Bring back APS!

<p>Wait. Am I crazy? Yes. Yes, I am. “So,” I hear you asking. “Why?” I’m so glad you asked!<br /> <br />The first question that I want to answer is why 35mm has enough shortcomings to warrant the return of APS. There are only two, but they are serious enough:<br /> <br />1. Loading and reloading is time consuming.<br /> <br /> • I don’t need a roll of film to magically hold 500 exposures in the way that an SD card does. But fast reloading is almost just as convenient as being able to shoot hundreds (or thousands) of photos without interruption.</p>

<p>2. Scanning is ridiculously inefficient.<br /> <br /> • Let’s say I shoot ten rolls of film for a project. I am happy to wait until they get developed, whoever does the developing. But scanning? My goodness. Okay, the Pakon is great but it accentuates graininess too much and it’s a bit resolution limited (and it doesn’t handle b&w as well as it does colour). Scanning APS film would be incredibly easy. And I do believe that a good scanner can be made at a relatively low price, but that is another subject.<br /> <br />So, what should a modern APS camera be like? It should be as quiet as possible and no bigger than necessary. I’d prefer manual focus lenses. The shutter would be a focal-plane type, vertically travelling. Weather-proofing would be nice.<br /> <br />Initial film stocks: chromogenic b&w, Portra 400, Portra 160, Ektar, Superia 400.<br /> <br />Necessary native lenses: 18-50/2.8; 35-135/2.8. Lenses from other systems can obviously be adapted. FYI, Leica M lenses have a shorter flange focal distance than an APS SLR demands, so they can only be used for macrophotography.<br /> <br />Extra features: I’d like to see metadata saved to each frame, so that your photo editing software can tell focal length, aperture, shutter speed. Knowing the focal length would enable the software to correct for distortion (it’s little features like this which I love about digital cameras).<br /> <br />Technical data on the APS format:<br /><br />http://www.kodak.com/cluster/global/en/consumer/APS/redBook/aboutSystem.shtml</p>

<p>Hi Karim,<br>

APS film was useful in creating work for camera and lens designers, and was said to have led to certain improvements in film technology that was later transferred to longer-lived formats. Some day it might prove an engaging diversion for archaeologists picking over the detritus of our civilization. You haven't convinced me to regret never having tried it, mourn its demise or engage in a futile hope for its return.</p>

<p>Why should APS work out, if 35mm was occasionally already hard pressed? Was there really a reloading speed advantage of APS over higher end 35mm SLRs - I am not talking knob wound LTM bodies as the speed benchmark for 35mm.<br>

Anyhow: lets hope that at least the simple formats will last in production.</p>

<p>My wife and family all tried APS , somewhat against my opinion. They didn't stay long. I can't help feeling that Kodak's attempts to reduce the size of film used by casual photographers had something to do with their decline- as would befit an organisation seemingly content to make things worse and more expensive rather than trying to make them better and cheaper- all I suspect in vain attempts to compensate for their declining control of the 35mm processing market.. Clearly APS is just one example of their efforts in that direction. Good riddance.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>I'd like to see metadata saved to each frame, so that your photo editing software can tell focal length, aperture, shutter speed.</p>

</blockquote>

 

<p>The APS standard allowed for this data, along with a pile more, to be recorded. However camera manufacturers didn't have to implement the full standard in every camera, and I believe that most APS cameras only recorded a fraction of the data that the standard allowed for.</p>

 

<p>Then, the scanner had to read this magnetically-recorded data from the film and write it into the metadata of the scanned image. Again, this was a feature that was very hard to find in any APS scanner. I suppose there just wasn't the demand. The only scanner I ever heard of that was able to do this was the Olympus ES-10 SCSI/parallel scanner and its A-10 APS adapter from the mid 90s or so, but I don't have any first-hand experience with that scanner, I just read it online.</p>

 

<p>Here is a link to the full APS standard:<br>

<a href="http://www.kodak.com/global/plugins/acrobat/en/consumer/advantix/RedbookReprintAug2002.pdf">

http://www.kodak.com/global/plugins/acrobat/en/consumer/advantix/RedbookReprintAug2002.pdf</a></p>

<p>How does adding another format (more fragmentation and more complex production lines) help the film industry that is already a small niche business? The simpler it can be made for them, the more likely they can survive in a normal way, with doable product prices. <br />And then, a new film camera system, in today's market? Who would be brave enough to sink money in that bottomless pit, you think? How many people, besides the OP, would be interested at all in this camera? So how much would this miracle APS camera end up costing (it would make a Hasselblad and Leica look very cheap probably), and then how much people remain willing to put up that money?</p>

<p>Sorry, but nothing in this plan makes any sense. Please let's not bring back film formats that didn't manage to get succesful even when they were a healthy business proposal. We need the companies making film survive to keep good, proven camera systems alive and kicking.</p>

<p>APS has many virtues but I rejected it because the film is smaller than 35mm. It's better if they make it the same size as 35mm. The cropping function is silly. </p>

<blockquote>

<p>1. Loading and reloading is time consuming.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>With enough practice, there will be not any appreciable difference between loading 35mm film and APS film - except maybe when using a Leica rangefinder.</p>

The fact that the APS cartridge couldn't be reloaded from bulk ( like Tri-x) would be the deal breaker for me.

Not sure why anyone would want to re-introduce a format whose image quality gets soundly trounced by the image quality of shots from my iPhone. I remember APS; it was not good.

Comparing to digital is missing the point. I think Karim was lamenting the positives of APS that have been lost in film photography today, and there certainly were some.

 

APS was not "not good". Granted, some cameras were not the highest performers, but that's not the fault of the film; it happens with every format. I had an Olympus Centurion APS camera, with which I took some of my favourite photos.

