State of Fuji film?

[Minoltafan2904]

The annual report has this sobering graph, which really shows what a challenge it is for any photographic film manufacturer to stay in the business.
View attachment 196183

That does not at all reflect what has happened in the last couple years.
Film sales are now going up, not down.
Let that be clear, much more film is being sold now than 5 years ago!
Kodak sold 40% more film last year than they though they would, somebody from Kodak Alaris stated that when interviewed.
They would not be reintroducing P3200 and Ektachrome if film sales were on their way down.
Ilford has also been seeing an increase in sales in the last few years.

Fuji's discontinuations are not a result of shrinking demand, it's something else, what? I don't know, Fujifim is very invested now in other things that are not film, photographic film has not been their main source of income for many years.

 

[lantau]

I wonder if Fuji is no longer making rebadged film. There was a thread a while back about another house brand discontinuing their film because their manufacturer was no longer providing it to them. Unfortunately, we will likely never receive a definitive answer from Fuji.

It is beginning to more and more look like it. After that notice about CT Precisa not being available much longer from a major German analog photography shop (from that shop at least), I now saw two shops in HK mention on Instagram that Agfaphoto Vista (both) will be discontinued. Their source appears to be JapanCameraHunter. I guess not everyone here will take his word for it, but he claims that industry sources told him.

If it means that Fuji branded stuff will remain available then, ok. The problem with Vista is that staple films, such as good consumer C41 (Fuji 400) and Tri-X are beyond €5 here, now. Around €6 for tx400, in fact. Superia 400 is around €5.50. That's a lot for a consumer film. At least it is quite good. I'm not into the other cheap C41 films. Ilford is holding the Fort for now. HP5 is still below that important €5 mark and much cheaper when buying 35mm in bulk.

That doesn't mean I am not willing to pay more. I have gotten used to the price of E6, somewhat. But there need to be films, which you can shoot in any situation without worry. Simply to experiment and to learn. Silvermax, HP5, and Vision3 films, all in 35mm bulk are what I'm using for that. For E6 I always try to find something not quite ordinary. For that reason my stock isn't being used nearly as fast as I'd like to.

 

[AgX]

Film sales are now going up, not down.
Let that be clear, much more film is being sold now than 5 years ago!
Kodak sold 40% more film last year than they though they would, somebody from Kodak Alaris stated that when interviewed.
They would not be reintroducing P3200 and Ektachrome if film sales were on their way down.

Why then Lab colour-processing is still on the decline in Europe?

 

[Berri]

Why then Lab colour-processing is still on the decline in Europe?

you would be surprised how many people go the DIY route. I'm one of those.

 

[Joerg Bergs]

Why then Lab colour-processing is still on the decline in Europe?

Hey Henning, It´s the bad overall quality of many labs. They lost customers with such a "service". But there are some small companies who love the colour-processing way, even with a accurat color filtering (like to filter a CineStill with natural colors without a filter )

 

[AgX]

No, I'm not Henning...

Yes, I thought of small labs too. Especially newer ones as Ag Photographic or yours. From some I know the troughput. But still my impression is that overall there is a decline.

I admit that in contrast to 20 years ago it is much harder today to etablish any market figure in our field. You yourself will only see your niche too.

 

[Minoltafan2904]

Why then Lab colour-processing is still on the decline in Europe?

That increase in sales has not translate through to the labs, it's hard to explain.
But film sales are up and there is no denying that.

Traditional labs that have been open since before digital i guess are in decline somewhat, but many new specialised film labs have cropped up all over, these traditional labs have now turned mostly into studios that just offer film processing because they already have the machinery to do so.

For example locally in my city a few months ago a 1 hour photo place closed recently, they offered regular C-41 processing.
But also, locally another lab i know locally just started offering B&W processing, where they didn't use to.
Another local studio also started to offer E-6 processing, ( although it is run by a young couple who are into analog heavily ).

 

[AgX]

New emerging labs have to be seen against others closing. And that does not indicate volume anyway. As I said that all is a tricky field.

 

[Ste_S]

That does not at all reflect what has happened in the last couple years.
Film sales are now going up, not down.
Let that be clear, much more film is being sold now than 5 years ago!
Kodak sold 40% more film last year than they though they would, somebody from Kodak Alaris stated that when interviewed.
They would not be reintroducing P3200 and Ektachrome if film sales were on their way down.
Ilford has also been seeing an increase in sales in the last few years.

Fuji's discontinuations are not a result of shrinking demand, it's something else, what? I don't know, Fujifim is very invested now in other things that are not film, photographic film has not been their main source of income for many years.

Fuji is heavily invested in film - of the Instax variety.

Speculation - I think the industry is in a transitional period, from mass market to niche.
Again speculation, Fuji has been hanging on using it's mass market processes to continue to produce 35mm/120 film when it's no longer profitable to do so. While film sales are up, it's still a niche product.
I guess Fuji have reached the point where they have to re-tool and downscale to make profit on non Instax film sales, and they've probably run the numbers and found it's not worth the investment

 

[NJH]

I am sure they reported several years ago that they had already done that with the E6 i.e. downsized to a sustainable level. However there are other factors one important one I mentioned on here before is the people. Camera film technology is extremely niche, if you owned a large technology company and had say for example camera film experts coming up near to retirement would you be putting significant investment into training young scientists and engineers to take over? If you were a young scientist/engineer would you want to go down this career path? It could be as simple as the ageing film staff reaching a critical tipping point at a particular date. One also has to remember its not just running production lines, components constantly change, we have seen the results ourselves of what happens when a critical component goes NLA, a product gets pulled because the cost to redesign may be too great.

