thirty thousand to go, but here it is still going strong. Absolutely fantastic! I've noticed a growing trend of people coming back towards film.

 

And to all of them, I say welcome! :D

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"Disposable 35mm cameras - really?

 

I would have said those were about 10 years ago - maybe 5... and I only found them as I was collecting the flash bulbs out of them for a project.

 

Haven't seen them since.

Disposable 35mm cameras - really?

 

I would have said those were about 10 years ago - maybe 5... and I only found them as I was collecting the flash bulbs out of them for a project.

 

Haven't seen them since."

 

For my mom's birthday present a couple years back I had maybe 50 of those suckers developed.. she'd just buy them, use them and forget about em.. fortunately they mostly came out ok, and she uses an Ipad now.. actually thanks be to heaven that she uses an Ipad now

Edited by Robert Glenn
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Disposable cams...

 

Maybe it's a location thing - I'm in Aus/NZ.

 

probably more it's specifically my world not coming across them - very good to hear though. (pity however that the medium is being exposed to those crappy little lenses !).

 

I just had 2 rolls of Provia developed and mounted into slides from a recent Japan trip, very fun pulling a Cliff Claven from Cheers and boring friends with 'holiday slide evening'. Used a Konica Hexar, auto-everything, great glass but there were a few out of focus snaps, so next rolls will be shot on my very first camera, a Pentax K-1000 with some spotmatic/M42 lenses.

 

I love how the physical artefact - i.e. the slide - is the very object that was exposed to the image you see.

 

For me personally, that fact was taken for granted before all the digital carry on.

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They won't be, however, bringing some Vision3 killing negative film stocks to market anytime soon. Instead the film they will be coating first is color reversal for which there are no motion picture film made anymore.

 

Why not shoot MP (theatrical or television) on reversal? It's been done.

 

Two stores near me carry disposable cameras.

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Why not shoot MP (theatrical or television) on reversal? It's been done.

 

 

 

Very rarely - parts of "Lassie Come Home" were shot in Kodachrome Commercial, and there's that movie "Buffalo 66", and some documentaries, plus news footage from the 60's and 70's.

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I interviewed some folks at Kodak who worked on reversal emulsions in the 80s and 90s, and it seemed that reversal stock was primarily used for news-gathering and that’s what the target market was. Of course, there were other outliers, but it was never a major capturing choice. I think the only reason Fuji’s reversal stocks stuck around for so long was because they didn’t really differ in R&D from stuff they were producing for 35mm still cameras. Purely conjecture.

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I interviewed some folks at Kodak who worked on reversal emulsions in the 80s and 90s, and it seemed that reversal stock was primarily used for news-gathering and that’s what the target market was. Of course, there were other outliers, but it was never a major capturing choice. I think the only reason Fuji’s reversal stocks stuck around for so long was because they didn’t really differ in R&D from stuff they were producing for 35mm still cameras. Purely conjecture.

 

Kodak had a whole gamut of color reversals, Ektachrome VNF, which stood for "video news film". "Film at 11" meant just that, because the VNF stock could be easily processed at the station and transferred with a projector style telecine. It was considered a low contrast reversal for video transfer. The Canon Scoopic was made as a point and shoot news gathering camera as in "getting the scoop". Surprisingly Kodak offered at least 4 VNF stocks in 16mm until January 2005.

 

When Vincent Gallo made "Buffalo 66" he wanted vintage NFL Films look. Someone told him he had to shoot on reversal and Kodak made a special batch in 35mm for him. The advice to shoot reversal was ill advised because he ran into major problems in the post film chain and almost had to scrap it. Fortunately someone was able to just barely pull it off. I liked the final look of the film, and although reversal may not be practical for full length features, it is a special part of film history and has many great artistic uses today.

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VNF was used by the mile for high-speed analysis. I must have personally got through 50,000'/year on classified trials and we were just one of half-a-dozen establishments in the UK- the US must have had many more. We processed on-site for security and often pushed the 400ISO stocks 2 stops. It was difficult to get consistent control strips even with that sort of throughput, but fortunately colour fidelity wasn't paramount for our customers. Running at up to 10,000 pps was.

When VNF was discontinued, before high-speed video was mature, users here had to go to b/w neg and video transfer.

Edited by Mark Dunn
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