Films comeback has been helped enormously with the ability to scan and print negatives.
Not my route but very popular.
I like it wet!
Not my route but very popular.
I like it wet!
Is there really a strong interest in film photography?
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I think veteran (old fart) film photographers get very wound up by C-41 film that costs US $11 / roll and $15 to process and scan, because they remember in 1995 when it cost $3/roll and $8/roll for developing and a full set of 4x6" prints. You still had to send the film out to get the cheap processing. Local, 1-hour minilabs were more expensive.
Younger photographers aren't burdened by this memory. They're just judging the price relative to the cost of their other necessities and luxuries. On the evidence, somebody is buying and processing enough film to buy up all the film on shelves, and to keep mail-order processing labs in business - I get the impression that the major mail-in color labs in the US have plenty of work.
Small outfits with a refurbed minilab may not be able to charge the price or get the maintenance expertise to hang on. Running a minilab once a week doesn't seem viable to me. However, that doesn't mean color film or processing is doomed. The tall pole in all of this is the large physical plant and materials that it takes to make the film.
Younger photographers aren't burdened by this memory. They're just judging the price relative to the cost of their other necessities and luxuries. On the evidence, somebody is buying and processing enough film to buy up all the film on shelves, and to keep mail-order processing labs in business - I get the impression that the major mail-in color labs in the US have plenty of work.
Small outfits with a refurbed minilab may not be able to charge the price or get the maintenance expertise to hang on. Running a minilab once a week doesn't seem viable to me. However, that doesn't mean color film or processing is doomed. The tall pole in all of this is the large physical plant and materials that it takes to make the film.
I distinctly recall paying 12.95 to get 36 exposures developed, and two sets of prints, AND a CD, AND another roll of ASA 100 36 exposures of fuji or Konica film under a chain stores private brand. Come to think of it, that chain store itself has disappeared.
As has been mentioned, commercial film processing equipment is aging even the refurbished and there is a shrinking pool of knowledge to operate the same.
Prices must reflect the time and investment involved in running a lab. IMO a stand-alone film lab will not survive. Even with the add-on of digital RA4 printing, as @koraks said where some money can be made, the price per print is sometimes so competitive that any profit on bulk printing is minuscule.
I found film processing costs from just before I retired and sold my minilab in 2020.
The prices are for film developed only.
Prices must reflect the time and investment involved in running a lab. IMO a stand-alone film lab will not survive. Even with the add-on of digital RA4 printing, as @koraks said where some money can be made, the price per print is sometimes so competitive that any profit on bulk printing is minuscule.
I found film processing costs from just before I retired and sold my minilab in 2020.
The prices are for film developed only.
- C41 chemistry.............................€0.25
- Neg sleeving...............................€0.05
- Print/neg wallet/envelope.....€0.05
- Equipment/depreciation........€0.70
- Labour....................................... ...€1.50
- Profit..............................................€2.74
- Vat @13.5%.................................€0.71
- Retail price...................................€6.00
My local shop, one medium sized shop with all kinds of gear, mostly digital but good chemistry and film section as well, is the cheapest lab in town (last I checked, price above). Development takes one day for c41 and seems to get ok volume. Probably other shops around send to them to process as well. Maybe mail in as well, from what I see on the webpage.
They charge $0.25 extra for film cutting, I guess to minimize labor cost and sleeving. Since I scan by myself, I do the cutting as well by myself.
They charge $0.25 extra for film cutting, I guess to minimize labor cost and sleeving. Since I scan by myself, I do the cutting as well by myself.
I am aware of that but it’s not like it was when you could go down to the local drug store and use their tube tester or find a local repair shop. BTW, I do have tube gear (radios) and a couple of tube testers.
This is one of the points that makes me a little concerned, and it's a good illustration at that (so thanks for sharing so candidly!)
I think that many small-scale labs will have a similar guesstimate of the labor costs of their film development. But I wonder how realistic they are. Alright, so you load the film into the machine, which takes just a minute or two depending on the system you use. But prior to that, you've received the film either from the customer and listened to what they wanted or collected it from the mail and did a brief inspection of what you got (let's say 5 minutes), when the film comes out of the machine you sleeve it and put it into an envelope, but let's say you included that in the labor cost to begin with. Then you dispatch the processed film to the customer, which takes you another 5-10 minutes to mail it, or another 5 minutes to chat with the customer, collect payment etc. When all is said and done, the single roll of film may have cost you 10-15 minutes, end-to-end. Now, in the Western world, that's not going to amount to a € 1.50 labor cost. It's probably at least 4x that number; something along the lines of €5 - € 10 is more realistic.
Then again, we don't look at it that way, because if we do, well, that's pretty much the end of the line, isn't it? Or isn't it? It isn't if the customer is willing to pay a reasonable (if you think about it) € 30-35 for a roll of film, including processing.
Most of us (and I'm explicitly including myself) are still hooked on the (unsustainable) price levels of 15-20 years ago, when this was still a volume industry and all slack was already pressed out of the system. One way or another, if we want this party to last, all links in the chain will have to be sustainable. I personally don't think they are, right now.
Hmm. As an experienced market researcher that tells me that people are trying to sell their Nikon film cameras. It also tells me that lots of people sell used camera equipment on e-bay. That really is not a surprise since e-bay is a very, very large online market for use and new equipment and is relatively easy for most people to use.
Just being a smart ass.
One has to find the investment worthwhile, but I think you can still get roller transport film processors from Colenta in Austria, made in Germany. Fairly recently, I think you could also still get dip & dunk film processors from Hostert in Germany, but I don't know if they are still around and making film equipment.
I don't think that independent (or small specialist chains of a handful of) brick and mortar shops, offering film for 10-20% more than the online retailers is the bottom end of the market. Wal-Mart probably is at or close to the bottom, but that's just an illustration of how cheap film can still be if one wants to be relatively thrifty. If people are spending $20 on a roll of C41 colour film then I find it hart to believe it is because they literally couldn't find it cheaper....they appear to be trying to find the most expensive source possible. That does not appear to be the norm...where I live or in Texas. As I said, the small independent shop with no buying power or influence has colour film at £12-13 for 135/36. B&W is a bit cheaper typically £10 for HP5+ and FP4. £1 cheaper for 120.
Regarding Texas, Precision Camera and Video, which appears to have two outlets in Austin and at least one other elsewhere in Texas, has Kodak C41 film listed on their website from $10 for Color Plus to $15 for Ektar and Portra. "FujiFilm" 200 is $8. They even have Phoenix at $14. And that was the first hit I made on Google. The search was not hard. But perhaps our friend would prefer Austin Camera and Imaging, where he can buy the FujiFilm branded 200 colour film for $9 or Kodak Ultramax for $11.
My local small shop here in rainy England makes a profit on the dev@scan for £5. BTW that's for colour and B&W 35mm, 120, 127, 110 and 126. Flat rate for all of them. It's an independent business renting space inside the camera shop and it makes a profit. The lady who runs it has an Agfa DLab 2 which she maintains herself for the most part, spare parts are indeed proving difficult to find. She needed a small plastic guide a few weeks ago which she tracked down to Poland for something like £200. We've talked about getting plastic parts 3D printed. She typically processes film two or three days a week, business is fairly healthy though the difficulty in obtaining colour film in the last 18 months has had an effect on the number of films coming in for processing. She has been processing film commercially since before C41 took over and knows what she's doing, an invaluable resource.
Thanks for offering such an apt illustration of the points I made. It's really uncanny.
That's interesting.
I will be dealing with Printpoint in Limerick this year. I notice they've increased prices slightly from last year, when I'm sure it was €3.50 dev only. Of course, the return postage on top more than doubles that, so I have to send a handful of flims in at a time.
Printpoint - Film Developing - Develop film by mail
Printpoint has more than 10 years of experience of film processing. Developing film starts from 2.50€ per roll. We offer film processing for 35mm, 120mm, 220mm etc.
As I said, my research was a good year ago. Perhaps sanity is returning to the C-41 marketplace.
and more and more of these repair shops are unable to give these cameras a second or third life.Most mechanical cameras are now 40,50 or more years old and are at the end of their lifes with nomore parts available for repair. Mechanical cameras lasting forever and will alwaysbe repairable is a myth!
My guess is that it is the electronic parts that are more of a challenge. Many techs will have a camera graveyard which can be harvested for donor parts. The trick is that if a given model has a common failure mode, like Foam attacking the silvering on prisms, that the "dead cameras may be dead because the needed part is also dead in the parts unit.
Once they got into Cameras with updatable firmware or computer based settings, the lack of old compters with even older software, including test software that was only distributed to authorized service shops you get into the "Right to Repair" sort of situation.
My oft-mentioned local shop is also a camera repair shop, indeed that is their main business. They have been going since the late 60s and have a huge inventory of parts as well as service data. They were an official Olympus repair centre for many years but tackle cameras of all makes and eras. That kind of expertise and stock of parts is certainly rare these days. As our cameras get older, and as "found in the attic" cameras have been there 30, 40, 50 years instead of 5 or 10 years....the supply and demand characteristics will change.
It's one thing to expect a 1940s box camera that's been in the loft since the late 70s to work....and quite another to expect an electromechanical wonder of the 70s that's been in the loft since 1995 to still work.
It's one thing to expect a 1940s box camera that's been in the loft since the late 70s to work....and quite another to expect an electromechanical wonder of the 70s that's been in the loft since 1995 to still work.
foc said:
Labour....................................... ...€1.50
Yes at first glance it looks very low and I understand the points you have made, regarding talking to customers at receipt of the film and on collection or dispatch, etc.
If we look a little further into this, the hourly labour cost I had calculated was as follows.
Yes, the investment is large. Refurbished film processors (Fuji / Noritsu) can range from €7000 to €12000. Personaly I don't like roller transport film processors like the Collenta, too many rollers in contact with the film and Dip & Dunk are very expensive and have a large footprint.
At €3.50 while great value to the customer, I can't see how they can turn any profit on that service at that price. I would worry that quality could suffer when keeping prices so low. I don't mean to criticise their service and I have used their services back in 2022.
I hope I haven't hijacked the discussion with lab talk.
Labour....................................... ...€1.50
Yes at first glance it looks very low and I understand the points you have made, regarding talking to customers at receipt of the film and on collection or dispatch, etc.
If we look a little further into this, the hourly labour cost I had calculated was as follows.
- Fuji C41 processing machine hourly capacity 36 rolls of film per hour.
- In reality, capacity would average 1/3, so 12 rolls per hour.
- 12 x €1.50 = €18.00 per hour or €720.00 per week. (Not a bad wage for the job involved)
Yes, the investment is large. Refurbished film processors (Fuji / Noritsu) can range from €7000 to €12000. Personaly I don't like roller transport film processors like the Collenta, too many rollers in contact with the film and Dip & Dunk are very expensive and have a large footprint.
At €3.50 while great value to the customer, I can't see how they can turn any profit on that service at that price. I would worry that quality could suffer when keeping prices so low. I don't mean to criticise their service and I have used their services back in 2022.
I hope I haven't hijacked the discussion with lab talk.
Back in the 1970s I worked in a medium size (3,000+ rolls per night) C-41/C-22 lab. We had a fleet of vehicles that roamed Southern California picking up orders and dropping off finished orders to grocery stores (Ralph’s was a big one), drug stores, and camera shops. We offered 24-hous service. We had a film crew that did the processing (a roller C-41 machine and a monstrous C-22 dip and dunk machine), a print crew that handled than, a checking crew that manually scanned through the images and packaged them, and an accounting crew that did the paperwork before they went out. Much of everything was manually done. I started there as a film cutter and cut all the finished negatives (after printing) into strips of 4-6 and matched them to the customer’s envelope. With all that I asked the manager how we could turn a profit since the price of the finished product was so low. He said “We lose money on every order but make it up in volume.” OK, I get it, sort of.
If 3,000 rolls a night is medium sized, I can only wonder what a big plant does.
No, you can't lose per roll and then make it up on volume. More rolls would just mean more financial loss. But a very low margin per roll, with lots of rolls, can become a fair profit over a time period. If the owner made 25 cents per roll, he'd make $750 a night, $22,500 a month. I could live on that!
The big place was up the street a ways, Berkey Photo, which was in North Long Beach or Paramount, and I think they were doing double or triple what we did. Fotomat was still a thing too and they had a large volume. There were many other smaller places. When I quit the place I was at (finished college and was off to an actual career) I did some side work for a small lab in Orange County. It was set up by some immigrants from SE Asia and were using it as a way to get their families over and have them jobs. They had a C-41 set up and I taught them how to “speed equalize” their printing process and a few other tricks that I learned in my training at Kodak in Whittier. They had a black and white lab that they were getting rid of and let me take a few items in partial payment for my services. This was 1979. BTW, my pay at the color lab I was at topped out at $5.25/hour.
Interesting history. When I lived in Sarasota, FL from 2008-20015, in just those few years C-41 processing went from everywhere to none. Talking retail places, drug and grocery stores.
My first minimum wage job was 1965 or 1966. $1.65/hr IIRC. I've looked up the CPI inflation from that period for another conversation. Multiplied by 9, that comes to $14.85, which is essentially the $15/hr people are fighting for these days. Somehow businesses got along fine and made profits.
but false.truth is digital cameras have not killed film cameras; smart phones have!
We could get into semantics since all smartphones use digital imaging, but I agree with you.
Yes, I got by on that $5/hour I made then. I had my own apartment, two cars, a motorcycle, my darkroom, and lots of fun. In addition I was also going to college full time and the GI Bill paid me $350/month for school. It was a money-maker as the junior college was $10/semester and when I transferred to the state university it was $150/semester. Prices have risen since then. ;-)
Back on the film topic, there was no shortage of places to buy it but I usually rode my motorcycle to Freestyle in Hollywood for film and darkroom supplies. At least they are still going.
Freestyle! When I was a freshman at the University of Florida in 1964 or 1965, I made my first order with Freestyle. I vaguely recall is was some kind of 35mm slide film, 10 ASA. Not ISO!
In 1981 I moved to LA. It was a couple of years before I took up photography after a hiatus, and of course, I headed to Freestyle. Ohmigod, the Mothership! I went there many times over the years. I haven't ordered from them in about five years, but I always love to see their emails pop us in my Inbox.
In those days I shot a lot of movie film, locally the company was Identicolor. Like Dale Labs and that famous/infamous "free film" outfit, name I can't remember. Slides were print to movie print film, so they were perfect. Prints kinda sucked since they were low contrast, but fine for passing around and such. I often rode my motorcycle down there on a sunny CA morning on Saturdays and returned a week later to pickup. Prices were very reasonable, and since they didn't "print" to slides trying to match exposure and color balance like C-41 labs, what you got was what you shot.
If you aren't familiar with movie film definitions, when they talk about prints, they mean the positive films that went out to movie theaters.
Around the time I left LA, 1993, I discovered RGB Labs in Hollywood. A different twist. They would take your C-41 and then make slides from it using a Kodak "SO" film. I don't recall the numbers. Anyway, stunning slides that were every bit as good as slide film. Again, what you got was what you shot. And, of course, perfect prints if you opted for them. RGB was one of the first casualties of the end of film. I wonder if part of that was that Kodak stopped make that SO film.
In 1981 I moved to LA. It was a couple of years before I took up photography after a hiatus, and of course, I headed to Freestyle. Ohmigod, the Mothership! I went there many times over the years. I haven't ordered from them in about five years, but I always love to see their emails pop us in my Inbox.
In those days I shot a lot of movie film, locally the company was Identicolor. Like Dale Labs and that famous/infamous "free film" outfit, name I can't remember. Slides were print to movie print film, so they were perfect. Prints kinda sucked since they were low contrast, but fine for passing around and such. I often rode my motorcycle down there on a sunny CA morning on Saturdays and returned a week later to pickup. Prices were very reasonable, and since they didn't "print" to slides trying to match exposure and color balance like C-41 labs, what you got was what you shot.
If you aren't familiar with movie film definitions, when they talk about prints, they mean the positive films that went out to movie theaters.
Around the time I left LA, 1993, I discovered RGB Labs in Hollywood. A different twist. They would take your C-41 and then make slides from it using a Kodak "SO" film. I don't recall the numbers. Anyway, stunning slides that were every bit as good as slide film. Again, what you got was what you shot. And, of course, perfect prints if you opted for them. RGB was one of the first casualties of the end of film. I wonder if part of that was that Kodak stopped make that SO film.
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