Everything new is just awful , isn't it?
So what else is new ?
Attacking your straw man, oh sure, I'd love to have my 1975 Mercury Montego back. Love that great gas mileage and reliability and all. New tech isn't bad but it can certainly be used in a way that diminishes the individual. When you can't walk from the parking lot to the office without needing to check your phone messages.... hope you don't get run over, 'cause you sure ain't watching where you're going.
Ken, your post is excellent and spot-on. I work for a large tech company, and daily I see a stream of mindless kids wandering into the building, eyes glued to their phone, mostly oblivious of the real world around them. Today's youth don't *see* anything for themselves.
In Kurt Vonnegut's novel Galapagos, he points out that humans laugh when another person farts. When humanity devolves into another, less intelligent species, they still laugh at farts. I'm convinced we're devolving in lots of ways and this smartphone obsession is just another step along that path.
Oh, now that takes me back, how I long for the fuel economy, ride, cornering, build quality, and mechanical reliability of mid-70's autos and trucks.
I jumped into the Apple ecosystem a few years back, my employer even got our group iPhones to make payroll easier and save us lots of driving, they paid for themselves and the customization of an App in two weeks. That initiative partly came because I was using my personal iPad 2 to do it already. Last month they got us new ruggedized Windows laptops. They are taking our iPhones away and giving us Motorola Rugby's. I know the dates don't match but OMG it sure feels like I've gone back in time and they have told me I need to work in multi-user CPM and use a princess phone; I'm waiting for them to hand me a floppy disk next.
From the Fuji press release: "The price increases are substantial and it would be an increase of at least double digit..."
I wonder why film consumption is droping.
Film consumption will almost certainly continue to drop for quite awhile yet. In some areas that drop will be slower than with others. I suspect that the use of large format film is pretty low already so may not be dropping much at all.
But 35m is almost certainly still dropping at a far faster rate. The drop may be slowing, I don't know, but it is still dropping.
Likewise I suspect that slide film is dropping quicker than C-41 negative film, and C-41 negative film faster than black and white, where things may be starting to level out a little.
But of course, this is all speculation and probably only wishful thinking on my part.
Film consumption will almost certainly continue to drop for quite awhile yet. In some areas that drop will be slower than with others. I suspect that the use of large format film is pretty low already so may not be dropping much at all.
But 35m is almost certainly still dropping at a far faster rate. The drop may be slowing, I don't know, but it is still dropping.
Likewise I suspect that slide film is dropping quicker than C-41 negative film, and C-41 negative film faster than black and white, where things may be starting to level out a little.
But of course, this is all speculation and probably only wishful thinking on my part.
On the recent visit to the ILFORD factory, we were informed that 35mm sales were slowly decreasing but 120 sales were increasing.
That makes sense. Changing from digital to 35mm is hardly worth the improvement and leads to a return to digital but changing from digital to 120 and sheet film sizes is certainly very worthwhile and encourages the photographer to stay with film...
RR
Remember, Ilford is selling black and white and I suspect that is one of the film types that is dropping in sales the least.
Remember, Ilford is selling black and white and I suspect that is one of the film types that is dropping in sales the least.
I recently flew to Rochester New York for a workshop in carbon transfer at the George Eastman House. Before the workshop I had never seen a carbon printed on glass. I had never printed, contact or enlarged, negatives from glass. It was a kink in my regular thought pattern toward photography in general. Half way through I needed a counselor more than a photography teacher. I mean to tell everyone how deeply ingrained our own ideas of photography are. For me it was an eye opener, I'll skip the details but on the last day part of the last day I selected a glass plate negative from the collection of vintage plates from the 1800's, exposed it on tissue I made, and processed it and transferred it to a sheet of glass. Then Mark Osterman demonstrated how to prepare it as an Orotone. It was at that time I realized I had gone full circle. My Kodak Panatomic X and Kodachrome 25 days are in the past with all of the fine memories. What life is telling me now is accept change or live in a fantasy world that I can't control. No one likes materials they have mastered suddenly taken away. It's well acknowledged by photographers of the past. I even have a quote from Paul Strand at the bottom of the screen. I think we are in great company and not alone in this, even though I believe it is happening at an accelerated rate in our recent time.
To be honest I feel much sorrier for those who have invested their lives in digital. Their world is also starting to change but I am afraid that it will be much harder to keep digital technology alive as a cottage industry than film.
"film does not exist anymore"
I find that more and more people are over it, the whole tech thing and even a fair share of young people are being intrepid enough in their thinking to want to get away from some of it....and use film.
Last month they got us new ruggedized Windows laptops. They are taking our iPhones away and giving us Motorola Rugby's
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?