Kodak Price Rises?

[Aurum]

Cetainly 35mm C41 film is not expensive in the UK at present.
Ferrania Solaris retails at £1 for a 36 exposure 200ASA, and Kodak Gold for the same for mexican made 200ASA 24 shot. (Thats 50cents a roll for our colonial cousins)

Though wether or not this is just "Jobbing off" of slow moving stock is another question

 

[Photo Engineer]

Sorry, but Kodak Gold is not "made in Mexico", it is assembled in Mexico from master rolls which were made in Rochester NY.

As for prices, before the Hunt brothers began their spree, silver was about $2 / oz in the US. I cannot remember the actual price but it fluctuated between $1 and $4 and at that time in the 70s was about $2. It rose to $50 / oz and then dropped to about $5 - $7 / oz. It never returned to its original value.

Kodak has a small stockpile of silver metal and silver nitrate, but actually buys silver every year in bulk for the majority of the next years production using the stockpile as a buffer. But, silver is not the major input into the manufacture of film. Film is made mainly of organic chemicals which are quite exotic in some cases and are all custom made. The base is organic, and the labor is another expense. So, in the long run, film is dependant on wages and oil prices more than silver prices. These and energy are the 3 things that appear to never go down and so the price of film keeps going up.

To you who say Kodak never reduces prices, that is the reason. Have cars gone down in price lately? Has gas gone down? Oh well, see if Fuji ever lowers their price.

BTW, just FYI, color paper was about $40 / 25 sheet box in the 50s and is now about $40/100 sheet box. That is actually quite a big drop in price with improved quality.

PE

 

[Aurum]

Sorry, but Kodak Gold is not "made in Mexico", it is assembled in Mexico from master rolls which were made in Rochester NY.

Fair point, I stand corrected. Though in my defence, from my side of the pond in the UK, if I was assembling Rochester made base, in a UK factory, it would be able to be labelled "Made in the UK"
Still only 50c a roll, so the major C41 shooter in the family (The wife) is stocked up with a good few rolls. Now if I could find a source of 120 for that price....

Kodak has a small stockpile of silver metal and silver nitrate, but actually buys silver every year in bulk for the majority of the next years production using the stockpile as a buffer.

Same as every other manufacturing company big or small. I can negotiate for my company on raw materials (Sunfilters as it happens) much more effectively for big quantities.
A supplier shows a lot more interest for a committment to a few tonnes than to a drum lot. Price is better too.

Also don't get me started on chemical commodity prices. They've shot through the roof. Glycerin for example less than a year ago was down at 670GBP/Tonne, now its over double that. However the supermarkets of the world don't want to accept that, so manufacturers are getting scr.... done over.

Prehaps I should become a politician. The hours are better and the pay...

 

[Photo_G]

I've only been around recently but have read the site and it seems here that folk really don't like Kodak.

I don't understand why.

Seems all of these folk wll jump for joy if (when) K leaves the film biz by shouting: "See, told you so! Told you they weren't committed to film anymore"

And exactly where will that leave the rest of us?

Folk here should get real and embrace Kodak as long as then can.....

 

[markbb]

I've never really got into using Kodak's products (Ilford and Fuji for me), but I don't understand why some people bitch about Kodak so much; some even give the impression that Kodak owe them something. If Kodak want to put their prices up, stop making something or start making something else that's entirely up to them. Kodak is, so far as I can tell, a private company run for the profit of it's shareholders; not some public service.

Maybe if some of us spent less time whinging and more time making photos the world (or APUG at least) would be a better place?

 

[kodachrome64]

I've only been around recently but have read the site and it seems here that folk really don't like Kodak.

I don't understand why.

Seems all of these folk wll jump for joy if (when) K leaves the film biz by shouting: "See, told you so! Told you they weren't committed to film anymore"

And exactly where will that leave the rest of us?

Folk here should get real and embrace Kodak as long as then can.....

I've noticed this too. I'm an avid user of Fuji C41/slide/B&W, but I would definitely be sad if mama Kodak took my Kodachrome away.

I definitely don't understand the apparent Kodak-hating though.

But I love the forums!

Nick

 

[Aurum]

Is it a regional thing or is it a more rationalisation thing?

Kodak in my living memory used to have one of the widest ranges of film products, so I think that this might be part of it

They have rationalised a lot of their range as volumes have decreased, so many fantastic films I would have liked to have played with are no longer available to me. Tech-pan I'd have loved to have tried for instance.

