Young people flock to film

<p>My point, Cool factor won't cut it..simply means film sales aren't dependent on the whims of fad, or what is or isn't cool. Who thinks Photographic method is fashionable? That's just non-sense. Although I'm sure someone, or more than I know buy camera's, expensive camera's, because of a vogue factor, but this group doesn't qualify as Photographers. Photographers priorities are such to outweigh the wimms of the day, but not to be confused with the quest for a better mouse trap so to speak. From what I have heard through younger Photo enthusiasts, they're not confused on the issues of what tool to use to express their art form. Perhaps their Photo classes are also teaching them to veer away from social media threads.</p>

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<p>Third, interchangeable lens digital camera sales are increasing. "MILC" sales are now about 20% of all interchangeable lens digital cameras sold worldwide and have reached the 50% mark in Japan.</p>

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<p>Yes, sales of MILC is increasing, but not that fast as many manufactures expected. Moreover , this increasing was a result of massive commercial campaign by reducing prices and paying of million dollars of rebates. All of this was supported by public media advertising (that’s might be one of the reason of losing revenue). Sorry, but film doesn’t have anything like that.</p>

<p>Well, this this is one of the example showing that many posts over here lack of comprehensive judgments. Many photoneters, including some “heroes” and mediators are acting like typical digital equipment propagandists – saying one thing, by some reason, they are forgetting or intentionally hiding another side of the problem. Probably following CIPA or PMA guidance instruction…</p>

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<p>My point, Cool factor won't cut it..simply means film sales aren't dependent on the whims of fad, or what is or isn't cool.</p>

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<p>I guess it’s right. The film photography is just a tradition; one of the best tradition of visual art. This is art of Ansel Adams, Dorothea Lange, Wolker Evans, Steve McCurry etc. And preserve it and safe it for future generation must be an honor for every artist who value it instead of keep yaking abot low percentage of film sale.</p>

<p>And in my opinion the digital popularity in most cases has been nothing but a fad. A fad that CIPA has brought to its official policy. Using their mighty financial leverages and public media they just flooded humane race with idiotic ideas about bright feature of digital photography and death of film for the sake of making their high record profits. This has nothing to do with real art.<br /> And I believe it’s absolutely nonsense to flush those goofy figures about digital equipment sale and percentage - anyhow all these cameras will turn into junk in 3-4 yrs. I don’t think that you guys are so naïve not to understand where these figures came from , who and what forces are really behind it.</p>

<p>"<em>And in my opinion the digital popularity in most cases has been nothing but a fad. A fad that CIPA has brought to its official policy. Using their mighty financial leverages and public media they just flooded humane race with idiotic ideas about bright feature of digital photography and death of film for the sake of making their high record profits. This has nothing to do with real art.</em><br /><em> And I believe it’s absolutely nonsense to flush those goofy figures about digital equipment sale and percentage - anyhow all these cameras will turn into junk in 3-4 yrs.<strong> I don’t think that you guys are so naïve not to understand where these figures came from , who and what forces are really behind i</strong></em><strong>t</strong>."<br>

<br /> I just <strong><em>knew </em></strong>it!!! Digital is an industry-supported conspiracy to knock off film! Surprised?</p>

>>>And in my opinion the digital popularity in most cases has been nothing but a fad.<<<

 

Much like the horseless carriage.

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<p>Much like the horseless carriage.</p>

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<p>John, if art of photography for you is same as a horseless cartridge, well.. that kind of photographer you are.</p>

<p>In the end the Horseless Carriage seems to be more a curse.</p>

 

"John, if art of photography for you is same as a horseless cartridge, well.. that kind of photographer you are."

 

I am confident, now, that you are better at photography than analyzing analogies. Despite access to digital resources to do so quickly now.

