Agfa Film Reintroduced in North America

mabelsound said:
OK, not anger--withering condescension, maybe? You are perhaps trying to burst the bubble with, shall we say, excessive gusto? If you think the return of this film is unlikely, let us down gently. Just remember there was a time when nobody could have imagined the return of Voigtlander rangefinders, Moog synthesizers, or Indian motorcycles. (AFAIK, aficionados may question the authenticity of the latter, but whatever.)

It's Christmastime! Let the sugarplums dance in our heads, eh?
Click to expand...

Would you prefer that people not say what they believed, that others agreed with them for the sake of being polite, that all discussion consisted of "I quite Agee, old fellow?"

You may depend upon me to render only sincere compliments, to agree when I actually only agree, and to defend my opinions with logic and vigor. You may also count upon me to admit when I am wrong without harboring a grudge or feeling the need to protect my ego from damage.

I strive to be both helpful and honest. I never offer condescension unless I actually have an opinion; I do not speak rudely for the sake of being rude or to gain attention or notoriety.

I am the ideal discussion forum member. Educated, erudite, and good-looking. You're welcome!
 
I still want Ansco, Dupont, and Neobrom papers to return. ;-)

Also, have lost track of the genealogy of some of the former "Eastern" companies that began as a license from Agfa, but will bug my friend Jan for details. I do not know the origin of the Foma films, but I do know a lot of Czech photo production was derived from German origins.

Regards, John
 
A quick search didn't yield much on the history of Foma Bohemia. I did find this timeline for the companies history on its own website. Though its not the most useful in tracking its genealogy to other companies if any.

Significant dates of the firm's history

1921 – establishing of the company
1931 – production of black-and-white papers
1932 – production of roll films
1935 – golden medal at the international exhibition in Brussels
1937 – golden medal at the international exhibition in Paris
1938 – golden medal at the international exhibition in Lublin
1949 – production of X-ray films for medical use
1953 – production of cine positive films
1958 – production of colour papers
1966 – 1972 reconstruction of the factory
1972 – production of colour reversal films
1988 – production of X-ray films for industrial radiography
1990 – change of the firm's name to FOMA, production of black-and-white papers resumed
1995 – production of dental X-ray films,
– privatization of the enterprise
– FOMA Bohemia Ltd has come into being
1996 – production of films for personal dosimetry,
– purchase of the Polish company FOTON Bydgoszcz
1997 – implementation of the quality control system according to ISO 9001
standard
1999 – production and sale ot inkjet materials
2000 – production of registration papers for transport
– certification of medical products EN 46001:1996 and recertification EN ISO 9001
2001 – acquirement of the certificate CE for medical X-ray films
2002 – development and production of NDT X-ray diagnostics for radioscopy
2003 – production and sale of radiographic systems for health service
– receiving of the certificate CE for sale of radiographic devices
2004 – establishment of the Romanian company FOMAMURES S.R.L.
 
Darren, thanks, they also were making glass plates not all that long ago, and when I bought Neobrom paper (factory in Brno), it came packed in Foma boxes with Neobrom stickers over the Foma. Under the Socialist government, am not sure of the overall connection.

Neobrom had some contacts with Ukrainian suppliers, and really had a smorgasbord of papers, including photo linen, and a silver iodide contact paper. The director seemed very interested in making color products then, when I thought rather than trying to compete with the big boys in that field, they could have specialized on boutique papers. Regardless, they suddenly closed, and the director got a Mercedes.

I did hear some of the companies were operating at one time under license from Agfa, either W. German, or E. German. I was wondering which were which and which had developed their lines from the licensed production prior to the Berlin Wall coming down. I have seen a number of very well made Czech products which were close copies of German products, film holders, etc.

It looks as if Foma has an extended history of their own, though I note they have been selling R09 developer for as long as I have been visiting Czech.

Regards, John
 
Last edited:
I just got some interesting views from Jan in Berlin/Frankfurt, he is a student of much of the history of films and processing. I asked about films produced with the lineage of Agfa. Here is his informal narrative emailed to me today.

Should be some items of interest, as always with Jan.

Regards, John

I cannot say for sure who has produced film according to an Agfa license or specs, but Foma's F21 / Fomapan 100 looked very much like Agfa's Agfa Pan 100. Development times had been practically the same. Even if it is Foma's own invention, then it definitely has got the Agfa feeling, and imo it comes very close to the older Agfa Pan 100. Agfa APX 100 (and its brother APX 25) was something different. It had an improved acutance and midtones showed a somewhat better separation.

It had a dark green anti-halation backcoating which resulted in these improvements. According to Agfa's statements then, they also changed the spectral sensitivity, ie they lowered the sensitivity for blue hues.

Thus they spoke of a "built-in yellow filter". However, the good old No.8 would not retire from service, as APX films still rendered yellow to red hues too dark.

