Thread: Film Cameras

Its is getting harder and harder to get a good quality film.
The cost of the film and do you own developing is going up and up.

Because the above factors and that i do not have my own dark room I put away my old (and good Nikon film cameras) and I am shooting digital now.

I love it because i do my own developing and photography now is affordable.

Pro films are getting axed more and more each year but I think there will be some basic films will hang around for a while. Polaroid canned their instant film a couple of years ago, just as a new generation of ravers and hobbyists were discovering it. An entrepreneur in Europe bought on of their fully equipped factories and continued making it. He has been so successful that now Polaroid are looking at making it again. I think there will always be a niche for film, just the range is going to be extremely limited.

I know a professional photographer who is also a contractor/freelance with News Ltd.

He told me about 2003-4 that the Kodak rep had informed him that Kodak were going to be totally out of film other than medical, industrial ,and professional stuff like cut film for plate cameras by 2009. He was passing razor blades as he has a German cut film (I think it uses 10" x 8") camera that is virtually irreplaceable for certain work like studio, landscape, calendar etc. If a new one was available it would be an enormous price. They were custom made. His dates to about 1930 and the factory was vapourised by Lancasters in 1944.

Anyhow Kodak were virtually out of film by 2006-7.

How long will film cameras be supported? How long is a piece of string?

I have seen high end film cameras with a couple of good lenses go through auctions under $200 and a point and shoot digital fetch almost that. I bought the last of the 35mm Praktica, the TTL model with 1/1000 second shutter at auction for $20. Condition as new.

I used to have 2 fantastic dark rooms with a delicious DeVere large format enlarger and a bunch of fantastic cameras. I could only use it at night as the dark used to leak out during the day, and in a Canberra winter i would have to constantly be adding a little hot water to my chems to keep them at the right temp.

*sigh* some of the best moments of my life where hunched over freezing my bits off waiting for the magical image to appear - and that feeling when you nailed it - you knew right away, even when you could hardly see anything.

...anyway, back in the real world

To answer your question, I guess no one really knows - except to say that films are stopping being made and eventually there will be none.

I still have a bunch of Film cameras, my favs of which are my Minolta SRT-101 and a Bronica ETRsi. I like Delta400 in the SRT and Velvia 100 in the Bronny.

It is heartening to read:

9 March 2010: ILFORD PHOTO has issued a commitment to all black and white photography enthusiasts that despite other brands’ products becoming discontinued elsewhere in the industry, it will continue to support its existing range of mono photographic products for the foreseeable future.

This makes me happy, as the SRT was my first camera (a gift from my grandfather) and still the camera that I make the best shots from - and the highest % of keepers.

The thing that hurts the most is that when I moved from a nice house in Canberra to a crappy apartment in Sydney I had to sell my darkroom gear. It now costs me $36 to get a 24 frame Delta400 developed.. so a snappy weekend gets pricey REAL fast. I forgot all about that when I was developing it myself.

Hi Kev, I went to a camera market in Sydney last month, 80% of the cameras and equipment for sale was for film. And people were buying it left right and centre, very little of the digital stuff was sold.

Most of the film camera buyers were young 18 to 25 year olds who were buying the film cameras to use not stick on a shelf. Film imo will go like vinyl records, it will fade but it won't go away. Big W and K Mart still process film so it must still be a profitable medium.

I have a Bronica ETRS that takes beautiful pictures. The film is still available (and I suspect will be available for some time).
The main problem I'm having is to get the photography shop to print it on photographic paper. They find it easier to print the photo's on a paint jet. When the photo's are printed on photographic paper, there is a richness and colour depth that is not in an ink print.
I think what will eventually kill film is the chemicals used (and disposal of).

I live in the UK
I have 3 Canon A1s with a range of lenses.
(Used to work for LRO)
Don't have any trouble getting decent film at the moment, although it's all via mail order. I don't do my own processing. At the moment it's easy to get done but the future's looking grim.