How long does film have?

How long does film have?

  • Film? Film is already dead! Long live digital.

    Votes: 5 1.4%

  • A few more years.

    Votes: 38 10.8%

  • A few more decades.

    Votes: 123 35.0%

  • Film will be around forever!

    Votes: 185 52.7%
  • Total voters
    351
rlightfoot, I really appreciate your view of the world. I am very similar. I love my older BMW motorcycle which even I with limited mechanical skills can work on. Setting valve clearances and balancing dual carbs, oil changes, etc. Modern bikes certainly have better performance, but need to go into a the shop where they'll hook up the electronics to a diagnostic computer.

I hate to say it, but I appreciate sitemistic's view of the world as well. It is perhaps more realistic and rational, but no one can force those on me when it comes to my passions of photography and motorcycling.

I also applaud how you two have carried on this discussion in such a civil manner!
 
rlightfoot said:
I believe my main point still stands, though... Lets say we compare the MP with the Canon 1Ds Mk. III ? From a longevity point of view, which one would you bet on becoming irreparable first, both given the same amount of use?
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Don't know about the MkIII, a MkII or MkIIn usualy gets 100,000 frames on the clock before it needs to go to CPS. I'm talking press work, i.E. outside in the rain.

Apart from electronic or mechanical failure, don't you agree that DSLRs also suffer (for want of a better word) from a measure of "built in obsolescence" ? The memory cards and batteries advance almost as fast as the technology in the camera itself and in 10 years, it'll probably be hard or impossible to get hold of the right consumables for today's cameras. They might make adaptors to fit the latest stuff, but by that time the camera body will be so outdated that you might as well just upgrade...
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A memory card is not expensive, but my 1998 32MByte CF card works fine in a 1DMkIIn, although it is far to small.



All in all, yes, a current dSLR is pretty tough, even my old Canon D60 shows no signs of ageing after some 70,000 shots.
2,000 films through a mechanical camera without any service, I doubt that's possible.

Just like old cars, on my 1978 VW Beatle I once had I had to adjust ignition timing and change Oil every 5000 km on my 2007 Miata not. I could fix my Beatle and I can't fix the Miata, but with the Beatle I had to and the Miata just works.
 
NickTrop said:
The only thing that digital has done was drive the labor costs out of manufacturing. Same as watches. You "invested" in a manual camera - it lasted a lifetime. You "invested" in a manual watch (which I own and prefer) it lasted a lifetime. Both required skilled labor to create.

The new photographic model is to create a product that's inferior in every way:

- inferior build quality
- inferior ergonomics
- inferior picture quality
- inferior longevity
- inferior durability
- inferior cost of total ownership
- inferior flexibility (no negatives, no slides, no acceptable black and white)
- inferior serviceability

And -zero- charm.

Build in "planned obsolescence", drive out skilled labor costs, charge inflated prices.

Marketing's task is to "sell" the masses that the product is somehow better. (And the next generation is "better", and the next, and the next, and the next...) You might have purchased two quality cameras in your lifetime in the "film" days. Now you "get hooked" chase megapixels and purchase ten inferiour products - throw the other nine away.
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Nick, I agree with you, even though one thing the march to digital has done is enable me to buy up old film cameras that I couldn't afford when new at bargain prices.

Let's all vow to now upgrade ever year as they want us too. I'm still waiting for a digital SLR, and can wait as long as I can buy film...

That said, I might just buy another digital P&S now that they are becoming relatively cheap. There are cameras I wouldn't have bought for $1,000 that I might buy now that they are $300 or so. Even $500 isn't out of line if I like the camera.
 
The digital P&Ss are what makes me use film 🙂
Sorry, nothing beats any ISO400 film in my Contax TVS.
 
Well, sitemistic, it's been very interesting debating this with you and I really appreciate your point of view... I think that we both have largely the same feelings, but express them in slightly different ways. Maybe your greater experiance in photography has given you a more realistic view of things, but I think you'll join me in saying that I'll shoot film until I can't? 🙂 Alongside digital, of course.

After what's been said in this topic, I've come to the conclusion that there's not a lot of point in worrying about the future of film... The thing to do is to go out and shoot in the format that suits you and your work best, do what makes you happy and if film is meant to stick around, then it will.

