Film - ONLY bought by Leica users?

[peterv]

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Hi Keith,

 

I guess there must be more and more people going the same route as we did - film, digital, film - and I can very well understand your interest in 4 x 5.

 

Working fast, light-weight, unobtrusive, and you know all the advantages, with our beloved M-system and seeing - again - what film can do for me, I long for more 'real estate' on my negatives and slides.

 

I'm now looking into the Alpa 12 system for usage beside my M's.

[bscott]

I had a similiar experience two week ago shooting with my R8, I was on vacation for a week shooting landscapes, wild flowers, etc and I seemed to be the only person with a film camera. It was such an exception that everyone wanted to discuss it and tell me why they switched from film. I'm still going to shoot slide film but it did make me stop and think about the future. I did meet one large format ( view camera) and he stated that he would make his own film if necessary. I just want film to be another choice in the future.

[Quintych]

I like to think that film is still alive and well. I just closed a show on Brasil that was primarily made with my M6TTL and M7. I shoot using transparency film but then scan them and the prints are digital so I guess I have come partly into the digital age but I do not want to give up film. I need to hold the initial image in my hand, put it on a light table and eavaluate it before going to the scaner.

 

My biggest shock now is not the fear of the loss of 35mm film but the ending of the 4 x 5 polaroid film by the end of this year!!

[peterv]

My biggest shock now is not the fear of the loss of 35mm film but the ending of the 4 x 5 polaroid film by the end of this year!!

 

Last week while visiting a local pro-shop, I saw this large amount of Polaroid film in stock.

The guy in the shop told me they sell like hot cakes ever since the announcement about Polaroid getting out of production...

 

Everyone wants to use it... (one last time)

 

If analog photography were invented now...

[brianv]

Let's see- Today, Nikon S2 and Nikon S3; Nikon N8008s;

 

Yesterday, Leica IIIa, Canon 7, and Kodak DCS200ir (digital)

 

Last Week, Canon EF, Canon P...

 

That Kodak is a Pain to use. Ever try to find 80MByte SCSI 2.5" Notebook drives?

[bullis]

Perhaps I used a wrong term, so I'll try to refine it a bit. It seems to me that if we think of the products of intensive R&D as "innovative", you are certainly right. My own bias (and it is a bias, which I will own) is that these constant "improvements" have not necessarily resulted in enhancement of what I am looking for in my images. Innovation, in that sense, has become the norm. For myself, the return to a simpler technology is a kind of innovation, and I welcome it.

 

The whole history of photography has been driven by the quest of convenience. As films and other products do more for us, we need to know less and think less. In other words, technical innovation has a way of wiping out innovation on the part of the worker on the ground. It seems that among the Leica community, there would be some sympathy for this point of view. After all, what makes the Leica so great? Most users would probably agree that the adherence to sound principles and quality standards is a large part of it. Other cameras may be more "innovative" and some people love the complexity that results; some of the later film cameras, for example, had innovated away our ability to choose an iso number for ourselves. Wading through the menus on the Canon digital cameras seems like a nightmare to me.

 

Today, I'll be developing some of my remaining stock of 2475 recording film in a super fine grain developer of my own construction (albeit not my own original formula). The quality of the images I will get from this will resemble most closely the sort of thing we would have seen in Life Magazine in the 50's. I learned to do this through extensive pondering, testing and hard work over a fairly long time; a period of growth. Now, they've innovated this great and generally unappreciated film right out of existence.

 

I don't see that as progress, really. I'm all for more ordinary and lower tech films. They won't be constantly changing and disappearing to be replaced with something else. I would rather have stable materials and do the innovation myself, thanks.

 

Sorry for my careless use of language. I'll try to do better!

 

Larry

 

 

 

That's interesting bullis,

 

I don't think film is ever going to disappear either. I started with an M8, after just five months I bought an MP and last winter an extra M7 and also a wonderful MDa from the sixties.