Still I recognise they're not a charity, so if they don't do a film I like the results from, I'll have to work around that

 

[Rolleijoe]

Story at this link
Surprised I haven't seen this posted here yet. It's from approx one week back & says that some Kodak film & paper prices will be increased by up to 20% due to rising costs of raw materials. Can't blame them for that one I suppose.

Time to stock up more on Plus-X and Tri-X before the next increase. Hopefully HC-110 won't go up more than it has already. As for color, I don't like Fuji that much, but I'm working on a 2-year project and need certain film.

Now that I'm purely MF (with LF every now & then) glad to see Rollei films filling some holes (like TechPan.....they have their version even better than the original) and their Rollei Ortho25 is a brilliant film.

So there are still more choices out there. The main thing is that we're shooting film, and keeping it going however we can.

 

[John Shriver]

Kodak film is mostly petrochemicals. Noticed anything funny about oil prices recently? Oh, don't forget you need to dry the film after you coat it, that takes a lot of energy. With the film lines running as fast as Kodak can run them, the oven has to put out lots of BTUs.

Even the price of gelatin is oil-dependent. Gelatin comes from steers or pigs, and they eat a lot of hybrid corn, which can only survive with massive doses of fertilizer, which is made from oil and a LOT of oil-generated energy.

 

[kram]

Only just found this post. I saw an article in last weeks' UK AP mag (I think) about Fuji film prices (heading showed pictures of film boxes) going up by 10% for film, paper etc. At the end of the list of items going up 10% -inkjet inks up 20%.

Why didn't it say ink jet prices soar above film prices? Yep most things are going up in price, a few pence on a packet of film big deal. My gripe is UK fuel prices.

 

[panastasia]

Only just found this post. I saw an article in last weeks' UK AP mag (I think) about Fuji film prices (heading showed pictures of film boxes) going up by 10% for film, paper etc. At the end of the list of items going up 10% -inkjet inks up 20%.

Why didn't it say ink jet prices soar above film prices? Yep most things are going up in price, a few pence on a packet of film big deal. My gripe is UK fuel prices.

It's called capitalism - charge as much as the market can bear - increasing demand = increasing prices, just look at the housing and auto industry for examples, and why are oil prices increasing? When we decrease the demand prices come down or businesses go under. It's all relative.

I'm a minimalist and tend to simplify things. Feel free to argue.

I should note, I buy only Kodak film (in volume) and don't care much about the price.

 

[railwayman3]

Fair point, I stand corrected. Though in my defence, from my side of the pond in the UK, if I was assembling Rochester made base, in a UK factory, it would be able to be labelled "Made in the UK"

I have some Kodak film (think it's 35mm Ektachrome, but it's in the freezer so can't check this minute) which says on the box "Made in USA, finished and packed in Nottingham, England" or words to that effect.

That would be the Kodak factory at Annesley, near Nottingham. Set up as a super-modern facility about 15+ years ago, and I believe mainly packed film brought up in big rolls from the works at Harrow. Awarded "Factory of the Year in 1992", and closed in 2004....and I'm not sure what (if any) film Kodak actually does make in the UK at present, as I use mostly Ilford B&W. Anyone know?

There's a report on the 2004 closure on:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/b...d-and-plant-shut-in-kodak-shakeup-550954.html

 

[fschifano]

Cetainly 35mm C41 film is not expensive in the UK at present.
Ferrania Solaris retails at £1 for a 36 exposure 200ASA, and Kodak Gold for the same for mexican made 200ASA 24 shot. (Thats 50cents a roll for our colonial cousins)

Though wether or not this is just "Jobbing off" of slow moving stock is another question

That's more like $2. Check the exchange rates. 1 GBP = 1.97 USD as of today.

 

[railwayman3]

Following on my post above, and just out of curiosity, does anyone know where the Kodak factories are which are still engaged in film manufacture?

I'm in the U.K., and have not purchased any Kodak B&W film for a few months, but 35mm colour which I've bought this week all seems to be "Made in USA, finished in Mexico" (that's K64, "Colour Plus 200ASA neg, and APS colour neg).

 

[AutumnJazz]

Time to stock up more on Plus-X and Tri-X before the next increase. Hopefully HC-110 won't go up more than it has already. As for color, I don't like Fuji that much, but I'm working on a 2-year project and need certain film.

Now that I'm purely MF (with LF every now & then) glad to see Rollei films filling some holes (like TechPan.....they have their version even better than the original) and their Rollei Ortho25 is a brilliant film.

So there are still more choices out there. The main thing is that we're shooting film, and keeping it going however we can.

