This is just my guess - there will be no more Polaroid-type films made. Polaroid won a huge court case against Kodak many years ago for infringing on their technology with a similar type film. Polaroid itself went bankrupt several years ago, after a long financial decline. The company is now owned by a merchandising company (The Petters Group) that 'brands' things with famous names. In the case of Polaroid, that means low-end Taiwanese digicams branded with the Polaroid logo. Polaroid's new owners have been making some money with the iZone cameras, which relies on the instant transfer technology, but that's died down now, so there really is no more mass market for the products.
This is a problem with factories that a lot of people don't realize at first. You see, the cost of the film as a finished product is not as closely tied to the cost of raw materials as you might think. For example, it costs very nearly the same to service the factory itself when it is running at 10% capacity or 100%. You can cut back on some workers, but not in essential steps in production - so the costs to 'cut back on production' don't drop in a straight line. That means that if you can sell a pack of film at retail for $15 when you make 10,000 a day, you have to sell the same pack for $150, give or take, if you cut back to making 1,000 a day. It's not that dramatic, but you get the idea. The night watchman still gets paid the same, not 10% of what he made before the cutback.
All this means that factories usually get closed before the demand really stops - more like when it drops to the point where you can't make and profitably sell film packs at a retail price people will pay.
There are other problems as well - like keeping distributors going when they can't make money on your products anymore - they've moved on, and don't want to carry your stuff when it sits on shelves and gets old and out-of-date waiting for the one buyer who still wants it. You end up having to just about bribe the guys to take it and keep it on the retail shelves and on websites.
I would not say you should sell your 195 unless you really want to. I would say that it will slowly become difficult, and then expensive and difficult, to keep it fed. But this is a problem all film cameras will face in time.
I don't know a lot about the 195, but I have a 110A. I still have dreams of putting a 4x5 back on it and shooting LF. I know there are companies out there that do the conversion, but I hadn't the bucks right now - not even Razzledog's service, let alone 4 Designs or Littman's.
Personally, I guess if I really liked shooting my 195, I'd grab some film stock here and there were I could find it without breaking the bank, and enjoy shooting it while you can, and have something nice to show for it afterwards. It really is an interesting technology.
Best Regards,
Bill Mattocks
