Harman Photo cryptic announcement/teaser

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Melvin J Bramley

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I'm not a fan of Ilford Harman producing colour film as , I think, will detract from the successful black and white business.
If they do so they have to be prepared to open photo labs world wide to process the material which , ideally, would include Ilford/Harmans own printing papers; not likely!
There is no way in hell that Ilford/Harman is going to process it's own C41 colour film and have it printed on a competitors paper.
I fear an over ambitious I/H could leave us with no western produced black and white materials.
I've seen it before with other long established UK companies that over stretched.

TB
 

cmacd123

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And, more importantly, all bulk rolls need slit, perfed and edge signed - same as packaged rolls. It may well be slitting or perfing capacity that's the limiting factor, not stuffing canisters.
I recently bulk loaded a 100 ft roll of Kentmere 400, and Noticed that the edge signing is subtly different between that and the pre-packed film. the Space between each occurrence of "K400" was different, and they are still using the 1 to 47 frame numbers with one frame unnumbered, the same as the last roll of Ilford brand bulk I got several years ago. (indeed the same as the last roll of Arista English Profesional I got well over a decade or two ago)
so I would imagine that the Edge signing is done on totally different equipment.

the perforating might either done while the film is still in Pancake form, or by the packing machines.
 

bfilm

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I'm not a fan of Ilford Harman producing colour film as , I think, will detract from the successful black and white business.

I think Harman will be able to handle both. I would think that they are planning this carefully, and that it won't harm their main pursuit of black and white film and paper. Kodak, Fujifilm, and Agfa were able to do both black and white and color film in high quality for many years.
 

MattKing

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Harman have been contract coating all sorts of non-photographic stuff for others for years.
They have also been contract confectioning/finishing all sorts of photographic stuff for others for years.
They have also been distributing photographic equipment for others for years.
There business seems to be able to handle distractions.
And by the way, the same applies to Eastman Kodak, although they don't do distribution for others.
 

Dustin McAmera

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screen.jpg

complete with roaring-fire sound. No more information really.

..and that comment: 'My guess is it’s something photography related.' 😹
 
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Dustin McAmera

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I started an Instagram account just to be able to see posts properly (I haven't posted anything, but somehow have three followers 😕)
So anyway I followed this German magazine 'Camera', and they are excited about the new Wolfen NC200 colour film, which they have tested for their issue 2. So did these clever Germans see Harman's teaser and say 'Guys, we have four weeks to invent a new film and spoil Harman's Christmas'?

Cameramag.jpg



Oh - and I claim post 1234! 😸
 
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bfilm

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the new Wolfen NC200 colour film

Nico mentioned this film recently on his photography show and said that it looked pretty good, better than their current color film. Hopefully, they have also worked out something to start doing the cartridges and finishing in Germany.
 

Arcadia4

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Presumably this is version 2 of the credible inoviscoat 200 colour film ( sold as adox colour mission 200 acquired presumably through the bankruptcy process). Whether they have the funds to contract & finish coatings is a different matter. The ownership structures of mr seals companies are extremely complex at least in the uk for anyone thinking of working that out.
 

brbo

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Presumably this is version 2 of the credible inoviscoat 200 colour film ( sold as adox colour mission 200 acquired presumably through the bankruptcy process).

What is the base of this presumption?
 

Agulliver

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I'm not a fan of Ilford Harman producing colour film as , I think, will detract from the successful black and white business.
If they do so they have to be prepared to open photo labs world wide to process the material which , ideally, would include Ilford/Harmans own printing papers; not likely!
There is no way in hell that Ilford/Harman is going to process it's own C41 colour film and have it printed on a competitors paper.
I fear an over ambitious I/H could leave us with no western produced black and white materials.
I've seen it before with other long established UK companies that over stretched.

TB

I do not imagine, for one nanosecond, that Harman would do *anything* that would jeopardise their core and longstanding B&W film, paper and chemical business. They are the undisputed industry leaders with an unmatched range of products of the highest quality, and unmatched distribution network. There is just no way they'd undertake this colour film project if it was in any way to adversely affect their main business.

And why on earth would they not print on someone else's paper?

This new film is supposed to be C41 which any damned mini lab can process correctly. Any competent lab operator can scan and make prints, either digitally or optically. Harman Lab already does C41 developing and printing anyway.


Honestly this smacks of panic and scaremongering.
 

Agulliver

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I would expect a bigger issue with bulk rolled C41 is processing. Even back in the heyday of film, many labs wouldn't touch home rolled films. If Harman also released C41 processing kits, that would be a major step.

That's interesting. I have very rarely had the opportunity to send hand rolled colour film for processing but when I have....it's been no trouble at all. I've used both my local lab and a mail order lab (C41) and a second mail order E6 lab. Have I just been lucky? I even got the plastic cassettes back.

