DownUnder
Vamoosed (for a while)
Indeed, the writing is very much on the wall for all traveling film photographers... given the new see-everything (= and fry everything) airport scanners, film is no longer safe to take with us when we go abroad, unless one is prepared and willing to take a certain risk. As I am.
Those lead-lined bags as were so popular in the 1980s and well into the 90s, were always a problem. I once had my suitcase yanked out of a loading cart at an Asian airport, forced open and checked after a routine scan before loading spotted one of those bags. Fortunately I wasn't in one of those corrupt countries where staff would then have freely helped themselves to some or even all of my things, but naturally I realised my bag had been broken into when I reclaimed it at the other end. I made an insurance claim but got nowhere. Lesson learned. (fortunately, the lead bag with the films was still in the case when I retrieved it.)
It's at least a consolation, sort of, for me that at my age (nearing 75), I no longer care to carry along a big bag of Nikons, a Linhof, Rolleis, my Contax Gs, etc etc etc, as I did for so many years when the going was good.
Until Covid-19 laid us all low and forced us to stay mostly at home, I did most of my Southeast Asian travel with digital cameras. Digital is now the new way, and if we want to go on going overseas and taking images, it's the way we have to go.
For those who persist in carting along analogue gear when they travel, film is still available in some countries - in Singapore, in Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) and in Bangkok and a few cities of Thailand, but no longer in Indonesia (Bali was the last holdout, but I've not seen films being sold in the pro shops of Denpasar since 2013 or 2014), Cambodia, Laos or even Sarawak. Unusually, when I was last in Asia just before the pandemic hit, a photo store I occasionally visit in Brunei (mostly to see what expensive film gear the locals have traded in on the latest digital wonder-shooters) I lucked into a small stock of mostly Kodak B&W 35mm films which I was able to buy cheaply, as it was close to its use-by dates. The shop owner told me he'd sold maybe six films in the past year - so it goes. I bought the lot and am slowly working my way through it, but tellingly, these days when I go out exploring in the rural areas of my home state in Australia, often as not I carry a Nikon F65 and one of my digitals, either a D700 or my D800.
We have to accept that time passes and all things change. We don't have to like it, but we sure as heck have to learn to put up with it.
PS When I left Brunei, I put all that B&W film in my suitcase, which probably was scanned before being loaded on to my flight. To date I see nothing to indicate the film was damaged in any way by this. Just sayin'...
Those lead-lined bags as were so popular in the 1980s and well into the 90s, were always a problem. I once had my suitcase yanked out of a loading cart at an Asian airport, forced open and checked after a routine scan before loading spotted one of those bags. Fortunately I wasn't in one of those corrupt countries where staff would then have freely helped themselves to some or even all of my things, but naturally I realised my bag had been broken into when I reclaimed it at the other end. I made an insurance claim but got nowhere. Lesson learned. (fortunately, the lead bag with the films was still in the case when I retrieved it.)
It's at least a consolation, sort of, for me that at my age (nearing 75), I no longer care to carry along a big bag of Nikons, a Linhof, Rolleis, my Contax Gs, etc etc etc, as I did for so many years when the going was good.
Until Covid-19 laid us all low and forced us to stay mostly at home, I did most of my Southeast Asian travel with digital cameras. Digital is now the new way, and if we want to go on going overseas and taking images, it's the way we have to go.
For those who persist in carting along analogue gear when they travel, film is still available in some countries - in Singapore, in Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) and in Bangkok and a few cities of Thailand, but no longer in Indonesia (Bali was the last holdout, but I've not seen films being sold in the pro shops of Denpasar since 2013 or 2014), Cambodia, Laos or even Sarawak. Unusually, when I was last in Asia just before the pandemic hit, a photo store I occasionally visit in Brunei (mostly to see what expensive film gear the locals have traded in on the latest digital wonder-shooters) I lucked into a small stock of mostly Kodak B&W 35mm films which I was able to buy cheaply, as it was close to its use-by dates. The shop owner told me he'd sold maybe six films in the past year - so it goes. I bought the lot and am slowly working my way through it, but tellingly, these days when I go out exploring in the rural areas of my home state in Australia, often as not I carry a Nikon F65 and one of my digitals, either a D700 or my D800.
We have to accept that time passes and all things change. We don't have to like it, but we sure as heck have to learn to put up with it.
PS When I left Brunei, I put all that B&W film in my suitcase, which probably was scanned before being loaded on to my flight. To date I see nothing to indicate the film was damaged in any way by this. Just sayin'...