Hi Dirk, Thanks for the quick response. I'm not sure where or who FujiHunt is, although I presume that they're somehow connected to FujiFilm (or maybe they bought the rights to the chems?).
I've had a response from AgPhoto just now too:
The carrier we use will allow us to send liquid chemistry, but provided it is packaged in containers of 1L or less – unfortunately both the Chrome 6 (and the companion C41 kits) have one item in them that is larger than 1L and we have attempted to send, and been unsuccessful each time – it gets returned to us before leaving the country.
I looked at sea freight before and there seems to be a critical mass to justify it – a pallet load would be OK, but one or two boxes works out a lot more costly than sending with the regular carriers who fly everything.
So yes, it's a volume thing, and there don't seem to be many ways around it:
a) buy the 20L chems individually, but surely it will go off before it gets used up (I'll investigate the Kodak chems, but they're all NOS if they're around, not being produced anymore)
b) try get Fuji to get it locally (I've tried but I can try again).
c) convince a local shop to just buy a pallet-load and pay local markup (or get a whole-of-Aus group buy happening, not sure how many kits we'd need)
d) maybe find someone in the EU to decant the big bottle into two smaller ones and post it on? (and deal with it having been opened, depends which chem it is).
or more than likely it's just
e) stick with tetenal 3-bath and the (alleged) less quality, less longevity, and no RVP/Ektachrome in the same tank (so I've heard).
ps:
mainly because I have no way of exhibiting chromes.
If I had a larger camera (and if this roll of ektachrome I've got works I'd consider building one), I'd just make 9.5" x 20" panoramae, no need for a projector, just paste them on a window...