Plus-x 35mm will be discontinued.

wblynch · Nov 3, 2011

Dave in Kansas said:
You may recall that around a year before Plus-X in 120 was discontinued, Kodak offered rebates on the pro packs of Plus-X 120 in an attempt to get people to buy it. Apparently they didn't sell enough.

Dave

Well I bought 4 boxes, which was more 120 film than I ever bought before at one time. Didn't do me much good though, as despite my efforts they still killed it off.

2F/2F · Nov 3, 2011

wblynch said:
Well I bought 4 boxes, which was more 120 film than I ever bought before at one time. Didn't do me much good though, as despite my efforts they still killed it off.

This is a good example of what has nearly killed Kodak film. Four boxes is nothing, yet it is the most 120 film you have ever bought at one time. You are a perfect case in point of the types of customers who now make up the market...to which Kodak has failed to adapt. They failed to downsize effectively once commercial photographers ceased buying huge quantities of film. Users shooting your volume of film could have maintained the film division if Kodak would have gone through the pains to appropriately set themselves up for a small-scale market when the time to do so was right. It's too late now, I think. Hopefully T-Max lasts, if nothing else. It's their truly unique product IMO.

jbl · Nov 3, 2011

I always wanted to like Plus-X, but I always preferred FP4+. I've always preferred Tri-X to HP5+, though, so go figure.

I guess the general consensus is that if/when Tri-X goes, we're all done for? .

-jbl

atomicthumbs · Nov 3, 2011

BrianShaw said:
Very sad; very sad, indeed.

But I love thier honesty:

"While there is no direct replacement for PLUS-X 125 Film, you may find ILFORD FP-4+ the world's finestgrained black-and-white film, to be a reasonable alternative. "

It does seem that every single film these days has THE WORLD'S FINEST GRAIN (for X kind of film).

Marco B · Nov 3, 2011

atomicthumbs said:
It does seem that every single film these days has THE WORLD'S FINEST GRAIN (for X kind of film).

Hey, I am the finest guy too... there is just one of me!

lxdude · Nov 3, 2011

atomicthumbs said:
It does seem that every single film these days has THE WORLD'S FINEST GRAIN (for X kind of film).

Not for Tri-(X kind of film).

Thomas Bertilsson · Nov 3, 2011

At my place of work we raise prices on things we are about to discontinue, because devotees will continue to pay. It's called a cash cow, which is in the curve of demise, never likely to recover for various reasons.
Then the replacement comes along and those same folks reluctantly adapt to the new situation.

I hope Kodak's reasons for discontinuing Plus-X are simply that they can't afford to keep it around, which makes it at least understandable. Still sad.

I was never able to tell it apart from FP4+ in a print, though.

Roger Cole · Nov 3, 2011

sepiareverb said:
That was the paper business.

As I've said before, I think the problem is that Kodak is too big to care about any one thing except the stockholders bidding. That's where Ilford has the edge over Kodak and Fuji- scale and ownership.

But no one cared because their (black and white) papers sucked, by and large. The only one I miss is Panalure and that's only because no one else makes a panchromatic B&W paper for printing B&W from color negs, not that no one can.

Yes, Ilford WAS doing badly and I never said otherwise. But after right-sizing they apparently aren't doing badly now.

semi-ambivalent · Nov 3, 2011

jbl said:
I always wanted to like Plus-X, but I always preferred FP4+. I've always preferred Tri-X to HP5+, though, so go figure.

I guess the general consensus is that if/when Tri-X goes, we're all done for? .

-jbl

I'm laying in a pretty big (for me) stock of Tri-X but I don't intend to panic; there's a lot of Ilford savvy people here from whom to learn if the time comes. I heard the call on Kodachrome and, in spite of always wanting some images of the family on it, I sat on my duff and missed the deadline. Now I have twenty-some boxes in the freezer, but I've managed to move on from my mistake. I'd hate to have to do it for Tri-X (between D-76 and Rodinal it gives me the looks I want) but I certainly could. I would still feel a deep loss though. It might provide some artistic catharsis.

s-a

cmacd123 · Nov 3, 2011

Interesting enough there seems to be even more afoot. I looked at Freestyle's best buy page and their are several other Kodak stocks in the Clearout bin beside PX. Now one of the 120 stocks seems to be more a switch to 5 packs from individual rolls. But they show PX-135-24. PX-135-36, TMax100 401, TMY120 (single rolls), TX120, TXpro 8X10, as well as the arista Premium 100 24. Now both the 120 Tmax films are shown on the main page as in 5 packs.