BTW, Agfa Pan 400 stayed the same for a very long time, even after renaming it to APX 400.

Agfa changed its formula in the very last stages of their history, around 2002. I don't know what they did to the film, but except from significantly longer souping times, especially with Rodinal, it just looked the same. So I suspect that Agfa changed the formula to enhance the shelf-life of the film, and not so much for an improvement of the image.

The latest version of Kodak's TMY has got a dark green backcoating now, and just like APX 25 and 100, it now shows much better acutance.
>
> I hear some companies picking up on the old Agfa names, but which are actually related to the films?

As far as I know, there's only one company buying and using some trademarks of Agfa, and that is Foto-Impex in Berlin.

Actually, it's the shop where you bought your photolinen when you visited me in Berlin back in 1999. Foto-Impex is not only buying the trademarks, they also acquired the patents, formulae, machinery and manpower to put up a production line for Agfa's multicontrast papers MCC and MCP - very much to my great joy.

Emulsion wise the papers are said to be identical to the original Agfa papers, just the base is said to be a bit different. I think, I'll have a try with these new papers soon.

Foto-Impex also sells the old Agfa developers, which are produced by Calbe Fotochemie. They had been the chemistry branch of ORWO and survived the collapse of ORWO.

They used to and still produce developers like N113 (ie Neutol) or A49 (which is an Atomal derivate), which Foto-Impex now sells with their original Agfa denominations, but under the brand "Adox".

Really funny, because Agfa and Adox used to be fierce competitors in West Germany during the fifties and sixties. In those days Adox had the reputation to make the sharpest films with the finest grain possible. Having printed some historical Adox negatives myself I must admit that they were really good even compared to today's best b/w films of the same speed.

I forgot to tell you that Foto-Impex had bought the Adox label many years ago and were distributing film and chemistry under this label. Today, they're selling the revived Agfa materials under the Adox label, but with the appropriate Agfa product names, because the general label "Agfa" is still owned by Agfa-Gevaert.

How come? Yes, there still is an Agfa-Gevaert company. It is involved in making x-ray, cine and aerial film besides specialized plastic foils and other stuff. In 2004 Agfa-Gevaert sold its photographic branch as a management buy-out, but kept its traditional trademarks, like the Agfa rhombus and the tradename "Agfa".

The new company became "AgfaPhoto", but for some yet unknown reasons it went into receivership by the end of 2005. Rumor has it that some leading managers had no hope in the future of the company and thus stashing all the liquid money available into their pockets, or that Agfa-Gevaert was cashing in AgfaPhoto's debts too early, so it had no chance to reconfigure and adapt to the new situation.

It is often said that AgfaPhoto became a victim of digital photography, that they put out digital equipment too late etc. I don't think that's true, as I can remember that Agfa-Gevaert / AgfaPhoto had a lot of digital devices on offer quite early.

I saw Photoshop in action for the first time at the Agfa stand at the photokina in 1990! Agfa offered a range of scanners and digital cameras as early as 1992. (Okay, Canon was much earlier, when it marketed its first, then so-called "still-video" camera in 1986.) And the marketing department people of Agfa well knew, that traditional film was on the decline and had prepared for it. But sure enough, they didn't plan to abandon the sector.

Concerning the Agfa b/w films, I haven't heard anything about their redemption.
Here and there you can find some left over rolls, most of them expiring next year, so that's it.

Unlike Ilford (or Kodak) Agfa's b/w films never had as strong community of devoted fans, number wise. I guess Agfa was selling most of its b/w film to institutions of the government, eg museums, archives, archaeologists, schools and such. Most b/w photographers I know use(d) Kodak or Ilford. With paper it was different, as a lot of photographers and printers preferred Agfa paper.

>
> How much did Foma take German Tech, am guessing the East Germans opened up everything they could in formulae-- I know the Czechs loved to appropriate German technology, what do you know about them? Efke? is the Orwo factory making anything now?

The core of original Agfa plant at Wolfen is now a museum and nothing is produced there since about 1995.

To all interested in the manufacture of photographic film and paper, the museum is worthwhile to visit. It's best to take a guided tour, so you can see all the old machinery and you'll get first hand information about it. They told us, that ORWO had some machinery from 1914 in use until the production ceased in 1994!

Efke is a Croatian company which uses Adox patents and machinery among others to make their films.

I doubt that they're reproducing the original Adox stuff today, as the speeds of their films are not identical to the original Adox films. I found Efke KB 50 and 100 quite pleasing, though the 50 is rather orthochromatic, whereas the 100 had a really high red sensitivity, so with this film you don't need a yellow filter. Efke KB 25 is almost orthochromatic, and for an ISO 25 film its grain is way too coarse. Haven't shot too much Efke, and that was long ago. So, Efke may have changed meanwhile.

