Is Film Dying Again ?

[noisycheese]

Everything is dying.... Period

What he said.

To quote Edward Abbey, "Ain't none of us gettin' out of here alive."

Come to think of it, the leading cause of death amongst humans is living.

 

[goamules]

"I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive"
Hank Williams, 1952

 

[ianstamatic]

digital still hasn't caught up in the highlights and when the image breaks down in the shadows. its all about the shoulder ... also dynamic range of films like hp5 and tmax400 is exceptional

 

[thegman]

In a word: No. Just look at the numbers.

There are lots of reasons to shoot film. Image quality isn't among them and probably hasn't been for the last three years or so*. At least not from a technical point of view if you compare apples to apples - and not smartphone snaps to drumscanned 8x10 slides.

* Interestingly, this is also the period in which increasing film sales have been reported ...

I'd say image quality is one of them. I've got a print of a 4x5 negative on my wall. I could get roughly 4x5 quality in digital, but what's it going to cost?

Also, if we say that compact digital cameras are limited to a FF image sensor, compact film cameras are not. I can get a 6x7 camera smaller than a FF DSLR. So if we're comparing film and digital, why should film have to compete within digital's limitations?

Here is what matters to me:

1) Can I afford the camera?
2) Can I be bothered to carry it about?
3) Is it pleasant to use?

If say a GF670 ticks all those boxes, and someone wants to compare image quality to a FF DSLR, the fact that the DSLR has a tiny image sensor by comparison is it's problem, not mine.

Apologies for the rant, but it reminds me of the old computer debates between PowerPC and Intel, there is always someone saying that you can't compare one or the other, because it's a 'server' chip, or it's 'last year's model', or 'Altivec wasnt' enabled on the benchmarks'.

Only thing that matters is the real world, and in the real world, film can go big for little cost, digital cannot.

 

[goamules]

I'm definitely shooting film for the image quality. I shoot 5x7 and 8x10 mostly. The tonal range, resolution, and joy of shooting it trumps spray and pray digital. Each tool has it's plusses and minuses. I shot a LOT of formats in both film and digital.

 

[Filzkoeter]

Here is only two major camera stores in Toronto left with film supplies. I never seen anybody else buying where, just me and only. Always.

I've experienced exactly the contrary thing last time I've went to the Fotoimpex store here in Berlin. It was so full of people buying film I had to wait several minutes in line to get served. 🙄
Also when I walk past film labs there's always customers in there. I've often seen sold out film shelves in drugstores and it seems there are increasingly more and more people with film cameras around in this city.

To me film nowadays seems really alive.

 

[zuiko85]

Never left film.

The problem is that you cannot tell trends from a few old farts like myself. I'm 'stuck' camera wise, in the 1970's. To me, 35mm SLR's such as the Nikon F2, Minolta SRT series, Pentax Spotmatic series, Olympus OM-1, Konica T3, Topcon D, Canon F1 (original) etc, etc were the pinnicle of camera development. It's been downhill from there.

* DISCLAIMER* (This is one mans opinion, worth only what you paid for it and is not bound by logic, reason, or facts.)

For myself, I only shoot B&W now and, as I have done for the last 40 years, do my own developing. In the last 2 to 3 years C-41 has gone away locally. I would have to pay at least $10 or more for develop and scan and wait 3 weeks. I do not know if you get your negatives back. So yeah, looks like color negative film is still in decline. Never was a slide shooter myself but from all reports it looks like prices have skyrocketed. That sounds like a death spiral, price goes up due to low volume, more folks stop buying, volume declines more causing prices to rise more etc, down to unsupportable numbers at any price.



As to B&W, looks like it is fairly healthy. Prices continue to rise but not to the point that will kill the medium.

I'm would not be surprised by a rise in prices of desirable film cameras. A fixed quanity were made and there is a certain amount of attrition among those remaining and also a loss of knowledgeable repairmen to keep them running.

By the way, I actually have a digital SLR, a very old (2007) Olympus E-410. It is starting to have some problems and when it goes belly up I'll toss it in the garbage and look for something else, won't know what that will be until that time comes.

Another thought; For quite a few years all my B&W film has had to be ordered online. In fact I doubt I'd fine a single roll of 35mm film at any retail outlet in a radius of 30 miles. I live in Olympia, the capital of Washington state.

 

[Phil_F_NM]

These aren't the droids you're looking for.
Move along.

Phil Forrest

 

[colyn]

For quite a few years all my B&W film has had to be ordered online. In fact I doubt I'd fine a single roll of 35mm film at any retail outlet in a radius of 30 miles. I live in Olympia, the capital of Washington state.

I buy most of my film from Freestyle and have found a few deals on eBay.

