Hello APUG from FILM Ferrania (PART 2)

[FILM Ferrania]

Oh by the way - referring to the stuff about Disc film a few pages back in the thread, I present this, which is hanging on a wall outside Corrado's office in the LRF

Dead Link Removed

 

[airgrphx]

Cool but seemed quite wastefull
Such a large piece of film for such a small frame. What was the width of the initial roll?

 

[Berri]

did disc film had an ID number like 135 120 127?

 

[Cholentpot]

And thus on May 03th, 2017, Cholentpot invented MACRO LANDSCAPE photography...

Buddy-boy, you got no clue...

I now own the only Panoramic Argus C3 known to man! Behold! the Panargus!

 

[cmacd123]

Cool but seemed quite wastefull
Such a large piece of film for such a small frame. What was the width of the initial roll?

Basically one frame of 6X6 gives a full disc full of shots! But yes, probably less than half of the initial film area actually ends up holding images.

Keeping with the Off-topic above, the DISC c-41 process, (it did have a suffix letter) had the stick of discs rotating continuously in the various chemical steps If I remember correctly.

 

[Photo Engineer]

Jobo made a special reel assembly for this.

PE

 

[mshchem]

Our decision to release P30 was certainly about solvency. I mean, we really LOVE the film, that is 100% true and was entirely unexpected. But as I said in an interview a while back, we don't have investors banging on our door. So yeah - we need to make some money.

The good news is that roughly 90% of what we're doing to make P30 is applicable to making color. This 90% still needs work to reach the scale we need, but it's moving along.

We've also decided to make P30 a permanent product. We'll introduce new formats later this year and new speeds next year.

In order to avoid any more foot-in-mouth issues regarding E6, we will update everyone when we are sure about the 90% mentioned above, and have a clear schedule and solutions in place for the remaining 10%.

(Seemingly necessary disclaimer: These are our generalized thoughts, plans and speculations as of today, May 3, 2017, and are very much subject to change for any reason whatsoever.)

Anything that gets the equipment running and bringing in cash makes E6 more likely. Each roll preserves a critical piece of infrastructure. It's a miracle that this plant has been saved. It should be declared a UN world heritage site. Film is like an endangered species, we need to sustain the knowledge and technology. Film Ferrania is a wonderful story, that I'm sure will have a great ending.
Mike

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

"We've also decided to make P30 a permanent product. We'll introduce new formats later this year and new speeds next year."

That's great to hear. I hope eventually you'll offer large format P30.

 

[Nzoomed]

Oh by the way - referring to the stuff about Disc film a few pages back in the thread, I present this, which is hanging on a wall outside Corrado's office in the LRF

Dead Link Removed

WOW.
So that answer's the question that Ferrania did make it!

No wonder this format failed, it looks so wasteful!

Probably one film format no one misses!

 

[Brady Eklund]

Maybe Dave is buying up thousands of disc film cameras as we speak...

 

[flavio81]

No wonder this format failed, it looks so wasteful!

If one disc of film has more or less the size of a 6x6 frame, then it needs 1/12th of the film area of a 120 film roll, or approximately 1/12th the film area of a 35mm film roll. Not wasteful!

I think the Disc format was a clever idea to try to make fully automatic cameras slimmer.

However for 'easy to use' cameras 126 format is the winner due to the image quality.

FILM Ferrania would be a bit silly if they don't release the P30 film in 126 format very soon. It will immediately find a market. There are tons of 126 cameras out there.

 

[cmacd123]

keep in mind that Kodak was fairly good at researching what the average "family" camera user was asking for. The format of the disc cameras is actually very close to a compact D+g+t+l camera in size and weight. the consumer wanted a camera that would slip in a pocket with NO fumbling. no muss- no fuss

The disc dropped in place, only one way with the printing on the label to guide the user. The disc opened when the camera back was closed. Auto film wind, Auto Flash, and a lithium battery good for the expected life of the camera. Just peek through and push teh button. It was even hard to get your thumb in front of the lens.

None of these criteria would apply to the average APUG user.

the disc had a unique serial number so the photofinisher did not have to match Twin Check tabs. And that number was on a bar code on both the label and the disc itself. (and I believe on the magnetic area on the film hub.) the magnetic hub could pass info from one processing station to another. frame numbers on back of print so the consumer did not have to touch the negative. There was a paper sleeve for the photo-finishers to use to return the negative, which meant that nothing touched the film.

Wonderful design as long as you can live with an 8X10mm negative. Kodacolor VR was ALMOST up to that challenge, if the camera was held VERY steady.

I bought one for my dad, he loved it until he saw the quality of the pictures. I got him a Ricoh AF-5 Point and shoot and he never went back.

 

[Nzoomed]

If one disc of film has more or less the size of a 6x6 frame, then it needs 1/12th of the film area of a 120 film roll, or approximately 1/12th the film area of a 35mm film roll. Not wasteful!

I think the Disc format was a clever idea to try to make fully automatic cameras slimmer.

However for 'easy to use' cameras 126 format is the winner due to the image quality.

FILM Ferrania would be a bit silly if they don't release the P30 film in 126 format very soon. It will immediately find a market. There are tons of 126 cameras out there.

Im talking about all the waste film from the discs being stamped out!
Look at the photo Dave posted, and you will see what I mean.

 

[Berri]

FILM Ferrania would be a bit silly if they don't release the P30 film in 126 format very soon. It will immediately find a market.

Totally agree. Never understood why LOMO never bothered with it...

 

[MattKing]

Im talking about all the waste film from the discs being stamped out!
Look at the photo Dave posted, and you will see what I mean.