It would never happen, but imagine if Kodak sold Kodachrome to a company like Rollei, and new life got put into that emulsion?

 

[Rolleijoe]

It would never happen, but imagine if Kodak sold Kodachrome to a company like Rollei, and new life got put into that emulsion?

If so, they might bring it back for us MF shooters. I've got 10 rolls of 120 Kodachrome that's been in the freezer for 15 years. No one anywhere can process it.

If Rollei (MACO) were to release a version of Kodachrome, in MF, I'd jump on it. Rollei makes absolutely some of the highest quality film there is. And BTW, when are Mörsch chemicals ever coming to the States? More 1st class chemistry for the discriminating photographer to use!

(As a side-note, Kodachrome is/was the original Agfachrome which Gaevert was developing prior to WW1. It was stolen as "war reparations" by the Americans after the war, when Germany was forced to sign the treaty of Versailles which declared them responsible for starting the war, when it was actually caused by the Serbs [yep same people as are still trouble today] assassinating the Archduke Ferdinand while on an official state visit).

So if Kodachrome comes back, will give whole new possibilities for us.

 

[markbb]

(As a side-note, Kodachrome is/was the original Agfachrome which Gaevert was developing prior to WW1. It was stolen as "war reparations" by the Americans after the war, when Germany was forced to sign the treaty of Versailles which declared them responsible for starting the war, when it was actually caused by the Serbs [yep same people as are still trouble today] assassinating the Archduke Ferdinand while on an official state visit).

I see. So German's declaration of war with Russia, two days later declaring war against France followed by the invasion of Belgium didn't happen? Complete rubbish.

'the Serbs' didn't assisinate Ferdinland, Gavrio Princip did. Austria issued a list of 10 increasingly extreme demands to Serbia and then declared war on the country, backed by Germany.

 

[Rolleijoe]

You obviously need to watch the History Channel more often. They recreated the whole thing, including Serb meetings before the Archduke's arrival. The fact still remains: Germany did not strike the 1st blow.

 

[railwayman3]

(As a side-note, Kodachrome is/was the original Agfachrome which Gaevert was developing prior to WW1. It was stolen as "war reparations" by the Americans after the war, when Germany was forced to sign the treaty of Versailles which declared them responsible for starting the war, when it was actually caused by the Serbs [yep same people as are still trouble today] assassinating the Archduke Ferdinand while on an official state visit).

I'm no historian, so can't comment on the correctness of responsibility for starting WWI, and perhaps this forum is not the place anyway,

But surely the original Kodachrome and Agfachrome (Agfacolor?) are unconnected? Kodachrome was a US invention (Mannes and Godowsky) in the 1930's, whereas Agfachrome was a totally different process and approach developed by Agfa in Germany and introduced at about the same time.

Agfa and Gevaert (Belgium) did not amalgamate until the early 1960's.

After WW2, I believe that various other European films used the Agfa patents when they became generally available (e.g. Gevacolor, Ferrania, etc.), and I'm sure that Kodak would naturally have taken note of any new information available at that time.

 

[Photo Engineer]

Agfachrome and Kodachrome are not nor were not related in any way. Nor is any Kodak product related to any Agfa product in the era between the founding of Kodak and WWII. After WWII, a few items of interest were passed on to Kodak by the intelligence reports, most notably use of gold in sensitizing emulsions.

During WWII, many Axis countries used methods of film manufacture based on Agfa chemistry and Kodak chemistry and thus Fuji and Konishiroku both produced Agfachrome type films and papers, and also Kodachrome type films up until the introduction of E6. There was exchange of film technology among Axis film companies until the end of the war.

The Soviet Union used Orwo (Agfa) formulas for film and paper at least until 1960 or thereabouts and perhaps for a while after.

Similarities in many products are simply based on the laws of Chemistry and Physics.

PE

 

[Rolleijoe]

I've got a book here from Germany in the 1990s which contains the history of Agfa from Rodinal up to then and gives examples of a color plate they were selling to the public in 1916 and the colors still look beautiful. That's why the K14 process is a slight variation which Agfa (just to use 1 name & make it easier) had developed.

If color was invented in USA in the 1930s, then why are there color photos (not hand colored, but actual color negatives) from Germany as early as the mid-late '20s? I'll look for the book and give you the ISBN so you can see for yourself.

And PE, history is always written by the victors.

 

[Ian Grant]

Because company's like Lumiere (Autochromes) were making colour additive films for many years before Agfa or Kodak began to manufacture modern type colour films. The Autochrome process was Patented in 1903.