I can see there being a concern about badly rolled film perhaps introducing contaminants, or incorrectly labelled film screwing up a run and/or gumming up the machine.

Not sure they need to also make C41 processing kits when bulk rolling is something done only by enthusiasts, and we know where to get C41 chemicals already...and probably have sniffed out labs that are happy to take bulk rolled film.

I'd potentially be interested, though more likely in 50 foot rolls than 100 foot. I just don't shoot *that* much colour compared to the B&W I shoot. But the right price could tempt me. A lot will depend on the price, to be fair. And I don't expect this stuff to be that much cheaper than Kodak. Though the more efficient distribution will help prices a bit.
 

Ian Grant

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I would expect a bigger issue with bulk rolled C41 is processing. Even back in the heyday of film, many labs wouldn't touch home rolled films. If Harman also released C41 processing kits, that would be a major step.

Even with E6 films very few labs would accept home rolled films, it was too risky. One mislabeled film could ruin an entire process batch in a dunk dip processor.

I don't remember anyone using bulk lengths of C41 film. Aside from Ferrannia the common bulk colour films here in the UK were Barfen (Fujichrome) E4, and Fujichrome 100D E6, but I always processed my own, only sending commercial work to the lab (120 & 5x4).

Ian
 

koraks

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One mislabeled film could ruin an entire process batch in a dunk dip processor.

I don't really feel like bothering my Fuji contacts with a reality-check on the above statement, but I'm a bit skeptical of its accuracy.

This is only tangentially related, but I discussed remjet with one of the chemists working at a major Fuji-run processing lab responsible for the maintenance of their chemistry (C41, B&W and a massive amount of RA4, and previously also E6). I saw some leaflets with instructions not to run remjet through their continuous processing and dip & dunk lines. So I inquired how bad it really is. He basically shrugged and told me it's actually not a major concern if it's just a couple of rolls once in a while, because all the muck gets filtered out in the inline filters anyway. Of course, they don't want things to get out of hand, so as a matter of principle, they try not to run any remjet-backed film through their C41 lines, but it's not a big priority for them to prevent it. Insofar as they are concerned about it, it's only about the remjet much and not the chemical nature of remjet-backed color film, which of course is more akin to E6 than to C41.

Of course, actual cross processing of E6 slide film is a bit of a different story since E6 film will affect the chemistry (especially the developer) in a way that filters won't compensate for and the load on the system of one roll of e.g. Ektachrome will be much bigger than a single roll of e.g. Vision3 due to the higher densities involved. Still, given the multi-gallon volume of a typical commercial bath, the odd cross-processed roll here and there wouldn't make that much of a difference. It'll add a little to the normal drift that's compensated in a well-run lab by means of control strip processing and adjustments to the chemistry. This particular Fuji lab of course does these things.

There were no signs of them not accepting hand-rolled film or being concerned about it. It's rare to begin with, especially in color, and if it happens, the impact is really minimal unless a large percentage of people start hand-rolling AND mislabeling their color film. Given the (un)availability of bulk color film, I don't they lose much sleep over this issue.

I can imagine that back in the days when volumes were bigger and more people specifically requested cross-processing, they would run the x-process rolls at the end of the day so that any drift in the chemistry would be caught by the next day's pre-production chemistry maintenance. But that seems to me more a matter of sensibility/best practice than of sheer necessity. Indeed, I vaguely recall this being done by the local lab I sometimes would bring my E6 film to for cross-processing in C41; I think they would run my film at the end of the day through their minilab so any effects it had on the chemistry would be reduced to the point of insignificance by the next morning's replenishment and control strip routine.

I can imagine something along the lines of a "no hand-rolled film" policy for very small labs who work with small and inherently less stable volumes; i.e. minilab scale, and much more limited resources in maintaining their chemistry. They might not want to risk anything mostly out of conservatism. You don't want to waste time and chemistry troubleshooting a problem without the means to actually do so.

More on-topic: I'd welcome a color bulk roll option of decent quality; let's say Gold/Superia-level. Given Harman's responsiveness to end user requests, it seems far more likely they'll entertain the thought than Kodak.
 

brbo

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Even with E6 films very few labs would accept home rolled films, it was too risky. One mislabeled film could ruin an entire process batch in a dunk dip processor.

I wonder how? How would a BW or C-41 film ruin the entire batch of E-6 chemistry? (edit: Ok, I think @koraks provided some explanation for E-6 in C-41 chemistry)

And if this was a case of remjet pollution, I wonder how they were able to spot hand rolled films? I reuse original cassettes and if I would send such film to a lab they would have to pull the film all the way out to see if it was hand rolled. So, the only sure thing that would prevent remjet ruining the processing line would be to extract the leader from every cassette (original or re-loadable) and check for remjet.

