One supplier is selling 5000 films per week in UK

[Austerby]

"In the UK alone Lomography sells on average 5,000 rolls of film a week through three gallery stores and an online store."

It's in The Guardian, so must be true.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/camera-club-blog/2011/dec/29/camera-club-january-achievement

Is this the end of film that we've heard so much about?

 

[sevo]

Given that there used to be department stores with ten times that turn-around, yes - this is (after) the end of (CN) film as it used to be...

 

[shadowfox]

Film *is* dead as a mass commodity item.

It is up to us to ensure that it's alive in its new niche: Artistic photography whose practitioner ranges from the curious to the committed.

 

[David Hughes]

Well, I will go on buying it in supermarkets and chain stores but 5,000 a week is good by any standards. Try thinking of it as 260,000 a year...

Regards, David

 

[Speedfreak]

5000 a week is more than I would have expected.

I dont worry about a "death" of film anyway. Vinyl is still around too and was declared dead 30 years ago.

 

[JoeV]

In my town in the southwestern USA, the only source for ISO100 color negative film is Lomo film in bulk packs from the local Urban Outfitters store. It's pretty good film, too. All of the usual chain stores sell only ISO 200 or 400 in color C-41 film.

Despite their reputation for marketing plastic point-and-shoot cameras of questionable quality, I like Lomo's enthusiasm and marketing methods for film and all things analog.

~Joe

 

[Coldkennels]

In my town in the southwestern USA, the only source for ISO100 color negative film is Lomo film in bulk packs from the local Urban Outfitters store. It's pretty good film, too. All of the usual chain stores sell only ISO 200 or 400 in color C-41 film.

Despite their reputation for marketing plastic point-and-shoot cameras of questionable quality, I like Lomo's enthusiasm and marketing methods for film and all things analog.

~Joe

It used to be good. Once upon a time, it was all Ferrania Solaris - I used to buy the three-packs of their colour neg because it was pretty good for the price. Without making any mention of it anywhere, though, they changed supplies to some sort of Kodak stock. I bought a stockpile of the stuff without realising, and I've not had a decent photo from it since. It's all much too saturated and everything looks sickly and wrong.

But, as always, YMMV.

 

[rogerzilla]

The mass market for black-and-white film has been dead since about 1970. 42 years later...oh.

 

[zone7]

Enjoyable Creativity

Enjoyable Creativity

I use film because it's fun. I find it enjoyable creativity. It's not my job (digital is a job for a lot of folks), it's my avocation. At times I use digital for "quickie" stuff that I doubt will last very long (those to whom it is important will pass). For "serious" creative, archival photography, I choose film and have fun with it.

 

[ajuk]

It doesn't help that the price of film in your average pharmacy or supermarket is just extortionate. The last time I paid £5 for a single roll of film was never.

 

[Paul Jenkin]

Up to us (film users) to keep it going. as long as demand justifies production and distribution costs, there's no reason to stop making it. Just a pity some of the film manufacturers don't spend a few quid on advertising it as I'm sure more folk would buy it if they knew it still existed.

 

[HHPhoto]

Up to us (film users) to keep it going. as long as demand justifies production and distribution costs, there's no reason to stop making it. Just a pity some of the film manufacturers don't spend a few quid on advertising it as I'm sure more folk would buy it if they knew it still existed.

I agree.
But it is of course not only the duty of the manufacturers, but also of the film dealers like Freestyle, Fotoimpex, Maco, ag-photographic, silverprint, ars-imago and so on.....
But these guys totally suck in this respect. They want to sell film, but don't want to do any marketing for film.
That doesn't work 😡!
The dealers need to be kicked in their ass to get active 🙄.
Speak to your dealers.

Cheers, Jan

 

[David Hughes]

Hi,

Look on ebay and you'll see a lot of brand new film for sale at a wide range of prices (Nice to so-so) and a lot of rubbish at worse prices.

This is one area where ebay does a lot of good, bringing bulk buys to everyone.

Regards, David

 

[btgc]

I agree.
But it is of course not only the duty of the manufacturers, but also of the film dealers like Freestyle, Fotoimpex, Maco, ag-photographic, silverprint, ars-imago and so on.....
But these guys totally suck in this respect. They want to sell film, but don't want to do any marketing for film.
That doesn't work 😡!
The dealers need to be kicked in their ass to get active 🙄.
Speak to your dealers.

Cheers, Jan

Any idea how film should be marketed this days? I assume you do not mean mass buyer can be convinced to use film again? Those who have departed are away not to return, not only snappers but also enthusiasts - they switch their interest from film to digital and continue there.

Few efficient ways for manufacturers to market film is participating in photo and photography related internet resources, give free film to people they believe can share their knowledge and keep in touch with users. People will market film themselves, just support their interest and show they can expect film supply.

This is somehow similar to Coke and Pepsi - largely, they do not differ much but each holds on his choice 🙂

 

[ajuk]

I think film companies rolled far over too easily it would seem that they didn't even try and and promote film as something that is best to use when quality is more important. And before you say "well digital is better quality" I'm not talking about SLRs I'm talking about compact cameras with sensor 25x smaller than film.

 

[Paul Jenkin]

I agree.
But it is of course not only the duty of the manufacturers, but also of the film dealers like Freestyle, Fotoimpex, Maco, ag-photographic, silverprint, ars-imago and so on.....
But these guys totally suck in this respect. They want to sell film, but don't want to do any marketing for film.
That doesn't work 😡!
The dealers need to be kicked in their ass to get active 🙄.
Speak to your dealers.