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<p>There is another problem with these figures in terms of context beyond what has already been discussed. Citing a stabilization of sales or increased percentage of sales is too isolated. There has to be a reference point.</p>

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<p>Those with this argument often use the year 1999 / 2000 as a reference point. That was the sales record in films history with about 3 billion photo films sold worldwide.<br>

They then further say today it is at best 10% of that, therefore film is doomed.<br>

That's wrong.<br>

For a film shooter only one thing is important: Whether he can buy film now and in the future or not. Therefore historic data or reference points are irrelevant for him. Relevant is only, whether some film companies are able to produce film on the current and future demand level.<br>

For example the CEO of Impossible Project has explained in an interview that they don't need the former high volume production anymore. Now they only need a minimum of one million filmpacks p.a. to be profitable. That is tiny compared to some years ago, but now it is sufficient. And that's what matters.<br>

Same is valid for Ilford, Foma, and Fuji: They have downscaled and can now operate with significantly lower volume. And new companies like Adox and InovisCoat have started right from the beginning with small volume production.</p>

<p>I live in Singapore (iv'e lived and worked in 6 countries), film here is thriving, and there is plenty of evidence and it's not anecdotal really. Of course digital is everywhere. There are more camera shops here than you could imagine selling film and film cameras, new and used. One shop has row upon row of Leica M's, there are 4 Leica shops from last count. I bought my Mamiya 7 here new for under 2.5k. There is a store entirely dedicated to black & white film photography, chemistry & paper. Film and processing (120 portra US$6) is cheap and fast. There are many people walking around with film cameras. I have asked the shop owners and they say film is very much alive and surging back into the market or else these stores wouldn't exist. They teach it at the university. Whilst living in Beijing briefly, walking through a high end mall, there was an interior being photographed with a 4x5 film camera...The chinese are designing and making large format cameras. <br /><br />My home town of Sydney, film (and most things) are expensive. Cameras are more expensive. I had recently been back home, shot some photos of a friends wedding and had it developed an scanned. I had one lab 'hand print' one of the negatives and I was shocked at the quality. This lab used to be one of the best, doing ilfochrome and negative optical hand prints. Because I do my own B&W dev & printing I could see that the image was either out of focus or just poorly done. Turns out, the lab scans the neg on some flatbed scanner and then prints it on RA4 paper. For me this was just unacceptable....<br /><br />The second issue with film is scanning. I have experimented with different scanners, and in my experience the only scanners that are acceptable are the high end flextights or drum scanning which does not exist here (only privately and in the university). I own an epson V700 and for negatives at least, they are only getting 60% out of the film so I only use it for scanning prints. So they too are unacceptable for scanning negatives. Scanning negatives is difficult, and requires allot more skill. The minilab scanners here are rubbish, probably the operators mostly. Jonathan Canlas seems to get allot more out of these frontier type scanners, but here for some reason they again are just not acceptable. Even if you do, printing 16x20 will yield inferior results to that of an optical print, no question.<br /><br />So knowing what information is actually in the film, I decided to do colour RA4 printing with an enlarger. At first I was concerned that it would be too problematic. I fact at the beginning it was impossible to source the chemicals here. The chemicals cannot be shipped but the paper easy enough to get from B&H and other places. I finally managed to source the chemicals here wholesale. And what did I pay? A little over $100 dollars for 16 liters of chemicals (dev & blix). And to my surprise they print perfectly at room temperature (it is warm here though). I recently bought a colour analyzer (way off in the beginning but calibrating now) as everything is now working. I simply just process in trays, as I would in B&W. Actually colour has a superior range than B&W so it requires less manipulation, almost none. The printing and developing times are less than half that of B&W.<br /><br />What you get on a piece of RA4 paper is everything the film has, and it simply stunning. Forget scanning, print it. The irony is although there is so much film here in Singapore, there are no 'pro' labs such as you get in the US and UK. There are NO facilities for RA4 optical printing (maybe at the university??). People shooting on film are also missing out on what it can actually do on paper as it was designed and have prob never held an optical colour print in their hands. I have no doubt they will be blown away (I do use a mamiya 7 which is one of the best film cameras in the world) with a print from a quality lens and enlarger. I cant even see the grain on a 16x20 print with 100 speed film....Although sharpness and grain is not what it is about. William Eggleston's new work on digital, to me, is another photographer from the days of his dye transfer prints.<br /><br />I have used digital too, and I look forward to advances in digital technology. Nostalgia & coolness aside, speaking objectively, for me film is my medium because I like it and I am glad I have stuck with it. With a bit of skill, training and patience and some good quality equipment you can get everything out of today's superior film technology with results that are truly outstanding. Yes, there is a learning curve that’s pretty big for those brought up on digital.<br>

<br />If anyone needs any hand prints done here in Singapore, let me know……<br /><br /><br /><br /></p>