Now I find myself using my film M's more then the M8. I guess the film-look is much more pleasing to my eyes.

 

I'm curious to now what is innovative about these new films you mentioned.

How come these small new filmstock manufacturers can come up with innovative film whilst they have much smaller R & D budgets?

 

Cheers,

 

Peter

[bullis]

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I just replied to Peter's question about what can be "innovative" when R&D budgets must be smaller and was so concerned with my own lack of care in what I had said about "innovative" films, that I forgot about the original reason I had said it. What you point out about the amazing variety of currently available films is absolutely true. With the big companies, "innovation" was directed by needs of the industry, driven by the potential for the most money; the variety was much smaller for us. Of course, if you were in a physics lab, or law enforcement, or forestry, etc. there was much more available for special purposes. I, for one, took advantage of that, but I don't think most people did. I loved shooting Kodak's 70mm aerial infrared film; no longer available. Glad I still have some.

 

My preference is to buy locally when possible, since I hate it when my local stores are forced out of business by the large online retailers (as Rainier Photo Supply in Seattle recently was), but if you want a great picture of what's out there FOR YOU, take a look at the 107 items listed under 35mm b&w films in the Freestyle catalog. Here's the url: "http://www.freestylephoto.biz/sc_main.php?cat_id=402". Yes, when in your memory were you able to shoot orthochromatic film in your Leica? When could you have had to choose between a whole bunch of infrared films? Remember how hard it was to reverse process B&W flims to make slides? Now, no problem at all.

 

Larry

 

Unfortunately not too many people have done the same action. But I have the same feeling when shooting digital. In general each year the decrease is about 25-30% in film business in Europe. However it seems to be that B&W is going to stabilize now.

 

Still a huge amount of different films on the market. You can load your M with slide film iso 50-400, even B&W slide film is still available.

Negative iso 25-3200, ortho, infra red, tech pan, micro film, classical type film, T grain type.

 

Some continents are still running mainly on film (Africa, South America) and some industry so the comming years there will be still some film left.

However not enough market to keep so many multinationals in life so a complete reconstructioning is necessary. I am sure we will loose some more analog manufacturers in the near future.

[peterv]

Hi Larry,

 

thanks for your elaborate answer.

 

It seems that among the Leica community, there would be some sympathy for this point of view.

 

There is, at least as far as I'm concerned. I like (relative) simplicity that puts me in full control of what my photo's are going to look like.

 

Today, I'll be developing some of my remaining stock of 2475 recording film in a super fine grain developer of my own construction (albeit not my own original formula). The quality of the images I will get from this will resemble most closely the sort of thing we would have seen in Life Magazine in the 50's.

 

Interesting way of working. If you scan these images, I'd very much like to see what they look like.

 

Are the chemicals you need for developing in this way easy to buy, and dispose of?

 

Regards,

 

Peter

[bullis]

Peter

 

No doubt, I write a lot more than most people want to read. Thanks for your patience.

 

I couldn't resist scanning a couple images. This was not easy, but that's part of the act, I guess, the price I must pay. 2475, like High Speed Infrared (I think it is the same film, just sensitized differently) has no anti halation backing. When it dries, the gelatin contracts, and the whole thing turns into a corkscrew like spring. This is bad enough with normal developers but the developer I am using contains pyrocatechin, a staining developer. It is pretty unmanageable unless I reverse roll the film and leave it for a week or so. So, I had to find suitable images at one or the other end of a roll, and fight it to get it to work in the scanner. This, of course, limited my choices. I haven't tried a soak in print flattener, but I may experiment with that. I don't think that a bit of ethylene glycol will hurt the film.

 

Here's the url where you can see some samples. samples Photo Gallery by Larry Bullis at pbase.com

 

What you have is a lakescape which I'm including much reduced to show the whole image, and several much enlarged fragments which show the quality of the grain in a sky/horizon area and some detailed area with grasses in the water. To give you an idea of the scale, here, the clips would be somewhat less than one inch or so from a 20x24 inch print (sorry, those reading from civilized countries which use the metric system). That is, if your screen is 1440 wide, as mine is, the thumbnails are larger than they would be in the big print.

