Film from Italy -- Ferrania starting production 2014

[flavio81]

Let us assume that an old formula, as mentioned by Ferrania themselves, used methyl mercuric iodide or cadmium nitrate. Both possible in products made in Europe (AFAIK at the time), but forbidden in the US. Today, they are forbidden in Europe and the US. This makes manufacture of the product impossible and the sale of a product containing them impossible.

There are grandfathered products that were made by companies that went out of business, that used banned chemicals and are allowed to be sold but not made (again AFAIK).

These are fairy tales made up to show real chemicals in an unreal situation. The fact is that whatever chemicals were used in Ferrania / Scotch products are no longer available or manufactured for one reason or another. So, here is the premise - make a cake with no flour! Too hard, I'll give you the flour and take away the eggs! If you can't do this in 30 mins, you are chopped!

Simple as that. You have to make a product missing a critical ingredient and you have to find a substitute. I hope they do at Ferrania or the product may be quite a bit more like TIP products that we would like.
(...)

Dear PE, thanks for your reply. I understand and agree on the potential difficulties. However, note that the C41 products were made by Ferrania up to the end of 2009; this is about 5 years ago; not so long. I would guess no critical chemicals have been banned since 2009?

 

[flavio81]

But what exactly makes C41 "better" than E6?
It seems everyone's opinions vary somewhat, is C41 better for prints, or because it is finer grained?

E6 is usually finer grained, and i would suspect this has something to do with the fact that the process includes a reversal step. They push process correctly, usually.

C41 films give more natural (precise) color, have far wider exposure latitude and higher sharpness. And they are easier to print. But this does not matter too much once you project a slide on a good screen using a high-quality lens...

 

[Roger Cole]

I disagree, and herein lies the crux of everything related to ongoing manufacture of all gelatin silver film/paper. No one needs any of it. The entire chemical imaging industry exists today only to supply wants. Unless those wants are great enough to sustain operating costs plus whatever level of profit each manufacturer's owners deem sufficient, production will end.

Although my instincts provide a guess, I am unable to predict with any accuracy what and how much the world population of gelatin silver product users will "want" going forward. That information alone, and not all the postings of desire or Kickstarter projects imaginable, will determine the industry's future. In the meantime, I carry a substantial doomsday stockpile and continue regularly refreshing it with new stock as the old is used. There's not really anything APUG bleating can do to change things.

Note to Roger. I started off this post quoting one of yours, but my thrust isn't directed at you. You conveniently provided a good jumping off point for my sermon.

Well, fair enough, but we "need" 220 even less than we "need" 120, because we can still shoot plenty of medium format with 120, we just have to reload more often. I can live with that.

 

[Ricardo Miranda]

Well, Agfa.com page for their Aerial Photography products reads: Film technology is alive and kicking!
Then, go to http://www.agfa.com/sp/global/en/internet/main/solutions/microfilm/index.jsp and you can read


Thats hardly “not interested” as you verse it

Georg
You are right, but that isn't commercial or consumer photographic films. They are for industrial purposes. The excess production of those films are then sold to Maco and other companies for photographic uses.
But, Agfa isn't interested in producing film specifically for the consumer market. They sold that part long time ago. Remember the factory in Leverkusen?

 

[Roger Cole]

E6 is usually finer grained, and i would suspect this has something to do with the fact that the process includes a reversal step. They push process correctly, usually.

C41 films give more natural (precise) color, have far wider exposure latitude and higher sharpness. And they are easier to print. But this does not matter too much once you project a slide on a good screen using a high-quality lens...

E6 isn't finer grained. I love Provia 400X (sigh) but while very fine grained for a 400 reversal film Portra 400 blows it out of the water for grain.

Portra 400 looks like crap projected, though!

 

[Ricardo Miranda]

InovisCoat are interested in photographic emulsions: http://www.inoviscoat.de/en/markets/photography

Miha,
I had in my head that Mirko (Adox) said something on those lines some time ago. That's where my info comes from. He said they didn'r specifically enter the consumer market, that wasn't their main business.

 

[Ricardo Miranda]

Id forgotten him - did you ask what film he was using?
You only get six shots per 120 with wide option.

No, i didn't! If I remember well it was the first time he was using it.

 

[Xmas]

@Flavio81

Ferranni said they were reengineering their youngest emulsion cause that was the easiest one to do first.

So the answer to your question is maybe.

But if you alter the coater you are going to have to do a prototype run to confirm that the 'cake' receipe still makes the same or an acceptable product.

All we can do is wait.

My chemical supplier keeps altering what he stocks and what he will ship and who he will sell to.

ammonium dichromate last one I noticed.

 

[flavio81]

But, Agfa isn't interested in producing film specifically for the consumer market. They sold that part long time ago. Remember the factory in Leverkusen?