 

[RattyMouse]

I am sure they reported several years ago that they had already done that with the E6 i.e. downsized to a sustainable level. However there are other factors one important one I mentioned on here before is the people. Camera film technology is extremely niche, if you owned a large technology company and had say for example camera film experts coming up near to retirement would you be putting significant investment into training young scientists and engineers to take over? If you were a young scientist/engineer would you want to go down this career path? It could be as simple as the ageing film staff reaching a critical tipping point at a particular date. One also has to remember its not just running production lines, components constantly change, we have seen the results ourselves of what happens when a critical component goes NLA, a product gets pulled because the cost to redesign may be too great.

You are 100% spot on. Aging staff arent going to be easy to replace, especially in the US where the major film producer has already gone bankrupt once and is staring a second trip there in one year. Who would devote their career to such a company? Not anyone I know. They look for stable employers with a track record of growth. Ilford probably has first dibs on any new talent in the film industry as they can offer stability that the others cannot.

 

[AgX]

You are 100% spot on. Aging staff arent going to be easy to replace, especially in the US where the major film producer has already gone bankrupt once and is staring a second trip there in one year. Who would devote their career to such a company? Not anyone I know. They look for stable employers with a track record of growth. Ilford probably has first dibs on any new talent in the film industry as they can offer stability that the others cannot.

With Harman (Ilford) though a young chemist would have to rely solely on one niche market, with Agfa of Fuji (if they would hire chemists for their film branch...) there still would be chemical plants behind that in case may give other perspectives.

 

[Sal Santamaura]

With Harman (Ilford) though a young chemist would have to rely solely on one niche market...

As well as a company whose site lease expires in seven years.

 

[NJH]

That is the thing though, there is some incredible research being done outside of our niche interest for an analog technology. Just the other day I read an article about a team which have managed to reconstruct detailed images by reading human brain patterns, in other words to capture how we visually perceive objects. Proper sci-fi stuff and I know from when I was young that is what I wanted to do.

 

[StevieRose]

Having recently returned to film based photography, including film development, I am equally distressed as many of you by the declining number of available film stocks. While it is encouraging that film sales are increasing, I think I understand why a large corporation who makes film would at least be hedging their bets if not retrenching. The fact is that besides a few (very expensive) Leicas, the Nikon F6, and your occasional Holga or large format camera sale, there are no new film cameras being sold. Not even a simple 35 mm point and shoot. Therefore, the resurgence in film sales is based upon the use of old existing cameras. I happen to love using those cameras, in fact that is one of the main reasons I have come back to shooting film. However, it doesn't seem like the kind of solid "growth strategy" that companies bank upon. Honestly, I am surprised that no one has brought out a new decent quality but reasonably affordable 35 mm point and shoot camera. Now that would be a sign of a true resurgence in film based photography. There certainly seems to be a market out there for it. I just sold one of my Yashica T4 Supers for over $400.

 

[RattyMouse]

Having recently returned to film based photography, including film development, I am equally distressed as many of you by the declining number of available film stocks. While it is encouraging that film sales are increasing, I think I understand why a large corporation who makes film would at least be hedging their bets if not retrenching. The fact is that besides a few (very expensive) Leicas, the Nikon F6, and your occasional Holga or large format camera sale, there are no new film cameras being sold. Not even a simple 35 mm point and shoot. Therefore, the resurgence in film sales is based upon the use of old existing cameras. I happen to love using those cameras, in fact that is one of the main reasons I have come back to shooting film. However, it doesn't seem like the kind of solid "growth strategy" that companies bank upon. Honestly, I am surprised that no one has brought out a new decent quality but reasonably affordable 35 mm point and shoot camera. Now that would be a sign of a true resurgence in film based photography. There certainly seems to be a market out there for it. I just sold one of my Yashica T4 Supers for over $400.

New cameras cant compete with used. The prices are just too low. You can get fantastic used gear for pennies on the dollar. I bought a mint condition Fuji GA645 for $400.. Now how is any new camera going to compete with that? Back in the day, a GA645 was $1500.

 

[Ste_S]

The existence of new film camera's isn't a problem for film sales. There's more than enough cameras out there second hand for those that want them. I suspect a large draw for people shooting film is using old/vintage cameras

The big stumbling block of course for film take up is digital photography and for mass market phone cameras in particular.
Film photography is a niche hobby.

 

[zkascak]

Best shoot Ilford film before the Trump trade-war kicks in

And you better shoot Kodak before the trade war begins . The trade war is gonna suck for everyone.

I love Kodak film, but I want to shoot as many different films as I can.

 

[FujiLove]

And you better shoot Kodak before the trade war begins . The trade war is gonna suck for everyone.

I love Kodak film, but I want to shoot as many different films as I can.

I checked the freezer...I can ride out a ten year trade war