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posted by martyb on Thursday June 07 2018, @09:54PM   Printer-friendly
from the Film-At-11-Maybe...-Or-Maybe-Not... dept.

It's easy to think that film cameras are gone forever. But Marketplace has a short story about how Kodak is apparently close to re-releasing the Ektachrome 100 film line. Tweet as covered in the story.

There's news that Kodak is about to bring back Ektachrome 100, a popular slide film for analog cameras, that's been gone for five years. Launched in the 1940s, Ektachrome was one of the first commercially available color films and became the "preferred choice of magazine and advertising shooters." (It was a favorite of National Geographic.)

As far as I can tell, the development has been hanging for quite some time as here is one among several stories back from January of 2017 stating it was coming back. I guess software isn't the only industry that suffers from vaporware potential. Marketplace's question could also be asked here: What pieces of discontinued technology do you wish would come back?


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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Appalbarry on Thursday June 07 2018, @11:43PM (9 children)

    by Appalbarry (66) on Thursday June 07 2018, @11:43PM (#690120) Journal

    Why film over digital? For much the same reasons that some people prefer vinyl albums [thirdmanrecords.com] over CDs and MP3s, and why there still a LOT of recording studios [facebook.com] offering analog and tape instead of direct to a computer.

    Obviously there are qualitative differences between analog and digital, and some of that just comes down to personal tastes. No matter how you look at it, a photograph created on film does look different from one created on digital, just as an album recorded to 1/4" tape sounds different from one recorded into Pro-Tools.

    More important though is the process. With film you really do need to stop, look, and plan your shots. With only a dozen or two exposures on a roll of film you can't just blast off fifty exposures in a couple minutes in the hope that one will be good. Endless digital snaps are free. Every film shot costs you money. And because you can't immediately look at your picture on the back of the camera, you have one more reason to shoot with great care and planning.

    (Which is not to say that there aren't photographers shooting phenomenal work on digital, but you'll find that the best of them almost always started with film.)

    Once you've shot a roll of film you're on to the truly magical part of the process: developing the negatives (or positive for slide film) then printing and developing the actual prints. There is something very powerful about spending an hour or three in a darkroom, watching prints appear out of nowhere, and working with the chemistry and the enlarger to create the perfect image. As much as I appreciate Photoshop (or GIMP in a pinch) my best photos always come from printing in a darkroom.

    If you want to know why so many people still want to shoot on film (and why so many film formats have been reintroduced after Kodak or Ilford abandoned them (just as any number of tape formulations have been reintroduced [atrtape.com] after Ampex and 3M abandoned them)) Go dig out a stack of vintage National Geographic, [tumblr.com] or even better, a set of the old Time/Life Photography [amazon.com] books. Take a look, and tell me if anyone is matching that kind of work on their iPhone.

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  • (Score: 3, Touché) by wonkey_monkey on Thursday June 07 2018, @11:52PM

    by wonkey_monkey (279) on Thursday June 07 2018, @11:52PM (#690122) Homepage

    Take a look, and tell me if anyone is matching that kind of work on their iPhone.

    That's a ridiculous comparison in this context and has nothing to do with film versus digital.

    --
    systemd is Roko's Basilisk
  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by mechanicjay on Friday June 08 2018, @12:52AM (4 children)

    Film. Hollywood still burns through miles of the stuff everyday, though that is slowing changing as digital continues to improve. Serious landscape photography is still a realm of film, largely 4x6 or 810 view cameras. Though again, the new large sensors are going to be giving those film formats a run for their money in the next 5 years or so.

    I shoot film because I simply enjoy the process more. I put away my my Minolta in 2008 when I bough a Nikon D40. The Nikon is on its last legs now after a not very hard life. I'm back to shooting film now with the 40 year old Mintola...still working perfectly. As it turns out, the new film stocks that Kodak has out, Porta 400 and Ektar 100 are jaw droppingly good. They can capture an incredible dynamic range with an insanely fine grain. I shoot, develop at home and do a 4000 dpi scan with a dedicated scanner. I couldnt be happier with the results. Best part is, I didnt end up dropping a couple grand on a POS that's going to fall apart on me in 10 years.

    I do worry about the long term availability of film and chems, so in the mean time I'll keep burning through a roll or two every month and enjoying myself.

    The other thing that brought me back to film was thinking about the long term legacy of the digital age. I'm pretty good about keeping multiple copies of all my images and stuff, but are Nikon Raw, jpg, tiff, still going to be viable file formats in 20, 30, 50 years? Having the negatives gives me a hedge against a personal digital apocalypse.