FrankS and shadowfox... Thank you for your kind words! I look forward to joining in with more interesting topics on this forum. 🙂 And I'll find some of my work to post as well, if I can find anything I'm not too ashamed to show people! I'm afraid I'm very much a learner. 😉
 
sitemistic said:
People buy these old cameras these days, many of which had little use in the hands of amateurs when they were new, have them CLA'd, and then use them relatively lightly and extol their superior mechanical construction to the current "all electronic plastic cameras." I can tell you as a PJ who has "been there" that I will take a 1DS Mk. III over an F1 with motor any day. The 1DS will last much longer, with far fewer problems and with pure image quality (not the subjective film look vs digital look debate) that just blows away a film 35mm camera.
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Modern professional DSLR's certainly have a much better MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure) than any mechanical camera. They are mostly electronics and electronics to not wear in the way mechanics do. The mechanical parts of a modern camera have much superior materials and precision manufacturing thanks to modern CAM (Computer Aided Manufacturing) techniques.

The only problem with DSLR's and even many newer film cameras is that once some of the electronics fail 20 years from now, they will be very difficult to fix. Even if you can find the faultly part without a repair manual and diagnostic software, the parts will be long out of manufacturing and supplies run out. Only possibility is cannibalization and even then surface mounted chips on a printed circuit board are a *itch to change. More so with the current lead free solders. In the repair shops they would not even change them but replace the whole board with a new one. You can still do that 20 years from now -- if you can find a functional spare part through cannibalization. That is why most broken cameras depending on electronics will be just unrepairable junk in the future. Common models will be easier to fix, since there will be more broken examples for cannibalization.
 
Availability of spare parts is a problem with mechanical devices, too.

Why do they "fix" M3 finders by fitting M6 finders into it?
 
I need a small spring for my Robot Royal shutter. It has to stamped out of a sheet of spring steel. The tooling alone would set me back some 400 Euro! So I have to wait for a donor.
 
i replied that film is already dead.

a viable global study that has been conducted by national photographie agency in yerevan, armenia found staggering statistics:

they estimate that by the end of 2007!! the global supplies of danastes hercules, a beetle whose ooze when mixed with octahedropolymorphonate (OHPMP) procudes the chemical which embedded into the film layer reacts to light and produces images is critically low.

on top of that, there seems to be a current epidemic which is wiping out the farming supplies of the beetle the cause of which has not yet been determined.

i have bought out the current supply of walgreens special color 800iso speed. i know it's not the greatest but with demand greatly exceeding supply in the next couple month i know my venture will be a profitable one.


i know some of you say that production will shift to eastern europe when the west is no longer capable of producing film, but current eastern europen film only has shelf life of no more than 4-8 weeks and often doesn't produce realistic looking images.
 
iridium7777 said:
i know some of you say that production will shift to eastern europe when the west is no longer capable of producing film, but current eastern europen film only has shelf life of no more than 4-8 weeks and often doesn't produce realistic looking images.
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I read this joke for the first time, good one 🙂
I don't like Foma films, but they don't deserve such rumour.
 
Socke said:
I need a small spring for my Robot Royal shutter. It has to stamped out of a sheet of spring steel. The tooling alone would set me back some 400 Euro! So I have to wait for a donor.
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And that single camera being one of the last mechincal cameras left in the world you are certainly screwed.
 
rich815 said:
And that single camera being one of the last mechincal cameras left in the world you are certainly screwed.
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Replacing it would be cheating! We want to proof that mechanical cameras can be repaired indefinitely 🙂



Note to self, install spell checker immediately.
 
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Socke said:
Replacing it would be cheating! We want to proof that mechanical cameras can be repaired indefinitely 🙂



Note to self, install spell checker immediately.
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Can the photographer be "repaired" indefinitely? My cameras just have to outlast me.
 
Kodak's Q3 2007 film sales drop 18% WW, 32% in US

Kodak's Q3 2007 film sales drop 18% WW, 32% in US

"Revenue in the consumer digital business increased 1.3% to $1.12 billion as stronger-than-expected sales of digital cameras and retail print-making kiosks were offset by declines in photofinishing. Film revenue declined 18% to $488 million, led by a 32% drop in U.S. sales."

/T
 
IMO, film as we knew it is already dead. There are die-hard dinosaurs still roaming the planet claiming film will be around forever. But for the most part film has been out-performed in absolutely all regards by it's digital counterpart and there isn't a need for it anymore. Start-up cost used to be the major advantage of film but with consumer DSLRs under a grand producing images that compete with medium format film in sharpness and clarity; film, 35mm film in particular, does not have a prayer.
 
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