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Commercially available home all in one film development machines


ymc226

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Not considering cost or cost efficiency, is anyone using one of the newer AIO film development machines.  I am referring to either the Filmomat made in Germany by essentially one person and the Dev.a which is made in Italy by a electronics/mechanical design firm.  I've used the Paterson tanks in 5 to 8 roll sizes, with multiple tanks going at the same time.  I enjoy home development and now, with starting to use color C41 film, think these machines would be convenient if they work well and efficiently.  My one comment about price is that they are similar in cost of a new M6, MP or MA.

Edited by ymc226
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Wow, you could buy a lot of film for that! I am on the other end of the spectrum, keeping it simple. Just using a small Patterson tank.

You will probably know this one already. I am now considering this to help with consistency:

Cinestill

They have other simple development tools that make it easier.

Development tools

Edited by dpitt
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All you need is a small tank and some jugs. I did once think about a jobo water bath unit for colour but you would still have to spend a lot of time messing around with the waterbaths. I have done C41 film developing the same way that I do b&w, just the temperature is higher. For colour print processing I used a drum on a Durst roller base, which I now use for processing sheet film.

Edited by Pyrogallol
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First of all, I think these tools come too late. The film price is getting higher and higher. The available film types are getting fewer and fewer. The film sky is getting darker. 

Secondly, the fun of B&W development do not prefer automatic. The detail is art.

Color film like automatic, For E6, C41, ECN2, consistency will be its strength. However, personally I think people should move to ECN2, not just much better color pallet, but also much cheaper. To me, Kodak Vision 3 50D is miles miles better than both Kodak Ektar 100 and all Portra. The problem is its less widely familiar Ramjet removal step. New comers are usually scared away for this step, though it is as simple as the first time into the darkroom. 

If these tools can change temperature from step to step, sometimes warmer, sometimes cooler, as what ECN2 requires (major different from E6 and C41 besides ramjet removal)m I can see it will be useful, if the price can be more friendly.

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13 hours ago, Einst_Stein said:

First of all, I think these tools come too late. The film price is getting higher and higher. The available film types are getting fewer and fewer. The film sky is getting darker. 

Secondly, the fun of B&W development do not prefer automatic. The detail is art.

Color film like automatic, For E6, C41, ECN2, consistency will be its strength. However, personally I think people should move to ECN2, not just much better color pallet, but also much cheaper. To me, Kodak Vision 3 50D is miles miles better than both Kodak Ektar 100 and all Portra. The problem is its less widely familiar Ramjet removal step. New comers are usually scared away for this step, though it is as simple as the first time into the darkroom. 

If these tools can change temperature from step to step, sometimes warmer, sometimes cooler, as what ECN2 requires (major different from E6 and C41 besides ramjet removal)m I can see it will be useful, if the price can be more friendly.

If there is a film revival, and there seems to be one. It makes no sense that film production is going down. Yes, there will be less variety but it will survive. IMO.
Maybe even the quality of photo lab development will become better also, because most of the film revival population is not going to develop their film themselves.

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5 hours ago, dpitt said:

 

If there is a film revival, and there seems to be one. It makes no sense that film production is going down. Yes, there will be less variety but it will survive. IMO.
Maybe even the quality of photo lab development will become better also, because most of the film revival population is not going to develop their film themselves.

I think it will survive for some time. There are lots of used darkroom equipments that are more than adequate. New comers need to offer something to make business sense. 

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4 hours ago, franzschuier said:

New Kickstarter from reveni labs (I use their exposure meter). To clunky for me.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mattbechberger/dunkbot-affordable-automated-film-processor


If I ever fullfill my dream and open a semi prof lab, it'll be a filmomat.

I can’t tell the productivity of this machine,mI guess it is about 10~20min per batch (135x3 or 120x2), Adding preparation, loading the film, etc. would be about 30min per batch. If so, it can only process 16 batch per day, that is about 12000 rolls (135) or 8000 rolls (1200 per year. Pipelining the preparation and developing and post process steps may improve the productivity by 2X, but will need 3x workers. 

Sounds an easy way to get bankrupt!

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vor 6 Stunden schrieb Einst_Stein:

I can’t tell the productivity of this machine,mI guess it is about 10~20min per batch (135x3 or 120x2), Adding preparation, loading the film, etc. would be about 30min per batch. If so, it can only process 16 batch per day, that is about 12000 rolls (135) or 8000 rolls (1200 per year. Pipelining the preparation and developing and post process steps may improve the productivity by 2X, but will need 3x workers. 

Sounds an easy way to get bankrupt!

Yeah, that's why would only use a filmomat for business. The reveni seem a lot to work intensive for my taste. And it takes not enough film. 
 

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I did order a Filmomat; it should take 3 weeks to build and about half a week to ship to the USA.  I am very excited to start using it and the only design issue for me that I can see from the video of the most recent iteration is that the cable is attached to the lid of the film canister and cannot be removed.  That means more chance for inadvertent damage when I am in my dark closet loading film.  

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9 hours ago, franzschuier said:

Yeah, that's why would only use a filmomat for business. The reveni seem a lot to work intensive for my taste. And it takes not enough film. 
 

I can’t see your point. They have the same essential problem: Productivity is too low to make sense for profitable business. 
At most they can be luxury advanced hobby lab. 

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20 hours ago, Einst_Stein said:

I can’t tell the productivity of this machine,mI guess it is about 10~20min per batch (135x3 or 120x2), Adding preparation, loading the film, etc. would be about 30min per batch. If so, it can only process 16 batch per day, that is about 12000 rolls (135) or 8000 rolls (1200 per year. Pipelining the preparation and developing and post process steps may improve the productivity by 2X, but will need 3x workers. 

Sounds an easy way to get bankrupt!

It's advertised as for home use, where not many people will get through that quantity of film! CA$950 doesn't seem a bad price compared to alternatives for home use.

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14 hours ago, franzschuier said:

Yeah, that's why would only use a filmomat for business. The reveni seem a lot to work intensive for my taste. And it takes not enough film. 
 

If somebody's ambition is to set up a film processing business not everybody dreams of one day driving a Porsche, just making an average living and driving a Toyota. And if the price per roll was set right I don't see why a person wouldn't make some reasonable money with either machine in a work-from-home business.

There is a small concern about cost effectiveness if only one roll was being processed and not a full load. But there is one massive reason not to go into business with them at all, the lack of fast turnaround manufacturer back-up if either of the machines goes wrong. That is the reason both are machines for amateurs who can can wait for a spare part to arrive. And I doubt a technician will be despatched to fix it so are either of the machines quickly user serviceable at all given the safety implications of needing electricity to work? 

There are small community darkrooms, amateurs processing at home, or one-man businesses who've never needed these sorts of machine to process E6, C41, or B&W, so the question is why they are needed now, where has the demand come from? I'll answer that, I don't think there was ever a demand for these new small to mid scale processing machines if all the pro's and con's are taken into account. It's simply that machines like the Filmomat and Reveni are easier to design, package, and manufacture today because of advances in hardware and micro processors. Just as today it's possible for somebody to set themselves up as a manufacturer of light meters which years ago would have been a major investment. For sure a new light meter fills a need because as we know they don't last forever in old cameras, but a deep tank lasts forever, so does a Paterson tank, and a Jobo rarely goes wrong.

 

 

 

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