 

Also, there is a jawbone image.

 

The images will be gritty, but they will have a lively quality in which the artifacts of the process, the medium, play an active part. If you've ever seen Henri Cartier-Bresson's landscapes, you may understand what I'm looking for in these images. We went to one of the more spectacular regions on the planet: Steens Mountain in southeastern Oregon. I didn't just do this; I took my Graphlex XL as well.

 

As for getting the chemicals, the raw chemicals are available from companies like Bostick and Sullivan, or the Photographer's Formulary. The Formulary sells this developer in a kit; it is called MCM 100. Very interesting formula. It uses paraphenyline diamine which gives very fine grain, and pyrocatechin to help sustain the emulsion speed. The negatives are slightly brown in color, have much greater printing density than the appear to have (if you use graded papers), and have a strange polished look on the emulsion side.

 

There may be better chemists than I reading this, and they may have something to contribute regarding disposal. I'm still working on my 45 year old chemistry courses (which were excellent and I retained a lot, but much more is known now). My understanding is that since these chemicals are reducing agents, they oxidize readily (they will turn brown and spoil if not stored carefully), so they break down into pretty inert stuff. The most important thing to remember about disposal is that your fixer dissolves the ionic silver, leaving the reduced metallic silver as the image. These ions should never be poured down the drain, because they will end up in the food chain. Not good. I love to eat the oysters from Samish Bay, and I don't want to ingest heavy metals, thanks.

 

Interesting way of working. If you scan these images, I'd very much like to see what they look like.

 

Are the chemicals you need for developing in this way easy to buy, and dispose of?

[peterv]

Larry,

 

this information is really very interesting. I like the structure of the grain in the samples. It's as if the contrast from deep black all the way to the highlights is there, but the image doesn't look harsh. Is that the 'effect' you're after?

 

I'll be off-line in the coming week. Thanks for the interesting explanation, both in writing and visually.

 

Peter

[bullis]

Peter,

 

That's part of it. Continuous tone is pretty much the province of photography. Actually, that is a big part of what I try to do in all of my images, regardless of the film, developer, etc. I design my processes for it, and its presence or absence is a primary criterion for evaluating the success of an image, for me. I don't necessarily hold everyone to the same standard, though. It is just what I'm about, in photography.

 

Here, I particularly enjoy the artifacts of the medium. Most people, I think, believe that grain is simply a defect. I don't mind grain at all, because it is a genuine element inherent in the process. A grain is the building block, so to speak, of the image. Without grain, we'd have no image. I am not always looking for grain, but with this particular combination, I am. Grain doesn't bother me at all, as long as it is beautiful.

 

I appreciate your interest, Peter. So often it seems like nobody's out there.

 

Larry,

 

this information is really very interesting. I like the structure of the grain in the samples. It's as if the contrast from deep black all the way to the highlights is there, but the image doesn't look harsh. Is that the 'effect' you're after?

 

I'll be off-line in the coming week. Thanks for the interesting explanation, both in writing and visually.

 

Peter

[morgants]

There are many other film users out there, and in some circles film is the cool thing, just take a look at this:

 

.Lomography 3.0~ / _

 

they are widely extended, I've seen shops in Barcelona or Madrid, for example, and they always seem to have customers interested in their stuff.

 

I am doing my part in teaching the young high school kids that film is still alive and well. Regularly I loan out my AE-1 and XE-7 and throw in a roll of kodak gold. The kids love it and can hardly wait for the surprise of seeing their exposures appear in prints.

 

You are right, lomo and holga are doing more than their part to ensure the emulsion keeps getting spread around.