Now I have a soft spot for Plus X, when I got my first 35mm camera back in 1965 or so, It had a 125 top shutter speed, so I did not dare to use Tri-x, and so spent much of my allowance on 50 ft rolls (all I could afford at one time) of Plus-x, (or sometimes it was 17 meter rolls of FP3 or Agfa ISS) It was only when I used Birthday Gift money to get a Practika that I could shoot Tri-X

Roger Cole · Nov 4, 2011

cmacd123 said:
Interesting enough there seems to be even more afoot. I looked at Freestyle's best buy page and their are several other Kodak stocks in the Clearout bin beside PX. Now one of the 120 stocks seems to be more a switch to 5 packs from individual rolls. But they show PX-135-24. PX-135-36, TMax100 401, TMY120 (single rolls), TX120, TXpro 8X10, as well as the arista Premium 100 24. Now both the 120 Tmax films are shown on the main page as in 5 packs.

Now I have a soft spot for Plus X, when I got my first 35mm camera back in 1965 or so, It had a 125 top shutter speed, so I did not dare to use Tri-x, and so spent much of my allowance on 50 ft rolls (all I could afford at one time) of Plus-x, (or sometimes it was 17 meter rolls of FP3 or Agfa ISS) It was only when I used Birthday Gift money to get a Practika that I could shoot Tri-X

I noticed the same thing.

I will scream if TX120 is discontinued. Then I'll move on, but I'll scream first.

Mackinaw · Nov 4, 2011

Well, Kodak proudly proclaims that Tri-X is the "best-selling B&W film in the world." Don't know if that means anything when film sales are a fraction of what they were decades back, but still, argues that it may outlast every other Kodak B&W film.

Jim B.

Thomas Bertilsson · Nov 4, 2011

Roger Cole said:
But no one cared because their (black and white) papers sucked, by and large.

Are you kidding? What was it about their papers that sucked?

Kodak Ektalure, Velox, Azo, and Polymax Fine Art are some of the finest papers I've ever tried.
Ektalure as enlarging paper for its beautiful mid-tones and rich velvet blacks, Velox and Azo for their amazing contact printing abilities for negatives of extremely long scale, and Polymax Fine Art was one hell of a VC paper in the same league as Agfa Multicontrast 111.

Mark Layne · Nov 4, 2011

Thomas Bertilsson said:
Are you kidding? What was it about their papers that sucked?

Kodak Ektalure, Velox, Azo, and Polymax Fine Art are some of the finest papers I've ever tried.
Ektalure as enlarging paper for its beautiful mid-tones and rich velvet blacks, Velox and Azo for their amazing contact printing abilities for negatives of extremely long scale, and Polymax Fine Art was one hell of a VC paper in the same league as Agfa Multicontrast 111.

I have to agree with you but don't forget Elite. Some of the older warm tone papers were- and still are -superb if you find them (Medalist)

Thomas Bertilsson · Nov 4, 2011

Mark Layne said:
I have to agree with you but don't forget Elite. Some of the older warm tone papers were- and still are -superb if you find them (Medalist)

I have some Medalist in my stash too, Mark, and it is sadly way too fogged for regular print developers, but works a treat for lith printing.

Roger Cole · Nov 4, 2011

Thomas Bertilsson said:
Are you kidding? What was it about their papers that sucked?

Kodak Ektalure, Velox, Azo, and Polymax Fine Art are some of the finest papers I've ever tried.
Ektalure as enlarging paper for its beautiful mid-tones and rich velvet blacks, Velox and Azo for their amazing contact printing abilities for negatives of extremely long scale, and Polymax Fine Art was one hell of a VC paper in the same league as Agfa Multicontrast 111.

I was talking about the papers that were still made when they stopped production, not every paper they ever made. Azo, granted, was a great contact paper. I never used contact speed paper so I forgot about that. Ektalure I'm sure was great too, but wasn't it gone by that time? I know Velox was ancient history (never used it, was gone by the time I got into photography - again, I didn't mean everything they ever made was bad.) Polymax Fine Art, well, I'll take your word for it. They came out with it after enough people had moved away from their fiber papers, in an attempt to get folks back. I was gone from the Kodak stable by that time.