Almost as much waste film as you will find in a 24 exposure roll of 135 - sprockets and leader and tail included.
Film is incredibly cheap and plentiful. The cost to increase the size of a "roll" by 25% is infinitesimally small compared to the cost of packaging, labeling, distributing, shipping, marketing, retailing and supporting a roll of film.

 

[Diapositivo]

Totally agree. Never understood why LOMO never bothered with it...

I suspect Lomo is not in the business of selling film, but in the business of selling cameras. Films are needed to fuel the camera business.

 

[Agulliver]

I bought one for my dad, he loved it until he saw the quality of the pictures. I got him a Ricoh AF-5 Point and shoot and he never went back.

And therein lies the problem. People in my cirlce bought disc cameras on the very grounds that you mention...they were easy to slip into and out of a pocket, they were easy to use (though no easier than any box camera) and they were new...advertised as being new and better than what went before.

Then they saw the photos....if 110 had often failed to delight, disc simply disappointed even with a 4" print. At least a compact 110 camera could usually muster a reasonably sharp 4" holiday snapshot. The problem with disc was that it didn't deliver a decent final product.

Whether Ferrania would produce disc film is anybody's guess....but I would imagine 126 has enough of a following to make at least one B&W and one C41 film viable. Assuming Ferrania have retained the means to manufacture the cartridges and backing paper.

I'd be curious about a 110 B&W film if I could find my spiral for loading it into a tank...

 

[spark]

The Yankee adjustable tanks would go to 16mm for subminiature film (think- Minolta and Mamiya 16 cameras), this also worked for 110 film. Kodak made 110 format Verichrome Pan for a while. (A really wonderful film)

 

[Berri]

I suspect Lomo is not in the business of selling film, but in the business of selling cameras. Films are needed to fuel the camera business.

but they sell 110 size film and no cameras in that format, why not sell 126 as well. Also if they ever made a cute 126 camera I would have bought it!

 

[Ricardo Miranda]

but they sell 110 size film and no cameras in that format

Then this must not exist: https://shop.lomography.com/en/cameras/110-camera-family

 

[railwayman3]

And therein lies the problem. People in my cirlce bought disc cameras on the very grounds that you mention...they were easy to slip into and out of a pocket, they were easy to use (though no easier than any box camera) and they were new...advertised as being new and better than what went before.

Then they saw the photos....if 110 had often failed to delight, disc simply disappointed even with a 4" print. At least a compact 110 camera could usually muster a reasonably sharp 4" holiday snapshot. The problem with disc was that it didn't deliver a decent final product.

Exactly like cmacd, I bought a disc camera for my Mother...quickly replaced it with a 35mm point-and-shoot, the quality of the disc prints was hopeless, even when carefully taken in ideal conditions ! It seemed that, at the time, 126 sales had reached a saturation point, and Kodak needed some new system to stimulate sales (rather like APS some years later?). Disc gave new cameras and accessories to sell, plus whole new processing lines being needed by labs. Also "discs" was, at the time, a fashionable advertising word, as CD's and early computer discs were other new gadgets just coming into use. But the problem was that negatives 10x8mm need care and skill to produce any kind of result (compare with Minox sub-min, a similar size of neg but always a system for the specialist.)

OTOH, 126 was a great system for the snapshot user....easy loading, film processable with normal 35mm, and a size of negative sufficient to overcome grain up to considerable enlargements. There was a "theoretical" sharpness disadvantage with the "plastic pressure plate "in the cartridge, but in practice this doesn't seem a big issue....I have many family and holiday slides on 126 Kodachrome and Ektachrome (mostly taken on a basic Instamatic camera) which I duplicated onto 35mm some years ago, and the best of the duplicates are virtually indistinguishable from original 35mm shots.

 

[Berri]

Then this must not exist

cool, I didn't know it!

 

[Arctic amateur]

but they sell 110 size film and no cameras in that format, why not sell 126 as well. Also if they ever made a cute 126 camera I would have bought it!

Pure speculation on my part: 126 format is quite similar to 135 format, and Lomo has always had a strong footing in 135. 110 is more of a "different thing" to 135 than than 126 is, both in film size and camera size and look of the final photo. So perhaps they thought it more likely that 110 would find more new customers than 126 would? It'd be an additional thing to 135, while 126 would be more of a competitor to their existing products.

 

[Agulliver]

I'd been lead to believe that 126 was an "out of date" format by the 80s, and not to be taken seriously. But I never saw a really bad 126 photo, certainly not unless it was shaken or woefully under-exposed. The format had very little wrong with it. The issue for me and those who taught me photography was probably simply that the "instamatic" cameras which made the bulk of 126 equipment were generally less sophisticated than average.

Today, I'd wager there are a good few working 126 cameras about...enough people wanting to shoot the format to make small runs worthwhile....which is kind of what Film Ferrania want to do...so who knows? It would seem to fit their business model for the longer term...once the 135, 120 and 16mm are going.

 

[Diapositivo]

Kodak Disc occupied the ecological niche of the 110 format: a camera which could be always in a woman's purse, to capture moments of her children, school parties, holidays, happy hours with friends etc. Good for having always with you, just in case. Probably 126 had the same intentions initially, but the cameras were not small enough.

126 had the advantage of the light-tight cartridge in respect to 135 which requires you to learn to load a film into the camera. That might seem trivial, but I remember, when I was a child, my parents going to the photolab, or to the photo shop, with the camera (Voigtländer Vito C) to have it unloaded and loaded. As easy as it is, some people just fear complications. 126 was brilliant, because you would be "dead sure" that you could load and unload your camera without risking the film to catch light. At 7 years of age I could load my Kodak Instamatic, and they couldn't load their serious camera (!).