That factory (or the equipment and people) became InovisCoat, and InovisCoat, if i recall correctly, manufactures some special film for Lomography and coats films for the Impossible Project.

So they are still alive and making consumer film.

 

[miha]

Miha,
I had in my head that Mirko (Adox) said something on those lines some time ago. That's where my info comes from. He said they didn'r specifically enter the consumer market, that wasn't their main business.

Yes, this is quite possible, photo business alone is too small to sustain them, although they can coat up to nine layers at once which is good enough for colour films.

 

[pbromaghin]

In the YouTube video, Nicola Baldini says "I would say that we can expect totally revolutionary analog imaging products."

 

[Photo Engineer]

Sounds like VERY poor laboratory notebook practices at Kodak! As my former manager once said, "If it's not in your lab notebook, it *never* happened!".

But that is a Ferrania notebook in the first place. In the second place is the fact that the formula is correct for a precipitation which is only one step in making an emulsion, and that is what most people misunderstand.

PE

 

[Photo Engineer]

maybe but Kodak bought out lots of competitors like verichrome.
Agfa commercialized embedded couplers?
Ilford discovered Phenodine and commercialized?
Afga Rodinal?
I don't use d76 and I know ID68 is a near clone.
Polariod instant using an Agfa process but lots of their own patents.

Fuji sold cheap film and they still are

1GBP for 200 ISO 24 135 c41 on our high streets
3GBP for 400 ISO 36 in photo shops

that has EK by neck KA won't be selling gold at gold prices, the bw400cn is stuck on our pharmacy shelves too

Ferranni don't need to innovate (I was happy with Ferranni Efke Foma and Adox film) merely to stay legal for hazmat
I have scratch mixed pre E6 and pre c41 Agfa soups.
The risks are that Ferranni can not break even with 35mm and 120 in E6. Impossible are struggling.
Ferranni might have been better to go with c41 for the commercial dependence on local E6 labs.

But I've dug out my 110 found three cartridges and can use a 16mm roll of cine from Foma (or Ferranni if they do mono).

Noel;

Just to give some examples, Ilford took years to commercialize Phenidone and it still decomposes slowly in alkali. Kodak invented Dimezone S, it is more stable, and they commercialized it!

Yes, Agfa invented embedded couplers using the Fischer method. Kodak went on to develop the oil soluble coupler which made slide and curtain coating possible.

Polaroid was unable to reduce color instant to reality and so they hired Kodak to do it for them. Kodak coated the first of the Polacolor films until the new Polaroid plant was completed. Kodak then went on to develop 2 new instant chemistries that were outside of the box and had one on the way to product introduction. It was an integral COLOR imaging system that had an ISO rating of 3000. Polaroid was unable to do this at that time.

PE

 

[Simon R Galley]

I have said this before...

KODAK's contribution to coating, technology, chemistry, innovation and invention is beyond comparison in the annals of photography....

Even more special were the people themselves, people make businesses, many of whom I have had the pleasure of knowing over the year's.

Simon ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited.

 

[Photo Engineer]

And Ilford is carrying the torch forward.

PE

 

[analoguey]

So tempted to start two threads that go

"I HATE KODAK"

&


"I LOVE KODAK"

just to keep that fight out of other threads!

 

[Ken Nadvornick]

Interesting thread, great good look to FERRANIA I wish them well in their endeavours, science, engineering and passion will hopefully get them to their objectives.

I hope so too. I think we should all be rooting for Film Ferrania to eventually become a smaller-scale, sustainable Color Ilford.

Because if they do hit any insurmountable obstacles, and the odds seem non-trivial that they may, and then Kodak and Fujifilm throw in the towel, each for their own business reasons, then you know which 70,000+ color film photographers are going to be camped out on Harman's front lawn the next morning.

The thought of opening the door, only to find 140,000+ pleadingly sad eyes staring silently back you is too gruesome to imagine. And I'm guessing you guys really don't want that to happen. So all I can do is to repeat...

Go Ferrania!



Ken

 

[flavio81]

I think we should all be rooting for Film Ferrania to eventually become a sustainable Color Ilford.

+1 !!

 

[Ricardo Miranda]

That factory (or the equipment and people) became InovisCoat, and InovisCoat, if i recall correctly, manufactures some special film for Lomography and coats films for the Impossible Project.

So they are still alive and making consumer film.

Yeap, that is correct Flavio! And they do custom coatings for Adox as well.

 

[Xmas]

Noel;

Just to give some examples, Ilford took years to commercialize Phenidone and it still decomposes slowly in alkali. Kodak invented Dimezone S, it is more stable, and they commercialized it!