[kenneth]

I think there is a lot of hype about digital and once it all settles down people will say- what was all the fuss about. Take DAB radio. Everyone raved about it but really it is very poor and does not hold a candle to FM broadcast which is the envy of the broadcast world. DAB will kill off FM, they said. New 25 year licenses have been issued to radio stations who wish to broadcast an FM signal. But for sure it would be easier if we all went DAB but the discerning audiences out there, me included will not let that happen

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[jacarape]

i have just started buying 35mm films, because i quit digital camera and give it away and bought brand new m7. before with DSLR I felt i did not take picture, i just consume photography as we consume the other good things in our lives (shoot it, check it, shoot it check it, dont like it? delete it!! so what is the result? what have i challenged? NOTHING).

I had started feeling the attraction of film cameras, since then i realized i did not check pictures of last 3 batches of pictures for along 6 months in my computer. They were fake for me.

Since 2 weeks i use my m7 and my soul in peace. now, after shooting, I feel the warmth and worth of the moment in my camera. Moreover the surprise will come to me after develop them. It is a secret between me and the camera.

whenever i see a DSLR user, i pity at them. They mostly sit at a cafe and check their pictures as i did before and never check them again in my computer. I want to approach tell them do you feel the spirit in air ?

I am not against digital cameras by the way. just I am sharing the sense in me

 

Today i phoned some remaining film developing store and went to one,

Staff looked at the rolls and told me, they cannot promise about deadline, because nowadays they dont run their darkroom so often. I said " no problem! take your time, i know it has been hard to gather enough numbers of rolls to run a darkroom, just phone me when you did"

 

other hand i am challenging with films and seeing the point it has come... Another joy of me.

 

thanks for reading

 

Nice post, very nicely said.

[thrid]

How long will it be before the majority of 35mm film sold is to Leica users?

 

It would be interesting to see how the proportion is increasing, year on year.

 

The biggest challenge to film's survival is the continued availability of reliable and functional cameras.

 

It is becoming more difficult to get even something as mainstream as a mechanical Nikon repaired. I estimate we will be facing a serious problem in 10 years or less.

 

And by repaired I mean work on the level that Don Goldberg and Sherry Krauter provide for Leica shooters, not the hack jobs many places perform.

 

Leica claims that they will service the MP for the next 20 years. You can still get most R bodies serviced by Leica. Time will tell how firm that commitment really is.

 

Hasselblad will still service V-series cameras and appears to be willing to do so as long as they remain in business. Again, time will tell.

 

I'm not sure what the story is with Nikon, but the biggest independent repair center here in the UK can't be trusted as far as they can be thrown to service film cameras, unless it's an F6.

 

I dropped off my FM to be given a full CLA and by a fluke discovered that they had never even opened the camera (but still tried to charge me $150 and claimed it had been serviced.). I'm still not sure what they did to my F and I am certainly not bringing my F3-P to them

 

The short story was that in their opinion anyone still shooting film is an amateur and does not need to taken as serious, as someone getting a DSLR serviced. Basically I was told that anyone shooting film is not a professional and is basically 'playing around'. I wonder how someone like Don McCullen or Gary Knight feels about that sort of a statement...

 

So, ultimately Leica and Hasselblad may be that last supporters of film cameras and therefore anyone wanting to shoot film will seek out these brands.

 

Large format and medium format bellows cameras will be around for as long as you can buy film. Mechanically these cameras are so simple that anyone with moderate mechanical skills can service them. If the supply of film should dry up, I would not be shocked to see some diehards resorting to the photographic techniques from the earliest days of photography and we will have come full circle.

 

Personally I have no plans to stop shooting film. I shoot digital at my day job, but for my personal work my choice is Tri-X, because that is how I see the world.

[kenneth]

i have just started buying 35mm films, because i quit digital camera and give it away and bought brand new m7. before with DSLR I felt i did not take picture, i just consume photography as we consume the other good things in our lives (shoot it, check it, shoot it check it, dont like it? delete it!! so what is the result? what have i challenged? NOTHING).

I had started feeling the attraction of film cameras, since then i realized i did not check pictures of last 3 batches of pictures for along 6 months in my computer. They were fake for me.