    --
    My VMS box beat up your Windows box.
    • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday June 08 2018, @07:30AM (3 children)

      by FatPhil (863) <pc-soylentNO@SPAMasdf.fi> on Friday June 08 2018, @07:30AM (#690235) Homepage
      MF may still be trumping digital sensors in terms of raw resolution for a few more years, but the graining noise is terrible - in my opinion.

      To look at, I'm prefering digital already, and have done for several years. Large format still trumps digital though, but it will go the same way as MF eventually.
      --
      Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
      • (Score: 2) by bob_super on Friday June 08 2018, @04:19PM

        by bob_super (1357) on Friday June 08 2018, @04:19PM (#690376)

        > but the graining noise is terrible - in my opinion.

        True. Conversely, thick brush strokes with too much paint haven't exactly hurt the value of Van Gogh paintings, and I really wish recent hollywood offerings had less perfect visuals in exchange for more scenario (the insane cost of the perfect visuals driving the "take no risk, don't offend anyone" narratives).

      • (Score: 4, Interesting) by mechanicjay on Friday June 08 2018, @04:25PM (1 child)

        Grain noise is highly dependent on the film stock used. My basic take on film grain is as follows

        • Fuji Velvia has basically none, it's amazing stuff. I just shot my first roll, so we'll see how it works for me. Ken Rockwell (love him or hate him) has a decent display of Velvia MF shots here: https://kenrockwell.com/fuji/velvia-50.htm [kenrockwell.com].
        • Kodak Ektar also has a supremely fine grain, at a 4000dpi scan you can kind make it out at a > 200% zoom. A shot of mine: Reflected World [smbfc.net] Note, this is a 35mm shot, I've printed up as 8x10, it's looks amazing.
        • Fuji Color Negative 200/400 speed doesn't matter -- I think it's shit. I find really very grainy and displeasing and as much as I'm tempted by it's low cost / roll, I'm done with it. Another shot of mine: Space Needle [smbfc.net] ITS SO DAMN GRAINY
        • Grain in Illford HP5 or Kodak Tri-X is a different beast all together and for whatever reason I love the gritty look it imparts, though scanning B&W is a bit of a fraught process. This shot as a darkroom print doesn't exhibit the heavy modelled grain in the sky and is overall smoother with a less pronounced grain. Pulaski Skyway [smbfc.net]

        Okay, that's enough self-promotion...

        But, yeah it won't be too long until MF gives way to digital, the new stuff out just last year, I think finally has the resolution to do it. LF still has a few years left in it and that may be enough of a niche market where the R&D required to get a sensor that big just isn't worth it. So the market will either further consolidate and continue as a Niche, or it'll go the way of Polaroid Peel-a-part film, may she rest in peace.

        --
        My VMS box beat up your Windows box.
        • (Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Friday June 08 2018, @10:40PM

          by Joe Desertrat (2454) on Friday June 08 2018, @10:40PM (#690564)

          If one is trying to get a perfect image as a representation of something, say a flower image for a field guide, I think digital beats film hands down. An awful lot of photography though is people trying to create "art", whether they (or anyone else) calls it that or not. Images are edited to look like what people want them to look like. People like the look of film, and there is of course a long history of film photography that is still a base for what photographs "should" look like. There are a lot of software programs that have options to try to emulate the results of various films. I doubt that any of them match the result of the film they are trying to emulate. In the end, it comes down to what you like.

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by mhajicek on Friday June 08 2018, @03:51AM (1 child)

    by mhajicek (51) on Friday June 08 2018, @03:51AM (#690188)

    Sounds a lot like the reasons people give for hunting with a bit w or muzzle loader. They're more interested in the challenge than achieving the goal.

    --
    The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
    • (Score: 2) by mhajicek on Friday June 08 2018, @03:52AM

      by mhajicek (51) on Friday June 08 2018, @03:52AM (#690189)

      *Bow. Phone typing.

      --
      The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
  • (Score: 2) by shortscreen on Friday June 08 2018, @07:09AM

    by shortscreen (2252) on Friday June 08 2018, @07:09AM (#690231) Journal

    (Which is not to say that there aren't photographers shooting phenomenal work on digital, but you'll find that the best of them almost always started with film.)

    That might be related to the fact that anyone who has been on the scene for 15 years or more started out before digital was really up to snuff. I think DSLRs started getting good around '04.