bjrichus said:
Hmmmmm .....

http://vimeo.com/45657361

bjrichus, I love that video clp, thanks for posting.
Robin

Tom Gresham said:
Storage is the main one. Hard drives die. They always die. They rarely tell you beforehand. If you aren't paranoid about hard drives dying you don't understand the realities. Logging, filing, etc. are other challenges

Regular, automated backups to external drives and careful cataloging in LR4 has helped me tremendously in both regards.

I shoot film for fun. All black and white. I like the look of film I developed at home and as of yet, I have not been able to duplicate that look in software. (not to mention much of the "charm" of funky developing mistakes)

Much as I appreciate the quality of photgraphs taken on DSLRs - and even my Blackberry takes a reasonable photo, I happen to like film cameras and have thus far resisted the digital tide. However I don't think the end will come suddenly for 35mm film use - it is more likey to be priced out or existence. Already the D+P for a roll of 36 is getting eye wateringly expensive so if Fuji keep nudging up the price of the film and the few processors keep putting up the developing cost then I will be off looking for a digital beastie.
Robin

Interesting posts.

I have only ever really used 35mm film for family snaps in the past, all my professional work has been on 120 and 4X5 film. Recently I have been scanning my large and medium format transparencies and negs. and producing digital files. They are still very, very good. The 35mm. however, to my surprise, is very poor compared to the digital images from my D700 and D800. There is no comparison from a technical point of view in my opinion; I can do much better with my digital cameras than I ever could on 35mm film and my current Nikons are astonishingly good. Philosophically might be another matter though, and I still shoot B&W on 4X5 and 120.....but not often! I am very glad though, to have the disciplines of shooting film in my head an as a result usually know how to get a shot right first time without shooting large numbers of 'shoot and hope' shots.

I do miss film, and admit to being in denial for a while, but cannot ever see myself going back, except for a bit of fun and to demonstrate the old days to my son! My favourite cameras are still home-made pin-hole cameras. They really are magical boxes of sorcery, magic and fun!

I'm really glad to have 40 years of experience shooting film (several 4-drawer file cabinets full of slides, 6x6 transparencies, negs and prints), but I hope to never shoot film again.

The discipline of shooting transparencies was great training for getting the shot right in the first place. I rarely spend more than a minute working on an image in post-production.

But I think digital is already much better than film in quality, convenience, speed, options, etc. It does present challenges, of course. Storage is the main one. Hard drives die. They always die. They rarely tell you beforehand. If you aren't paranoid about hard drives dying you don't understand the realities. Logging, filing, etc. are other challenges, but, in the end, as a guy who gave away 35 film cameras three years ago (and was able to sell a few of the medium format ones), I kept one F5 and a Leica M4.

I have run one roll of film through the F5 in three years, and one through the M4 in three years. The D700 produces much better images than either.

BTW, can someone please (!) correct the spelling of "separated" on the screen when typing a reply. It's not "Tags (comma seperated.)" It's "Tags (comma separated)."

There is "a rat" in separated.

Sounds fun Spraynpray, and you're right, in my opinion the only real attraction in using film nowadays, is the anticipation and buzz you feel in waiting to see the results. The increased chance of failure, is what heightens the feeling of satisfaction when the prints turn out just how you wanted.

Due to losing all of my negs and printed photos in a house fire (nobody thought about off site back-ups 40 years ago), I've just bought the first roll of 35mm film I've bought for m-a-n-y years. I hope to get some good B&W's with it and compare it to my digital results. Should be interesting to see if I can still take the pressure of HAVING to get it right in camera!

Mike Gunter said:
Hi all,

"What would happen if all electronic devices on earth just didn't work any more......

Bristol Records office recently had an open day.

Using natural day light, I was able to view documents going back to the 16th century

but recent stuff, was unavailable due to a technical issues , including incompatibility, a power failure and other "technical issues"

I asked the senior archivist her advice preserving some of my best images of Bristol, for future generations; Her advice "Black and White Prints"

SkintBrit said:
How long do you think it will be before ALL film supplies will dry up, and the world will never go back from digital?

The sooner the better. There really is no need for spoiling the planet any further with the chemical waste from film development. And if one cannot get the look to their photos they are after with digital gear, perhaps it would be better to consider another hobby/profession.

Hi msmoto,

Decade, hum, that's type porch covering?

My best,

Mike

@ Mike Gunter

Let's not talk about age.... something tells me we were born in the same decade. I just cannot remember which one, LOL

Mike Gunter said:

Long term archival processes and new methodologies is a worthwhile for digital media.

Hi all,

I'm hating growing older - regardless of the alternatives...

That sentence should read:

Long term archival processes and new methodologies for digital media is a worthwhile discussion.

Geez, I used to be a copy editor, too.

IMHO, I don't see too much use for average joes to use film, period.

Arty-farty types might see a bump in _marketing_ their wares to a self-labeled important niche market using film (my abrasive language notwithstanding, if photogs make money on it good for them), but the end products can be achieved by digital cameras just as well.

In the 'for what's it's worth' category, a new topic might be, what are the career path(s) for the budding photographer(s)', because I see that changing a lot.

My best and worse( on me)

Mike

Hmmmmm .....

http://vimeo.com/45657361

Wow, I turn my back on this thread for a moment, and look what happens :-) It's interesting to see I'm not alone in thinking about the question. After reading many of your responses, about your local stores offering to 'handle' the film, but actually send it away to be processed, I think that situation will become more and more common, with fewer and fewer companies being around, but the ones that are, serving a greater and greater geographical area. In fact I can see a single company obtaining global dominance in film sales and processing............someone like Kodak! :-) (Did I just say that)?