Arlington Camera still stocks and sells film in 35mm, 120, and 4x5. They are a 25 minute drive from me...but I can still get my film cheaper from Freestyle..

 

[rlim1987]

FP peel apart films. One of my favorite genre beside the Portras.. Is the one that is truly dying. With fp3000b dead, there is only fp100c left now 🙁

 

[btgc]

Film is becoming a niche hobby.

Cameras itself are becoming niche. Lots of people around me don't even have dedicated camera anymore even if they could afford anything from Fuji X-world or comparable. They even don't use their digital cameras bought several years ago because they have smartphones.

 

[Georgiy Romanov]

Just sit down and relax. I try to quit three or more times but can't do this step. Every time when my film stocks comes to end i say myself what that roll will be my last. I take my digi cam, try it for 2-3 weeks, get bored and buying another 100 rolls of Kodak Gold 200 per dollar or bulk of b&w for my M4 or P&S.

For me film will never dead because i try find opportunities to shoot, not reasons to stop. In my small town (less than 70k population) we have a lab that still support cheapest C-41 develop (about .50cents) and have full line amateur's color film. Time freeze here 🙂

 

[igore]

Film has that special charm in it. I will use it till I die, hopefully.

 

[LeicaFoReVer]

I bought 4 rolls of film (fuji velvia 50, provia 100, acros 100 and pro400) for 45 USD!!! For me the film is not dying but suffering from a serious illness, digital photo-cheuma 🙂

 

[Ranchu]

Ultramax 400 is $11.99 for three rolls. It's good.

 

[KansanTim]

As others have mentioned, film never died. It just lost some popularity, but never went away, and it's not going to go away completely for a very long time. I suspect black and white film in particular will still be easily available the day I die, and I'm pretty young yet. The fact is that most economic battles such as digital v. film don't end with the elimination of the losing product, so characterizing the situation like only one option may remain in the end is wrong.

The question if film is going through a distinct second decline in popularity is somewhat more interesting. I'm skeptical that its market would be in for a second dip that is truly different from some continuation of the previous decline, but I am not really informed about the market.

 

[VertovSvilova]

Film is not a problem. I get my film from high count Feedback sellers on eBay, with at least 99% positive feedback and high sales. Often expired but refrigerated and excellent experience with the film I am receiving.

I realize that people always want to get bargains and save money, that's totally understandable. And I'm not at all picking on you personally. But just as a reminder to everybody: if we don't buy fresh film from the manufacturers then film will go away faster and/or get more expensive even more quickly. Part of supporting film use is buying it from the current manufacturers who are selling it. Maybe it should be seen as the 'cost of commitment' or something like that.

I sold several bricks of 35mm E-6 film here last week and felt a little bad about it. And yes, the buyers got a good deal. However, I did take that money and bought a bunch of 4x5 film from my local shop (I'm not using 35mm right now and am concentrating on sheet film.)

 

[Welland]

Some of the comments here crack me up.

Don't confuse the film arm of Kodak with the rest of the sh*t. Ilford's profits are up, they run their business sensibly.

Yes actual shop sales are falling but thats the same for every type of purchase. The internet is taking so much business from the high street.

Fuji and Kodak are discontinuing some films but when your business wants to invest its time and efforts in printers and X range that's what happens. Nothing to do with poor ROI.

 

[thegman]

Everything is dying, you just need to look ahead far enough.

Film is cheaper than it ever has been, you just have to take inflation into account, same as we do for every other product we buy.

Yes, retail film is expensive, but so was the last smartphone I bought, I went online and got it for $200 AUD less.

Right now, I only shoot film, no digital except for my phone for eBay sales. I can get film easily and have it developed easily. There are only two types of people who think film is dying:

1) Passive aggressive types, trolls, etc.
2) Those who have genuine concerns about the future of their passion/hobby.

Type 1 can safely be ignored. Type 2 need to be encouraged just to continue what they do.

 

[Sparrow]

Everything is dying, you just need to look ahead far enough.

Film is cheaper than it ever has been, you just have to take inflation into account, same as we do for every other product we buy.

Yes, retail film is expensive, but so was the last smartphone I bought, I went online and got it for $200 AUD less.

Right now, I only shoot film, no digital except for my phone for eBay sales. I can get film easily and have it developed easily. There are only two types of people who think film is dying:

1) Passive aggressive types, trolls, etc.
2) Those who have genuine concerns about the future of their passion/hobby.

Type 1 can safely be ignored. Type 2 need to be encouraged just to continue what they do.

... there is a third type, the pedant who goes about highlighting little grammatical errors, like pointing out that 'dying again' is actually a logical absurdity ... either film died the first time and therefore is in fact dead, or it recovered and therefor was not in fact dying just a bit poorly 🙂