Back in June 2018, the Ferrania Folks hoped to be in continuous production by Fall

[Nzoomed]

I found another video of the ferrania factory probably in the 50s, not sure if it was shared here earlier.

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

I believe someone posted it previously, as I can remember the scary sound effects

 

[Nzoomed]

I believe someone posted it previously, as I can remember the scary sound effects

I know there was an older film that was in black and white of the factory shared here earlier, both these films show the big boy coater and the power plant, etc.

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

Still, it's fun to watch P30 coming off the line!

 

[Nzoomed]

Still, it's fun to watch P30 coming off the line!

And its still being made today!

 

[twelvetone12]

There are lots of interviews of ex-Ferrania people on youtube, they are super interesting, I can post some but they are all in Italian.

 

[foc]

There are lots of interviews of ex-Ferrania people on youtube, they are super interesting, I can post some but they are all in Italian.

Do they have English subtitles (captions turned on in English)?

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

There are lots of interviews of ex-Ferrania people on youtube, they are super interesting, I can post some but they are all in Italian.

Please post them!

 

[twelvetone12]

This is the channel: https://www.youtube.com/@labaudiovideosdc
You can just search "ferrania" and there are many interviews, but it seems no subtitles

For example this one is super interesting:
Apparently at Ferrania they were packaging medical film for Kodak (there are various references to this in other interviews too) and they went under in the early 2000s when the contract ended.
Very cool images of the coating lines, with an automated transport "robot" similar to the one they have in B38 at Kodak!
It is so sad all this went belly up, I sincerely hope FILM Ferrania can keep going on and preserve what they can (and make 8mm film...)

 

[Nzoomed]

There are lots of interviews of ex-Ferrania people on youtube, they are super interesting, I can post some but they are all in Italian.

no harm in posting, youtube can translate them reasonably well these days.

This is the channel: https://www.youtube.com/@labaudiovideosdc
You can just search "ferrania" and there are many interviews, but it seems no subtitles

For example this one is super interesting:
Apparently at Ferrania they were packaging medical film for Kodak (there are various references to this in other interviews too) and they went under in the early 2000s when the contract ended.
Very cool images of the coating lines, with an automated transport "robot" similar to the one they have in B38 at Kodak!
It is so sad all this went belly up, I sincerely hope FILM Ferrania can keep going on and preserve what they can (and make 8mm film...)

Thanks, there is quite a bit of ferrania content on that channel, the translate seems to work OK, the employees seem to be talking about the challenges the company faced in the later years and their work culture.

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

no harm in posting, youtube can translate them reasonably well these days.



Thanks, there is quite a bit of ferrania content on that channel, the translate seems to work OK, the employees seem to be talking about the challenges the company faced in the later years and their work culture.

Youtube will only translate if the content provider turned that option on. Hopefully, it's switched on other videos but judging by the video twelvetone 12 linked, it's doubtful.

 

[abruzzi]

its available on the one above (to me at least)

 

[Nzoomed]

Youtube will only translate if the content provider turned that option on. Hopefully, it's switched on other videos but judging by the video twelvetone 12 linked, it's doubtful.

I had already tested it and its working fine. Doesnt get it all right, but you get the idea on what they are talking about.

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

I had already tested it and its working fine. Doesnt get it all right, but you get the idea on what they are talking about.

None of the videos translate for me... Oh well, some of the visuals are interesting!

 

[Nzoomed]

None of the videos translate for me... Oh well, some of the visuals are interesting!

Does it let you turn on the captions?
You then should see Italian subtitles, then you click on the settings gear and under language, you can select auto translate and then you can select the preferred language.

 

[cmacd123]

he subtitles get translated, not the audio.

 

[Nzoomed]

he subtitles get translated, not the audio.

correct

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

Does it let you turn on the captions?
You then should see Italian subtitles, then you click on the settings gear and under language, you can select auto translate and then you can select the preferred language.

That works! Thanks!

 

[twelvetone12]

Well if there is interest we could maybe think to add proper English subtitles to some of them, even if some are very specific about the workings of the old company. My favorite one is a guy that fondly remembers the legendary _mangiate di tagliatelle_ they did at company parties!

 

[Harry Callahan]

at the time of the Kickstarter, the kolks did metion that one of the two was a movie fan who owned a Movie Lab in Italy and wanted to have fresh 16mm reversal film available. P30 WAS originaly made in 16mm (as Negative) so it is quite possible that they have a R8 Perforating machine. Unless they start making and perforating some print film though they would need to work on a reversal film. (the original plan was to make Scotch Chrome 100, which would work well as a FAST Regular 8 Film.)

On second thought, I guess that given that folks often scan film anyway, that regular 8 Negative might still be useful,

As far as i recall one of the founders is a movie film enthusiast. Initially they went to the Ferrania campus as they were just looking for some 35mm-perforators, as they intended to put out some color film bought off a big company. But when they found Ferrania to basically have everything needed for color film production at hand, they decided not to just get some more perforators but to set up a small film factory.
They already had perforators for (almost?) any format, also exotic ones like DS8 and even 9.5 . As long as they survive, they can give you almost any format you could dream of.

I don't like the business model of Kick Starter, so I have never "donated" anything to them. Its not a donation in my mind, its a gamble w/ no guarantee of a return. If it were a donation you could deduct it on your income taxes. You can't make a "donation" on 7 come 11 on a Vegas crap table and try to deduct that as a deduction if you lose your "investment".