Cheers, Jan

To be fair, if you look in the magazines that aren't purely "digital" based, Silverprint and Ag (in the UK) have regular advertisements. Morco also advertises a decent selection of films. Silverprint makes a regular appearance at Photographica. The frustration for me is the limited selection of or, in certain cases, non-existent availabilty of film in specialist photographic equipment shops.

As mentioned later in the thread, it's difficult to see "how" they'd market the benefits of film when the majority of people with cameras are conditioned to accepting digital output "immediately" rather than waiting a little for film to be processed (or processing it themselves).

There is, however, a small but growing number of photographers who have never used anything other than digital who are trying (and liking) what film has to offer. This is from the "toy camera" fraternity, through Impossible Project replacement for Polaroid and right up to medium and large format. It's very much a niche market but it's sufficiently noteworthy to warrant attention.

I hav no problem with digital whatsoever and it's understandably popular with the masses. However, LONG LIVE FILM 🙂

 

[ajuk]

Any idea how film should be marketed this days? I assume you do not mean mass buyer can be convinced to use film again? Those who have departed are away not to return, not only snappers but also enthusiasts - they switch their interest from film to digital and continue there.

Film companies didn't even bother to try and market film against digital even in the days when it was obviously a better choice for occasions where better quality was more important.:bang:

How about a viral ad. This a girl is having her picture taken on a DSLR by a pro, he then switches to MF film gear and the girl
starts making getting more emotional and less ridgid to the camera and she starts taking her clothes off, and the caption
just says, "The feel of film [Brand]"

 

[HHPhoto]

Any idea how film should be marketed this days?

Oh, there are lots of ideas.
For a long time I've shot film and digital parallel. As an engineer I've analysed the strengths and weaknesses of both mediums intensively.
From this experience I know in which areas film has significant advantages, for example:

- slide projection (color and BW) has by far the best image quality at this huge enlargement factors; digital beamers with their extremely low resolution of only 1-2 MP, their bad color reproduction and their ridiculous high prices can not compete at all with slide projection

- higher dynamic range with film

- better performance in highlight and backlit situations with film, smoother transition from tone to tone, no "collage effect" as with sensors

- more natural color reproduction

- better skin tones

- more natural look with film, more similar to how our eyes are working

- better archiving capabilities

- higher resolution at medium and higher object contrasts (and with some color slide films and the high-resolution BW films also at lower object contrasts)

And then you have all the "soft" reasons like slowing down, getting away from the daily boring computer work, enjoying older cameras, enjoying the contemplation of viewing slides, real prints or making prints in the wet darkroom and so on.

There are much more reasons, we all know. Digital has its benefits in some areas, film in others.

Those who want to sell film (Freestyle, ag-photographic, silverprint, Maco, Fotoimpex, ars-imago etc.) have to tell the photographers about the benefits of film.
There are lots of young shooters who have started with digital. They now see "hey, there is also something called film".
They want to know more about it.
They think, "hey, those who sell film will explain it to me".
Then they look at the websites of Freestyle + Co, try to find why it may make sense to shoot film, they are searching and searching on these websites and find......absolutely nothing!!
Not a single word why shooting film makes sense.

It is the duty of the film distributors to get the people, especially the new young ones, interested in film.
But these guys are totally lazy and in-active in this respect.

I assume you do not mean mass buyer can be convinced to use film again?

Of course not in the numbers of former times, that is obvious.
But that is not needed to keep film alive.
But different photographer groups can be interested for film if it is made right, with an effective marketing.
Look at the Holga and Lomo crowd (see the article in the guardian): Already about two million film shooters in this group worldwide.
Because of a working marketing concept.
Same with the Impossible Project.

Those who have departed are away not to return, not only snappers but also enthusiasts - they switch their interest from film to digital and continue there.

There are people returning.
But the most attractive group for the film distributors are young digital shooters who don't know film. It's new for them, they are curious, it can be cool stuff (with proper marketing).

Cheers, Jan

 

[HHPhoto]

To be fair, if you look in the magazines that aren't purely "digital" based, Silverprint and Ag (in the UK) have regular advertisements. Morco also advertises a decent selection of films. Silverprint makes a regular appearance at Photographica.

Hi Paul,

I know they sometimes make some little ads. Fotoimpex, Maco and Nordfoto are doing it as well in Germany.
But this is not a marketing for film, not at all!
In these ads they only tell you that you can buy film at them.
That is not what is needed.

What is needed is raising interest in film, telling what film can deliver, where its strenghts are.
Where film can complement digital.
Especially to those who have never shot film, the young digital photographers.

Cheers, Jan

 

[Pentudlian]

Here's a rather depressing tale.

My local Boots [for non-UK readers, the country's largest group of chemists/pharmacists] has had a small stock of its own brand slide film, with an expiry date of February 2012. It is priced at £9.99, processing included. Quite by chance, I was in another branch of Boots about 150 miles away yesterday. The same expired film had been on sale, but at a post-expiry discount for £1.99 per roll. It had all gone. Today I popped into my local store hoping to take advantage. I was told that they couldn't sell it as it was past its expiry date. My protest that it was perfectly usable fell on deaf ears. To make matters worse, I was told that Boots would now throw the film away. I asked if they'd throw it at me, but sadly not.

Quite apart from the poor business sense, the really appalling thing about this tale is that the staff plainly had no idea about film. So well done to the Lomographers!