After WWII German patents were released to the world as a part of the compensation for the damages Germany had inflicted on the world. Thus many photographic patents came into possession of other manufacturers, though an Ilford employee who had evaluated the quality of German photographic materials drew the conclusion that English and American films and chemistry had already surpassed German makes by the end of the war. Only Agfa papers were still at least on par.

I don't think that ORWO did open up their formulae voluntarily, it might have been dictated by the socialist party, and they had to share their knowledge.

Besides, Foma may have produced Agfa stuff during the war, as it was out of reach from Allied attacks and bomb raids. Many Czech factories had to produce German goods for that reason, and a lot of know-how was left there.

For instance, before becoming a socialist state, the Czech aviation industry built their variants of Me109 fighter planes for Czech Air Force and even exported a number to Israel in 1948 (who, ironically, fought with them against Egyptian Spitfires!).
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
Trius said:
John: Is he saying things are as simple as others here claim? Just askin' ...
Click to expand...

Jan, to my knowledge, has not followed this thread, except the questions I asked.

I would generally not disagree with Jan easily, he is pretty scholarly in his sources and he has done serious research.

It is a lot of information in one email, bit off the cuff, but I recall discussions with him last I saw him and he was very much on top of the information then.

Bits and pieces of the puzzles from a reliable source, I am unsure how much of this is common knowledge here.


Regards, John
 
Last edited:
Fred: My point exactly. It seemed to me we were damn close to determining how many angels could dance ... etc.
 
I've got the first roll of current Agfa Vista 200 back -- family portraits that I won't post online -- and it is indeed Ferrania 200.

The only Ferrania strips I have to compare to are about 4 years old. It's definitely the same film. The edge markings are very distinctive, e.g. the frame numbers use a seven-segment font. Where the old one has the Ferrania logo pre-exposed, this roll says AGFAPHOTOVISTA; the rest is identical.

This is Agfa Vista 200 which I bought earlier this month in Germany (dm drugstore chain, if memory serves) at 0.75 euros for 2x24. The box doesn't carry the tell-tale "Made in Italy" but rather "Made in EU."
 
Interesting read, thanks for the information. Many of the Agfa, Adox, Efke films I never shot. Only films readily available to me back when I was shooting film in 70's early 80's was Kodak & Fuji. Now I have access to all these films I hope to wet my taste buds. So I wont miss the old emulsion's & learn to adapt to the characteristics that makes each film special.
 
Ok guys,sorry to bring bad news,but:
1) The Agfa Vista are made by Ferrania an Italian company that produces cheap films (don't know about APX and Precisa CT)
2) I've bought 20 rolls of Vista 100 and I can say that it is...absolutely the worst film I've ever shot :(

Sadly,that are not real Agfa film...please note the different logo (round instead of diamond shaped)
 
Last edited:
Notes:

1. AgfaPhoto is not bankrupt. It was, but emerged as AgfaPhoto Holding.

2. We aren't ever getting AgfaPhoto colour emulsions back. They're going to be rebadged crap instead. Colour is just too hard to do in small batches and too hard to do well anyways.

3. APX on the other hand could easily come back. There's several possibilities for coating it, including Ilford which does that already for Berger, they don't rebadge their own emulsions. but they do coat for others, Foma/Efke, ADOX and Agfa Gevaert in Belgium. The latter is probably the best placed to do APX100 properly. No new factories are required.
 
Agfa Gevaert in Belgium has very little incentive to start an APX production. they already have the Avphot line. They sell it to Maco who gets it packaged in 135 and 120 formats, some even in 127. Maco sells those films under the names Rollei Retro 80s, Rollei Superpan 200 and Rollei Retro 400s.

I have experience with Retro 400s and Superpan 200. They offer fine granularity, but not to the T-Max levels. Their sensitivity goes down to infra-red and combined with a red filter they allow for good landscape photography even in hazy light. I have a 12x18" print from 35mm 400s that appears nearly grain-free.
 
I don't think they (Lupus) are using the last Agfa stock...I'm 99% sure that it's a Ferrania...
Have a look here:

On the left the new AgfaPhoto on the right a custom roll for a local PhotoLab...same canister,same adesive label...


Even the expiring date is stamped in the same way




And now have a look at the old Vista (real Agfa)....

Different canister and no adesive label (the roll is painted)...
 
If the films are coming off of master rolls still refrigerated and not cut or perforated yet, let alone assembled into rolls and boxed, it would not be surprising that Lupus would engage some third-party to perform that work for them, so the packaging would change and probably be a close match for whomever was doing that subcontracted work for Lupus. The proof would be in the pudding - the film itself.

In any case, none of this 'new' Agfa Vista has yet hit the USA, so I think it is too early to say what kind of film it might be.
 
The new vista 200 has more grain(the smudged variety) than fuji 800 press and nearly as much as natura 1600. Given its more expensive than kodak/fuji 200 here in China i dont see it lasting long.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom