Kodak discontinues E6 chemicals?

[Photo Engineer]

E6 is dying a rather painful death. Why put money into it?

PE

 

[Ken Nadvornick]

I would think Film Ferrania isn't taking the business gamble hoping to lose money. They may. But I don't they are expecting to. And if they can make it work at today's market appropriate volumes, they may soon have the entire remaining world demand to themselves. That's not a bad gamble.

Ken

 

[AgX]

It seems that the major drop I heard of was in 2005, again, the year that Agfa and Ilford ran into problems.

Agfa had been negotiating a sale of their consumer department years before.
Finally they sold it in 2004.

 

[ME Super]

I want Film Ferrania to be successful, but it's been over 4 months since there was a blog post made on their site. The most recent post was November 19, 2013 and its now March 29, 2014. I'm starting to become concerned that this is more difficult than Nicola and his team thought. I wish them the best of course and am anxiously waiting to try their products out.

 

[pentaxuser]

E6 is dying a rather painful death. Why put money into it?

PE

You are probably right about E6's expected death but my point was that the Fuji chemicals are already there in the U.S. and in Europe Fuji-Hunt kits exist and presumably could be exported to the U.S. in the same way Ilford exports its stuff.

That leaves CATLABs point about state regs etc. In my possible naivity I had thought that as Ilford manages to comply and presumably the chemicals themselves comply with transport regs and a Fuji kit already exists then meeting such regs would not be that difficult or expensive.

That still leaves simple inertia on the part of Fuji U.S. and/or a decision that insufficient profit will be made.Both possible reasons

I suppose my point was that in the event of all the other E6 kit makers suddenly ceasing to exist I'd be surprised if Fuji didn't then step in, given that its kits already exist. Never is such a strong word in the marketplace

pentaxuser

 

[CatLABS]

You are probably right about E6's expected death but my point was that the Fuji chemicals are already there in the U.S. and in Europe Fuji-Hunt kits exist and presumably could be exported to the U.S. in the same way Ilford exports its stuff.

That leaves CATLABs point about state regs etc. In my possible naivity I had thought that as Ilford manages to comply and presumably the chemicals themselves comply with transport regs and a Fuji kit already exists then meeting such regs would not be that difficult or expensive.

That still leaves simple inertia on the part of Fuji U.S. and/or a decision that insufficient profit will be made.Both possible reasons

I suppose my point was that in the event of all the other E6 kit makers suddenly ceasing to exist I'd be surprised if Fuji didn't then step in, given that its kits already exist. Never is such a strong word in the marketplace

pentaxuser

Fuji is not interested. There are 3 other indipendant E6 chemistry marks/brand kits (all of which are made in the same factory...) so there will never even be a "need" or void for fuji to fill.

 

[destroya]

i talked to fuji about selling some of the e-6 home 5l kits. they told me that if enough were bought the would consider selling them to me. I asked how many. they implied that it would be in the thousands. so they could sell em if there was some demand for them, at least thats how I took my conversation with them

 

[Photo Engineer]

It is difficult to build a color film from scratch, which is what Ferrania is doing. Give them time. Our lead time at EK with existing facilities and materials was up to 5 years. So don't worry.

The problem is; will the market be there and the chemistry when they have the product ready?? With some of the comments here, it seems as if Fuji is "giving up" on the US market just as Kodak did, but that there is a market in Europe. This aligns well with what Fred said earlier about the EK market in the US and Europe for reversal products.

In any event, things are not smooth for Fuji either.

PE

 

[AgX]

It is difficult to build a color film from scratch, which is what Ferrania is doing.

I don't see what they would be doing from scratch. Except for tuning any emulsion for currently available chemicals and maybe adapting to their coating machine. No start up in this field had such a good Position technically, at least based on what they communicated.

 

[Photo Engineer]

I respectfully disagree. They have to assemble literally thousands of items and bring them together in a coating that tests perfectly. They have to do light stability and raw stock keeping as well as Latent Image keeping and Reciprocity. I can think here of a years worth of labor by many people to get an acceptable product out the door even if they have a viable formula. Things change. Look at TIP. Many of their chemicals are just not there anymore.

PE

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Our E-6 chemistry is not based on Kodak or Fuji materials and is independently sourced, and marketed as end user kits.
We hope to have something ready in the summer of 2014.

Any chance of that being a dry kit like C-41, for those of us for whom ground shipping isn't so much of an option?

 

[CatLABS]

Any chance of that being a dry kit like C-41, for those of us for whom ground shipping isn't so much of an option?

David,

Being a powder does not make the stuff less ominous in the eyes of shippers.

So far we have several happy customers in HI who use our C41 kit (shipping cost is slightly higher then usual, but the high capacity of the material more then covers that).

One of the many things we are working on with this kit is the viability of shipping, and once we have numbers we will be able to say weather or not this shipping to Hawaii is possible and or worth while.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Thanks for the speedy response. I've seen the C-41 kit locally.

Just to give a sense of what the scene is like here--

There are three labs that offer E-6 services on O'ahu, but it's hard to say if they all actually process the film locally or if they ship it to the mainland and charge extra for that. One seems to process locally, but only every two weeks. Another has shorter turnaround, but at double the price per roll compared with LA or NYC, not including shipping. Another lab is a bit vague about their E-6 services, and I suspect they are outsourcing to one of the other local labs or to the mainland.

Right now, I'd say my best bet for E-6 processing, if I can't do it myself, is shipping it to The Icon in LA.

 

[thomascn6113]

I am sorry if my original post did not have a link to a dealer announcement. I didn't mean to post anything inflammatory, apologies to all. I recieved a courtesy call from the distributor I purchase some of my E6 chemicals from(Liberty Photo). I was informed that if I needed any Kodak E6 chemicals I needed to order by the 31st, as the chemicals were being discontinued and would no longer be available. Liberty provided me a list of comperable Fuji chems, even though they do not carry them. I will ask them to foreward the letter from Kodak so I can post it here. Ron gave a good alternative with CPAC Trebla, and there is still what is in distributors stock. Thanks, PE!

When I started really getting into photography, it was with a digital camera. I had used Kodak disposable point and shoots, the APS ones, when I was in the Marine Corps. I purchased a digital point and shoot before deployment to Iraq, because i didn't have any idea of how to take enough disposables with me. I also didn't have any idea to the possibility of a real camera, I had never used a 35mm SLR.

Fast foreward six years, and I have to take a Fine Arts course for my degree. I chose photography because, well, my drawing skills are limited to stick figures. Bad ones at that! I was introduced to the SLR and film and the darkroom, and I love it. I have basically forgot silicon based photography, and couldn't be happier. I'm just going to enjoy shooting and developing for as long as I can, while I can get the film & chems.

I would imagine one day it will become what it once was, a niche art. Hopefully the knowledge base and skill sets will survive.

 

[thomascn6113]

Hey David, I see you are on Oahu, I used to be stationed at Kaneohe Bay. Some of the first photos I ever took were when I climbed to the old Coast Guard transmitters up the mountain from Kbay. The ladder was quite shaky, but the view was magnificant.

 

[pentaxuser]

Liberty provided me a list of comperable Fuji chems, even though they do not carry them.

Did Liberty say where you might obtain the Fuji chemicals? I presume it understood that you are a home user so need the chemicals to be available in home use quantities and presumably containers

The reason I ask is that most here and Catlabs in particular believe that what Liberty may or may not have supplied you in terms of access is in fact non accessible to the home user

pentaxuser

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Hey David, I see you are on Oahu, I used to be stationed at Kaneohe Bay. Some of the first photos I ever took were when I climbed to the old Coast Guard transmitters up the mountain from Kbay. The ladder was quite shaky, but the view was magnificant.

I'll have to check that out. My wife grew up here, so we've been to Hawai'i many times, but now that we're living here, I've been taking more time to explore the mountain trails.

 

[pentaxuser]

Any chance of that being a dry kit like C-41, for those of us for whom ground shipping isn't so much of an option?

David Just a thought. As a moderator of long standing you will no doubt recall the name of Robert Teague(roteague) who was once a member/subscriber here. If I recall correctly he was based on Oahu and specialised in E6 pictures

He left APUG to establish his own forum of which I was a member several years ago but haven't visited for quite a number of years so have lost contact.

If he is still around he may have information on E6 in Hawaii. A long shot I know but I though worth raising

pentaxuser

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Robert and I met a few times on past visits to Hawai'i. Robert is in Arizona these days, if I'm not mistaken, and even when he was here and there were more E-6 options, I believe he was shipping film to California.

 

[LJH]

I really don't understand why people just don't get the Tetenal E6 kit (eg. from Freestyle) and get on with shooting/processing. Surely it's better to support the companies that are proactively supporting us?

 

[pentaxuser]

Ah, so a dead-end. Still, worth a mention just in case

pentaxuser

 

[StoneNYC]

I really don't understand why people just don't get the Tetenal E6 kit (eg. from Freestyle) and get on with shooting/processing. Surely it's better to support the companies that are proactively supporting us?

Some people prefer the 6/7 bath kits.

 

[LJH]

Some people prefer the 6/7 bath kits.

And some people also enjoy self-flagellation.

 

[CatLABS]

Some people prefer the 6/7 bath kits.

For no good reason...

 

[Photo Engineer]

For no good reason...

There are reasons. I have run the tests which show them for C41 and E6 both.

PE