Since 2 weeks i use my m7 and my soul in peace. now, after shooting, I feel the warmth and worth of the moment in my camera. Moreover the surprise will come to me after develop them. It is a secret between me and the camera.

whenever i see a DSLR user, i pity at them. They mostly sit at a cafe and check their pictures as i did before and never check them again in my computer. I want to approach tell them do you feel the spirit in air ?

I am not against digital cameras by the way. just I am sharing the sense in me

 

Today i phoned some remaining film developing store and went to one,

Staff looked at the rolls and told me, they cannot promise about deadline, because nowadays they dont run their darkroom so often. I said " no problem! take your time, i know it has been hard to gather enough numbers of rolls to run a darkroom, just phone me when you did"

 

other hand i am challenging with films and seeing the point it has come... Another joy of me.

 

thanks for reading

 

Spot on- my sentiments entirely. The whole world has gone consumer crazy. But here's the rub. We don't need to and that is wonderful. Enjoy your M7

[NZDavid]

There are thousands of film cameras in circulation. If they are mechanical, they can be maintained and repaired (just like cars). Parts can even be made. Electronics and computerized components -- probably not. It all comes down to demand. Plenty of film users on this forum!

[KM-25]

Feel free to join The Kodachrome Project

 

I am currently trying to get these guys to underwrite doing a 75th anniversary of Kodachrome book in which people from all over the world will shoot for the entire 75th year in 2010 and publish a book the next year:

 

America 24/7

 

If they don't got for it, someone will....

 

I have 3 Leica film bodies and will soon have a 4th. All filled with Kodachrome, of course...

[antistatic]

There are other makes...?

 

Regards,

 

Bill

 

Allegedly, though I remain a skeptic on this matter.

 

David

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Hallo,

Look here: Interesting Leica gear

[earleygallery]

The biggest challenge to film's survival is the continued availability of reliable and functional cameras.

 

It is becoming more difficult to get even something as mainstream as a mechanical Nikon repaired. I estimate we will be facing a serious problem in 10 years or less.

 

And by repaired I mean work on the level that Don Goldberg and Sherry Krauter provide for Leica shooters, not the hack jobs many places perform.

 

Leica claims that they will service the MP for the next 20 years. You can still get most R bodies serviced by Leica. Time will tell how firm that commitment really is.

 

Hasselblad will still service V-series cameras and appears to be willing to do so as long as they remain in business. Again, time will tell.

 

I'm not sure what the story is with Nikon, but the biggest independent repair center here in the UK can't be trusted as far as they can be thrown to service film cameras, unless it's an F6.

 

I dropped off my FM to be given a full CLA and by a fluke discovered that they had never even opened the camera (but still tried to charge me $150 and claimed it had been serviced.). I'm still not sure what they did to my F and I am certainly not bringing my F3-P to them

 

The short story was that in their opinion anyone still shooting film is an amateur and does not need to taken as serious, as someone getting a DSLR serviced. Basically I was told that anyone shooting film is not a professional and is basically 'playing around'. I wonder how someone like Don McCullen or Gary Knight feels about that sort of a statement...

 

So, ultimately Leica and Hasselblad may be that last supporters of film cameras and therefore anyone wanting to shoot film will seek out these brands.

 

Large format and medium format bellows cameras will be around for as long as you can buy film. Mechanically these cameras are so simple that anyone with moderate mechanical skills can service them. If the supply of film should dry up, I would not be shocked to see some diehards resorting to the photographic techniques from the earliest days of photography and we will have come full circle.

 

Personally I have no plans to stop shooting film. I shoot digital at my day job, but for my personal work my choice is Tri-X, because that is how I see the world.

 

I find it hard to beleive that Nikon actually said that! Did they really or was that just your impression of how they might think based on your - obviously unsatisfactory - experience?

 

I know of plenty of pro photographers who use film, and I also know of plenty of camera repairers who should be able to fix your Nikons.