But I'll withdraw the statement and just say there are enough great papers now that I don't really miss them (ok, with the possible exception of Ektalure - I've gone on a bit of a warm tone portrait paper binge and would love to have that option.)

Thomas Bertilsson · Nov 4, 2011

Roger,

I agree that Kodak went a little bananas with the RC papers. I didn't really think they were any worse than Ilford, though. It's sad that the papers that excite me the most are gone. I loved Forte Polygrade, Fortezzo, and Polywarmton, Agfa Multicontrast (which we have a clone of in ADOX MCC, thankfully, but on a much brighter base), Kodak Fine Art, Agfa Portriga and especially Brovira...

What I would really want is another Brovira... Without cadmium, I'm not sure it's possible.

But it's getting off topic here. It's supposed to be about Plus-X... I liked the film a lot, especially for its poor reciprocity performance, which made it great for pinhole photography. Other than that FP4+ is, to me, the same as Plus-X basically, so there is a great alternative out there.

- Thomas

Rudeofus · Nov 4, 2011

I feel sorry for all those who loved and enjoyed this film, but to me the handwriting is on the wall when a film is no longer sold in 120 format. In a time where very decent MF equipment can be had for less than a cheesy DSLR kit a lot of amateurs get professional MF equipment - and having a film unavailable in 120 makes it barely interesting to me in 135 format, too, especially if similar products are offered in 135 and 120. It came as no surprise that Elitechrome got axed, too.

Second: there are lots of companies around who can coat simple B&W film but only three who have t-grain or something similar. I can therefore understand that Kodak leaves these low tech product lines to cheaper and less sophisticated producers and focuses more on their T-MAX product line and their professional color products, of course.

Third: while film&paper discontinuation is annoying, it's certainly not a show stopper if you have a decent freezer.

Tim Gray · Nov 4, 2011

Thomas Bertilsson said:
Are you kidding? What was it about their papers that sucked?

I was never able to try them; discontinued before I started shooting film. But based on the opinions I've read here on APUG, it seemed like a lot of people didn't really care for them. At least that's the impression I've gotten from reading on the internet.

Tom Kershaw · Nov 4, 2011

Depending on who one reads, it would be possible to come up with other conclusions. I haven't used the Kodak papers as I stuck with ILFORD when starting out and Kodak discontinued their line around the same time as I became more involved.

Tom

BrianShaw · Nov 4, 2011

Rudeofus said:
... but to me the handwriting is on the wall when a film is no longer sold in 120 format...

I read a different wall. When the film (any format) drops down to the bottom of their web page rather than in a featured location...

NB23 · Nov 4, 2011

Why do people say that ilford are doing ok? Just parroting around?

As far as I'm concerned, their HP5 2-for-1 sale showed how much in trouble they can be.
And if kodak goes away, just watch Ilford's prices double. It's going to get ugly.

Kodak was bad in business. Just its labeling was extremely bad. God knkws how many films Ive lost by following their developing times. Who knows how many customers they lost just there, by provoquing and causing absolutely horrible results, thin negatives.

While Fuji has been active and createf the X100 + X10 line, what has kodak done? Nothing. They relied too much on the good old crappy american way of doing business.

Thomas Bertilsson · Nov 4, 2011

NB23 said:
Why do people say that ilford are doing ok? Just parroting around?

Over at filmwasters.com Leon Taylor interviewed Steven Brierly of Harmann/Ilford, and in the interview Mr Brierly states they have had an increase in sales this year, contrary to the market trend. I remember a figure of 8%.

Roger Cole · Nov 4, 2011

Kodak providing recommendations leading to thin negatives? I always thought they were intended to create negatives for solar eclipse viewing.

Actually they've always been spot on - for the specified c.i. which was optimized for printing with diffusion enlargers. For those of us using condenser enlargers, a reduction in time is generally needed - in my experience anyway.

NB23 · Nov 4, 2011

Thomas Bertilsson said:
Over at filmwasters.com Leon Taylor interviewed Steven Brierly of Harmann/Ilford, and in the interview Mr Brierly states they have had an increase in sales this year, contrary to the market trend. I remember a figure of 8%.

Dumping free film on the market helps to boost sales for sure

Plus-x 35mm will be discontinued.

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