 

If you want to talk about crap formats that have made a comeback, we should be talking about 110!<div></div>

I won't dispute that 110 is even worse than APS (though neither can compete with disc film for the title of crappiest format), but I'm not sure that having a couple of overpriced types of 110 offered by Lomography really constitutes a comeback.

<p>Not sure I agree that comparison with digital isn't appropriate. In the ( extremely unlikely) event that APS were to be re-launched, that would be the primary competition it would face and IMO lose out to. </p>

<p>A lot of money went into developing APS cameras. Nikon, Canon, and Minolta even had APS SLR's which now go for cheap on the used market. Minilabs had to upgrade to offer APS processing. When APS was launched it was called the "Advanced Photo System", but I remember at least one person saying APS meant "Almost Profoundly Silly". Well maybe or maybe not. If the system got people interested in taking photos and some of them eventually moved on to 35mm, medium format, or digital, then maybe it wasn't so silly after all.</p>

<p>I think the people who developed APS were not thinking very well. In addition to coming so soon before digital took off that nobody was willing to invest in it, its size advantage over 35 mm. was so slight that there seems little reason to have changed it. What in APS film could not have been done with 35 mm? The difference in size between an APS camera and a small 35 is trivial.</p>

<p>I imagine that if APS had been developed ten or twenty years sooner, it might have enjoyed the kind of over-development that was enjoyed by the compact cassette in audio. There's a format that screams bad quality in multiple ways, which was so convenient and compact that it was worthwhile to invest in technological advances to make it good despite itself. </p>

<p>As it is, we are left with a film that has no particular advantage over 35 mm., except for slightly easier loading and mid-roll changing. Aside from the very nice idea of embedding data on the film, which was problematic when it was used at all, the very nice idea of changing shooting formats on the fly, which could have been done with variations in wind distance, was done with masking and wasted film, something even very cheap 35 mm. cameras could also do. </p>

The APS film frame is about 58% the size (based on square mm) of FF 35mm film and the cameras where not

that much smaller, so I really never saw the point of this format. Loading 35mm film in a modern auto-focus film

SLR is highly automated, reliable and easy to do and rewind is automatic. Besides, no one is going to restart

APS film camera manufacturing and no one (certainly not Fuji or Kodak) will restart APS film manufacturing.

<p>For the record half frame (18x24) cameras were not half the size of full frame 35 mm (24x36). I think there is an engineering term for the inability to reduce all other parts in the same proportion to the reduction in negative size. To be fair to the half frame format (which I think Olympus did more with than any other camera maker), if such cameras were made today I think they would be able to better take advantage of the smaller format as far as compactness goes. I know for APS the Canon ELPH and ELPH Jr. were about as compact as an APS could be. The smallest full frame 35 that I own is a Nikon Lite Touch (with a 28mm f3.5 autofocus lens). If this camera had been made as half frame I think it would have still been larger than the ELPH.</p>

<p>I will add, though, that I briefly had a Canon Elph APS camera which was beautifully made, and felt really good to handle, as well as being pocket sized. It was rather square and metallic in feel, and very solid. The quality of photographs was no more than just OK, but the machine itself was quite likeable. I would have been happy if the format had been more useful, and happy to carry that little camera around in my pocket. But the little digital point and shoot I have now for that purpose does more better. I think my regret over the Canon is for the wasted effort more than for the results. It's a shame that such a nice piece of hardware is so useless. </p>

<p>I would like to see 126 and 110 and 127 and 116 and 122 brought back, too.</p>

<p>But they have to be at affordable prices, or people won't buy enough of them.</p>

<p>Seems to me that APS is harder to make, so will be harder to make affordable.</p>

<p>I think with 126 just the availability of film would be nice since there were some good high end models (like Instamatic 500, Instamatic Reflex, and a Ricoh model of some type). Even the Instamatic 804 would be nice to use. But again, it's doubtful that the film could be made and sold at a scale that would interest potential manufacturers. As for 127, I think a rangefinder model with provisions for holding the film flat would be nice. Back in the early 1960's (or maybe late 50's) I think one photo magazine writer touted 127 as the format of the future.</p>

<p>As I have said in the previous post. APS offers a good number of useful features but those features are nice but not something I can's live without by using 35mm. I would not choose APS over 35mm simply because the quality lost due to smaller film size. </p>

<p>I'd rather see 126 or 127 revived than APS. Both these formats allowed slides that fit standard 35mm projectors. A good 127 slide could be very nice indeed, and the format was ideal for small TLR cameras.</p>

<p>For the record I recall it was not the arrival of Digital which killed APS, but the clear superiority of 35mm once the auto focus / exposure / film wind and rewind 35mm compacts had been perfected.</p>

<p>During the APS era we sometimes visited a friend of my wife, and to pass the time I used to browse her catalogue, and after tearing myself away from the lingerie section I would count the number of APS versus the number of 35mm cameras (I was then, as now, a very sad individual). For a while, APS outstripped 35mm, but then fell back and 35mm was back in the lead.</p>

<p>My other recollection of APS was waiting for an age to be served at photography stores (there were some, then) while the assistant explained at great length, the advantages of APS to a customer, despite the smaller frame size</p>

<p>I can't recall ever having taken an APS picture, however I've got a nice Canon 22-55 zoom, designed for their APS SLR's, which works very well on my 20D. It seems ironic that the crop size DSLR sensor is often described as "APS-C".</p>

<p>I suspect APS would have survived if digital never occurred.</p>

<p>For one, it is enough easier for less experienced photographers, and some also liked the smaller cameras. Other film sizes might have stayed around longer, too.</p>

<p>But smaller, simple digital cameras, even before the super high resolution, could take enough of the market away in the amateur market.</p>

<p>I would agree if developing the stuff wasn't so damn expensive</p>