With regards to R8R's comments about CME and the potential fragility of storing digital images in the long term, would it be impossible to make a negative or slide from the digital data? Now that would be turn around, a machine in your local store, that takes your cameras memory card and spews out a length of film for archival purposes.

msmoto said:
It is my understanding the darkroom techniques are still being taught at colleges and technical instates across the country in the USA. I am about to give and enlarger and other equipment to one near me.

We are still doing a course unit (one semester) that covers much of the same ground as the old Kodak series of booklets about use of film and D&P as the core material. We also have several of the Visual Arts guys teaching "traditional" photo techniques side by side with digital. Darkroom space has gone down by 80% over the last 10 years and we now only have three enlarger bays. We used to have 30 enlargers in 4 separate rooms, now just one (the smallest) room. Only students and a few of faculty are still using it.

All our 'commercial' work (brochures, promo, web, newspaper, most academic, etc) is digital now.

As a university employee, I thank you for donating some gear to a sister institution.

I am told that some are no longer accepting darkroom gear. We certainly have spares enough for a few years if anything breaks - and it does at the hands of some students (and staff) HAHAHAHAHA (looks the other way).

I hate seeing changes more than anybody, and I'm only 35 yrs old. Unfortunately we have to accept some changes and technology is the most susceptible to change. What bothers me about the "digital age" is not about the smartphones, digital cameras, or LCD/plasma TVs; No, the increasingly plastic & disconnected mindset of society scares me much, much more.

From October 10: http://www.popphoto.com/gear/2012/10/ilford-says-delta-3200-film-here-to-stay

andrewz said:
I think film will be around for a long time but perhaps only use by the hobbyist/artist. Look at Polaroid it folded as a company and then shortly there after the Impossible project was born. Instant photography will never be viable commercial product again but for a nitch market it will be there. Same thing will happen to film. The Analog Photography users group, APUG seems to have a pretty big following.

The Polaroid film has become more of a novelty though- the price they're asking for is pretty steep, if not astronomic. At those prices it can't be used as an everyday thing. But it is nice that it'll be back for a while.

As recently as five years ago there were still tangible, objective reasons for film having a role (?roll :)). However the latest crop of dSLRs, together with powerful software from Adobe has, in my view pretty much eliminated any real advantage of film over digital. The number of young professional photographers still preferring film over digital must now be infinitessimal.

When that number drops below a certain critical mass, film will disappear suddenly, and without warning. Fuji will cease production soon after it becomes non-profitable. When that occurs, what processing companies remain will fold overnight. Time scale? Who knows, but my guess is between 5-10 years.

Hi all,

"What would happen if all electronic devices on earth just didn't work any more because the grid was annihilated by a CME?"

Unfortunately, I'd have many other things to worry about.

Color films don't have the staying power of B&W, either, not 100s of years, anyway.

Long term archival processes and new methodologies is a worthwhile for digital media.

My best,

Mike

I think film will be around for a long time but perhaps only use by the hobbyist/artist. Look at Polaroid it folded as a company and then shortly there after the Impossible project was born. Instant photography will never be viable commercial product again but for a nitch market it will be there. Same thing will happen to film. The Analog Photography users group, APUG seems to have a pretty big following.

Film processing is no longer available onsite from any of my local stores (CVS, Walgreen's, Walmart, Sams Club), who do the same as my local camera store; send film away for processing. They do a reasonable job of it so long as you don't mind the 5 to 7 day turn round. Of course, you could always do it yourself, which is easy for B&W but harder for color neg stock.

For those who say Fuji when it comes to film, there are several sources of other brands both in date and expired including all the usual brand name suspects (for B&W I always seem to be able to get Ilford FP4) from online vendors - try Film Photography Project and also there seems to be no end of it on eBay, but as others have said, "for how much longer"?

While I have not personally shot a frame of film at all this year (first time I can remember for ages), I suspect film will be available for several years to come, but as the processing options become more and more limited, at what stage will it no longer be worth it?

If I need to I can dig out my darkroom gear from it's dusty boxes, but with digital improving as it is, by the time film does finally go away, will I care?

I recently got into this discussion when I was recording a record. The engineer I often record with is a dyed-in-the-wool analogue technician. His studio is still a state of the art 24" tape facility.

He's also a photography expert, from the film days.

We got into the discussion about Kodachrome, and how sad that this processing has gone away. The metallic dyes used in that process made high quality negatives that would last generations. 100 years from now you could dig them out and make prints.

What happens if you can't access your digital files? Your images don't actually exist. They are just math. What would happen if all electronic devices on earth just didn't work any more because the grid was annihilated by a CME?

Think that can't happen? Wrong.

Hang on to those negatives.

Hi all,

I used to have brown fingers when I was younger. As a US Army, then wire service photographer I've shot and developed in the 6-digit range of rolls of film.

RIP film.

My best,

Mike

Like I said above, I think we will have just the basic film types for each size and that is it. I agree the larger format film will be around for a very long time. There are still applications for Film but as you noted it is getting expensive. I like shooting B&W and considered setting up a dark room/corner to make it cheaper but still, 30 rolls and I'm halfway to a new 85mm 1.8g. Hard to ignore that.

What has amazes me is how good cheap cameras with film really was. The IQ was really good. Better than our cell phone photos for sure and most compacts. Interesting how we accept mediocrity just to have convenience. 10 years from now, many will look back, remember how many images were lost to computer failures and how bad the photos really look. Then they will look at their parents photos from 25 years ago with film, and be amazed how much better they looked.