Well, actually you can, but you have to keep studious records, and who would be willing to tell the IRS about their gambling? That might prompt them to get real nosy. The dealers usually frown on anyone writing anything down in a casino anyway. Besides, you can only deduct the losses if you tell them of your winnings, in which case the tax on that is surely much more than your tax deduction. It's a sucker's bet.

Maybe its just me, but if I had a valid idea to make a product and the equipment to make what the idea was about (or needed funds to get the equipment) I would go to private investors rather than getting strangers to send me money online based on a possible future product. Those investors are out there. I've made plenty of mistakes w/ money myself, but one learns, you know? As long as someone is willing to gamble their money, then sure, there is no guarantee of anything. Other than one person suddenly has a smaller stash and the other entity now has a bigger stash.

If someone invested/gambled in or on a product and the funds are diverted to something else like a store credit, while that may sound better than getting nothing, it also does not sound legal.

One thing to consider is that back in 2014 digitalization was going strong. They were cranking out new digital cameras having more and more Megapixels every year - and everything analog was "old" and "the past".
The founders decided to set up a film factory because Kodak discontinued Ektachrome, while Fuji axed Velvia. Users all over the world complained and showed will to pay increased prices, but Kodak stated that "demand for Ektachrome was too small to continue production". (Some years later they brought it back, making me wonder how you determine increased demand on a discontinued product - and they even reformulated, which does cost quite some money, but anyway)

Meaning: Back then most investors, trying to make profit, would not have taken a look at Ferrania, because it was old, analog, the past and just "not digital". They would have had a hard time to find any investors - while Kickstarter was much more easier and at the same helped to show the italian government - who own(ed) the Ferrania campus - that there still was/is interest in analog film, as the Kickstarter-goal was reached fast and even overfulfilled.
Kickstarter may not be the best way if looking for investors, but back then it was just the right thing - if not the only thing for Ferrania.

 

[twelvetone12]

FILM Ferrania started with a 1.5 Mil investment fro the Regione Liguria plus the Kickstarter: https://www.regione.liguria.it/home...co-valbormida-stabilimento-film-ferrania.html

I also found some more interesting videos of old Ferrania.
Triacetate base making in building A:



And another video of building H while coating the anti-halo for color film:


The small robot il called "Zaccaria". Both videos have a voice explaining what is going on but often it is covered by the sound of machinery and I could not really understand.
It is interesting to see how "run down" the plant seems in some places, particularly in building A there is a mix of old and new. Everything seems to be digitally controlled. At some point the cameraman shows a pile of trash on the floor and says "degrado! degrado!" (degradation! degradation!), it sums the feeling I had viewing the video (also notice the leaking radiator later on). They also show some of the buildings around (thousands of people worked there is the 80s, is the comment), including the LFR.
They also show the cooling towers of the power plant which was still in operation, in one of the interviews they interviewed one of the technicians there who proudly stated that they never had any downtime in 50 years or so.
It is quite sad that most of this was lost, and I hope some of it can be reconstructed and kept alive by FILM Ferrania.

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

Thanks for posting those videos!

 

[Harry Callahan]

Yes, there also were other investments, but if those had sufficed they probably would not have gone to Kickstarter - and the response on Kickstarter did help to show the interest of people to the other investors. I cannot read italian and don`t really trust translating software - is it possible that Kickstarter was first and other investors joined in later? Also as Regione Liguria does own the Ferrania campus, could this be an indirect investment - like "we let you work here but you don`t have to pay rent" or alike? I think there is some kind of agreement like this.
As far as i know the plant was abandoned for more than 10 years when they decided to set up the new Ferrania factory.

 

[Nzoomed]

FILM Ferrania started with a 1.5 Mil investment fro the Regione Liguria plus the Kickstarter: https://www.regione.liguria.it/home...co-valbormida-stabilimento-film-ferrania.html

I also found some more interesting videos of old Ferrania.
Triacetate base making in building A:



And another video of building H while coating the anti-halo for color film:


The small robot il called "Zaccaria". Both videos have a voice explaining what is going on but often it is covered by the sound of machinery and I could not really understand.
It is interesting to see how "run down" the plant seems in some places, particularly in building A there is a mix of old and new. Everything seems to be digitally controlled. At some point the cameraman shows a pile of trash on the floor and says "degrado! degrado!" (degradation! degradation!), it sums the feeling I had viewing the video (also notice the leaking radiator later on). They also show some of the buildings around (thousands of people worked there is the 80s, is the comment), including the LFR.
They also show the cooling towers of the power plant which was still in operation, in one of the interviews they interviewed one of the technicians there who proudly stated that they never had any downtime in 50 years or so.
It is quite sad that most of this was lost, and I hope some of it can be reconstructed and kept alive by FILM Ferrania.

wow, those are great videos! I wonder what happened to the robots?Would be interesting if they were sitting there among the stuff that was saved before demolition, not that they would provide any use in the LRF.

 

[Nzoomed]

Yes, there also were other investments, but if those had sufficed they probably would not have gone to Kickstarter - and the response on Kickstarter did help to show the interest of people to the other investors. I cannot read italian and don`t really trust translating software - is it possible that Kickstarter was first and other investors joined in later? Also as Regione Liguria does own the Ferrania campus, could this be an indirect investment - like "we let you work here but you don`t have to pay rent" or alike? I think there is some kind of agreement like this.
As far as i know the plant was abandoned for more than 10 years when they decided to set up the new Ferrania factory.

I believe the last coating run on their coater was some time around 2006 or 2007. Going by the 2011 expiry dates on some of their film, that would sound about right.