Agfa manufactured a lenticular type film before WWII

Ian

 

[railwayman3]

I've got a book here from Germany in the 1990s which contains the history of Agfa from Rodinal up to then and gives examples of a color plate they were selling to the public in 1916 and the colors still look beautiful. That's why the K14 process is a slight variation which Agfa (just to use 1 name & make it easier) had developed.

If color was invented in USA in the 1930s, then why are there color photos (not hand colored, but actual color negatives) from Germany as early as the mid-late '20s? I'll look for the book and give you the ISBN so you can see for yourself.

And PE, history is always written by the victors.

Yes, additive color plates (Lumiere Autochrome) were available well before WW1, with variations by other manufacturers including Agfa. The theory of the process was suggested by Young in 1807(!), and proved experimentally by Clarke Maxwell (U.K.) in 1855, with a color photograph of a tartan ribbon.

Subtractive color photography is a different system altogether, using a triple-layer film, and Kodachrome and the 1930's Agfa had that in common.
The point is that neither have any similarity with the earlier additive Agfa, and each of then has a totally different approach to the chemistry of the process.
PE could explain it much better than I, but basically Agfa put the colour couplers in the emulsion, Kodachrome has them in the developers (three separate developers for the three colors). (Both remarkable achievements, and I have read that German organic chemists were second-to-none in the
19th and early 20th century.)

All E-6 films now have couplers in the emulsion, which is why Kodachrome and K-14 are sadly at risk of becoming history.

So we can agree that history is (sometimes) written by the winners, and that color was not invented in the US....but that the laws of physics and chemistry take no regard of politics or countries.

 

[Photo Engineer]

Kodak manufactured a lenticular color film called "Kodacolor" in the 30s as well. The Kodachrome process was invented from scratch by Mannes and Godowsky who later sold the process to Kodak and who worked in the Kodak research labs for many years.

Kodachrome has had two process sequences in its history, none of which were "invented" by any other company. All Kodachrome processes relied on alkali soluable couplers which formed crystalline dyes in the film after processing and use 3 color developers. No other process did that, only Kodachrome.

The basic idea of a coupler that formed dye was invented in Germany by Fischer, who used ballasted dyes with sulfonic acid groups on them to form dyes in individual dye layers. Kodak used dyes which were soluable in oily organic solvents and which formed small droplets in the emulsion layer. The Kodak method was the only method compatible with multi hopper coating and as a result the original Agfa formulas used by Fuji, Konishiroku and others was abandoned in the 70s in deference to the high speed coating possible with the oil soluable couplers.

So, all modern chromogenic color films derive from Kodak technology except for the basic discovery of the coupler by Fischer in the late 19th century. Kodak was the sole owner of the Kodachrome process until they abandoned it in the 80s due to lack of interest by any other company and by a severe drop in sales of Kodachrome film.

Kodak is the holder of the basic patents on DIR couplers, colored couplers, oil soluable couplers, DIAR couplers, slide hopper coating, curtain coating and 2 electron sensitization to name a few. All other companies licensed this from Kodak. They hold basic patents on UF washing and ISO washing with PA gelatin. They hold many of the patents on T-grain emulsions as well as some unique color film structures.

They were the first company to eliminate Cadmium and Mercury from B&W and color papers and to eliminate ferricyanide from color processes. As a result of the latter, they were sued and lost to GAF, Pavelle and others due to a claimed compatibilty problem of other color papers with the new Kodak 3 step color process.

The word Blix was coined and used internally at Kodak and a visitor saw the first prototype bottles sitting on the shelf at EK on a visit to the Photographic Technology building. His company quickly trademarked it and forced Kodak to re-label their bottles and change the trade name to Bleach-Fix.

Kodak had a 400 speed Kodacolor film about 10 years before they sold it. They didn't think it was good enough, but when Fuji began selling one, they brought out their 400 film. The Fuji product was about 1/2 stop slower than the EK product. They had a 400 speed T-grain Kodachrome which was never sold due to lack of interest.

There is lots of history on this that y'all don't know.

PE

 

[Photo Engineer]

Thinking more about this I have some other examples for you. Kodak spent a lot of time and money coming up with the C-41, E6 and RA processes which are not patented but are disclosed in patents for the films and papers. So, Tetenal, Fuji and others have no development costs for process chemistry and can sell at cut-rate prices as opposed to Kodak which must bear all development costs.

The same is true for Microdol, HC-110 and a whole host of other chemistry. Others have no development costs and can sell at lower prices than Kodak.

So, if Kodak quits R&D, who will do it?

PE