Seem like dodging the remjet bullet by having a policy of not processing films in re-loadable cassettes was more a matter of luck than sense.
 

koraks

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And if this way a case of remjet pollution, I wonder how they were able to spot hand rolled films?

At the Fuji lab I mentioned above, for the dip & dunk line they use a film picker and can tell by the leader if it's remjet backed. For the continuous processing line, the film goes into an automated splicer and nobody ever gets to see the film before it emerges from the processor. This means that any remjet-backed film will go through along with the rest of it, and apparently the impact of this on the process is sufficiently negligible for them to not even spend any time trying to fix it. I've never heard any accounts of people getting film with remjet muck back from this lab. They process many thousands of rolls per week for a significant part of the European market.

The remjet issue is mostly a concern for minilabs.
 

brbo

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At the Fuji lab I mentioned above, for the dip & dunk line they use a film picker and can tell by the leader if it's remjet backed. For the continuous processing line, the film goes into an automated splicer and nobody ever gets to see the film before it emerges from the processor.

Which was exactly my point. Whether you have to pull out the leader (and you can easily determine if the film has remjet) or not, just eliminating re-loadable cassettes is not going to save you from unwanted cross-processing.

I don't think people running labs wouldn't think of that, so I wonder if there was another, more sensible reason for the "no re-loadable" policy.
 

Lachlan Young

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This new film is supposed to be C41 which any damned mini lab can process correctly. Any competent lab operator can scan and make prints, either digitally or optically. Harman Lab already does C41 developing and printing anyway.

Exactly. Some people seem quite intently ignorant of Ilford having made C-41 films for decades.
 

Lachlan Young

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I recently bulk loaded a 100 ft roll of Kentmere 400, and Noticed that the edge signing is subtly different between that and the pre-packed film. the Space between each occurrence of "K400" was different, and they are still using the 1 to 47 frame numbers with one frame unnumbered, the same as the last roll of Ilford brand bulk I got several years ago. (indeed the same as the last roll of Arista English Profesional I got well over a decade or two ago)
so I would imagine that the Edge signing is done on totally different equipment.

the perforating might either done while the film is still in Pancake form, or by the packing machines.

I think that the edge signing depends on machine - on 120 it happens in the spooler/ packager (at least in the ex-Agfa machines at Ilford), possibly the same for 135 in canisters, but that it requires a separate step for bulk rolls. Either way, bulk rolls are more labour intensive to make, relative to actual demand.
 
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koraks

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Which was exactly my point. Whether you have to pull out the leader (and you can easily determine if the film has remjet) or not, just eliminating re-loadable cassettes is not going to save you from unwanted cross-processing.

Indeed. And cross-processing does occur alright at this lab I mentioned, because there were some Cinestill 35mm canisters in the dumpster alright. The fact that this is not a C41 film doesn't seem to bother them in the least. It just goes through with all the rest of it. I also saw no instructions along the lines of "don't accept ECN2 film" - other than the remjet issue which they try to avoid if feasible, but don't seem to mind awfully much.
 

Ian Grant

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I don't really feel like bothering my Fuji contacts with a reality-check on the above statement, but I'm a bit skeptical of its accuracy.

When E6 films were released there were issues with older reversal films being accidentally processed at the much higher temperatures of the E6 process. E6 ran at 38°C, where as E4 films needed a pre-hardening bath to run at approx 30°C, or the E3 process at around 24-25°C.

There were instances where large labs had major issues,when an an E4 film was accidentally processed in an E6 line, essentially at 38°C the emulsion of an un pre-hardened E4 film lifts off the film base, some ending up stuck to other films, and the process line, the whole line then had to be thoroughly stripped down and cleaned, a very costly and time consuming job. It happened once to the Fuji lab I used, and around that time almost all Fuji & Kodak E6 labs stopped processing home loaded 35mm films.

I know that C41 labs would not process a colour print film unless the manufacturers cassette stated C41 process, there were still Agfa and derivative negative & positive films around for years after the introduction of C41 and later E6.

I wonder how? How would a BW or C-41 film ruin the entire batch of E-6 chemistry? (edit: Ok, I think @koraks provided some explanation for E-6 in C-41 chemistry.

A B&W film could contaminate an E6 process line, unlikely the chemistry which could be filtered, It's an issue of film hardening and temperature.

Ian
 

koraks

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@Ian Grant thanks for following up; and yes, emulsion melting would be a concern for sure. It would be worse than having some remjet floating around. I don't think much E4 and C22 film is still around, although it pops up once in a blue moon with people asking how to process it here on the forum. I guess it's so rare that the lab I visited isn't bothered by it.
 
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