Ilford Color Negative Film

[tykos]

Now, with high prices, unavailability of Kodak colour negative film is very very rare. Most of the time they have ALL of their films in stock. Of course, Fuji has NONE, but they are history anyway. But those Ilford colour negative films are priced higher than anything from Kodak, so that can't be the reason.

on that same shop they have portra 160 and ektar @ 7cents/frame cheaper and portra 400 at the same price. No other C41 color availability.

Other oddball films are also not really competing with lower prices. I guess there is enough people that like variety and don't really care about predictability in their results.

some people look for impredictability. I don't, but...

anyway, i shared that because it's quite odd: never found that product anywhere on other websites or on the ilford/harman ones, quite strange

 

[tykos]

No, that's not correct. The exact number is hard to establish, of course, but consider these clusters of printers who are still active today:
* Commercial fine-art printers dedicated to chromogenic prints; partly working for fine arts photographers, and party for the heritage sector (e.g. museums).
* 'Hipster' print finishers who have revitalized old optical minilabs to do smaller prints from film brought in by customers.
* Artists who use chromogenic print as a creative medium (i.e. people making a living, or trying to, with their art). Depending on the definition of 'art' you use, this could include an apparently growing number of young fashion photographers who use optical RA4 prints as a distinguishing element of their work.
* Color darkroom facilities used in an educational setting.
* Color community darkrooms used by amateur printers.
* Solitary amateur color printers.

It's very difficult to attach numbers to these categories, but I was surprised when I started to reach out for fellow color printers and I actually encountered others who are active in this area and often passionate about it. Some of them are in their late sixties, others in their early twenties.

You might want to check this out, too: https://www.photrio.com/forum/threads/list-of-color-darkroom-facilities.202221
This list has only just begun, so it's growing, still, and only covers a fraction of what's actually happening today. These are all color darkroom facilities in collective use (educational, commercial, artistic/community) so the individual amateur darkrooms are not even represented, nor are the printers who use shared facilities for lack of their own workspace.

yeah, just don't take everything literally, i've said "quite rare" on the previous reply.
Personally i'd have to struggle to find a commercial lab near me that prints ra4 with an enlarger. In our darkroom we have color heads, but no processor (hence the "pain" part of my reply).
I know lots of people are dabbling with it and i don't know the numbers, but can we agree on the fact that ra4 printers (commercial or amateur) are a small fraction of the bw ones?
[disclaimer: i shoot very little color film, and i'd like to have some of it ra4 printed. but the lab i knew stopped recently, i'd have to find another one but it's difficult]

 

[koraks]

can we agree on the fact that ra4 printers (commercial or amateur) are a small fraction of the bw ones?

Absolutely. And those are a fraction of the people that (at least occasionally) have something printed digitally. And those yet again are only a fraction of the people who photograph and hence could at some point decide to print something. There's a lot to be gained, still. Or should I say, regained?

 

[tykos]

oh, i wish it was easier