Yes, Agfa invented embedded couplers using the Fischer method. Kodak went on to develop the oil soluble coupler which made slide and curtain coating possible.

Polaroid was unable to reduce color instant to reality and so they hired Kodak to do it for them. Kodak coated the first of the Polacolor films until the new Polaroid plant was completed. Kodak then went on to develop 2 new instant chemistries that were outside of the box and had one on the way to product introduction. It was an integral COLOR imaging system that had an ISO rating of 3000. Polaroid was unable to do this at that time.

PE

ID68 stock keeps ok for me, think the Dimezones are better for high concentrated liquids? I sometimes get eczema so dare not use metol.

Polariod offered his development of the agfa process to Kodak they did not buy. Subsequently they paid 909 million $ + interest for wilful patent violation. The lawyers made money, Ja pooled their photo patents.

Normally big companies bought minnows with products like verichrome.

 

[Photo Engineer]

The ruling by the judge excluded willful patent violation. It was done without intent and Kodak had made a credible effort to avoid willful violation.

PE

 

[Nzoomed]

But that is a Ferrania notebook in the first place. In the second place is the fact that the formula is correct for a precipitation which is only one step in making an emulsion, and that is what most people misunderstand.

PE

Yes, your correct, i expect there would be quite a few more pages in that notebook to that formula, and im sure that Ferrania will just make all that info public for their competition to see since that film was a flagship product of theirs!
I cant quite make out all the writing in the photograph, but i can make out AgNO3, and KBr which is the Silver nitrate and Potassium bromide components of the film.
So if thats all the chemicals used in that film, it should be pretty straightforward since they are the two major components of a B&W film, i dont see any Cadmium or Mercury compounds mentioned there, unless its on another page.
Did most B&W films contain such toxic compounds? I thought it was mainly photographic papers that were of concern.
If so, such a B&W film should be pretty straightforward for them to reproduce without having to substitute chemicals like some are saying.

I hope so too. I think we should all be rooting for Film Ferrania to eventually become a smaller-scale, sustainable Color Ilford.

Ken

Yes i agree.
I think Ferrania should concentrate on Colour film, although if the founders are interested in cine film, there could be a call for B&W.
I see P30 being mentioned everywhere, it was originally first used as a cine film, but was also popular for still photography.

Perhaps Ferrania could form a partnership with Ilford and contract them to produce P30?
IDK, but it could work out well for both businesses, as it would free up resources for ferrania to produce colour film, and at the same time, gives Ilford more business as well as a product for ferrania to sell, since Ilford is geared up for producing B&W films, it is a logical choice.
I also get the feeling that Ferrania will want to produce an ECN type cine film - something they have not worked on since the 80's when 3M pulled out of the cine film market. If kodak pulls out from producing Vision3, this marks the end of colour cine film as we know it unless Ferrania have come up with a product.

 

[Prof_Pixel]

The ruling by the judge excluded willful patent violation. It was done without intent and Kodak had made a credible effort to avoid willful violation.

PE

... and the Kodak instant process was completely different from the Polaroid process. (I've pointed this out to Xmas several times, but he doesn't seem to care to understand this.)

At least the EK instant process still strongly survives as Fuji Instax film! (You can't say the same about the Polaroid processes).

 

[Roger Cole]

So tempted to start two threads that go

"I HATE KODAK"

&


"I LOVE KODAK"

just to keep that fight out of other threads!

Sometimes though Kodak is simply the company many love to hate. I love many of the products and the old incredibly capable culture. The business decisions the last decade to decade and a half, however...


Sent from my iPhone via Tapatalk using 100% recycled electrons. Because I care.

 

[flavio81]

Yes, your correct, i expect there would be quite a few more pages in that notebook to that formula, and im sure that Ferrania will just make all that info public for their competition to see since that film was a flagship product of theirs!
I cant quite make out all the writing in the photograph, but i can make out AgNO3, and KBr which is the Silver nitrate and Potassium bromide components of the film.
So if thats all the chemicals used in that film, it should be pretty straightforward since they are the two major components of a B&W film, i dont see any Cadmium or Mercury compounds mentioned there, unless its on another page.
Did most B&W films contain such toxic compounds? I thought it was mainly photographic papers that were of concern.
If so, such a B&W film should be pretty straightforward for them to reproduce without having to substitute chemicals like some are saying.

Film is not just silver halides... You need to add, for example, sensitizers so the emulsion is not only sensitive to blue but to other colors. And those are special chemicals that can cost like $300/gram and have secret formulas, closely guarded by elves of the black forest.

The magic of this is explained in the excellent threads named "Photo System Engineering" I, II, and III, by our prolific scientist and photo engineer better known as... Photo Engineer!!

(there was a url link here which no longer exists)