People sometimes think shooting film has gotten too expensive and long for the good old days. Here's my take on it:
https://shop.stearmanpress.com/blogs/news/who-said-shooting-film-was-expensive
The Cost of Shooting Film and a Side Order of French Fries.
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People sometimes think shooting film has gotten too expensive and long for the good old days. Here's my take on it:
https://shop.stearmanpress.com/blogs/news/who-said-shooting-film-was-expensive
Give me a Big Mac with 5 sheets of HP4 on it...
MattKing
Moderator
indicator free stop bath on the fries please.
I like the Freestyle ad. I spent a lot of time in my youth figuring how much paper and film I could buy from them with my paper route money. I also agree with your conclusions, film and paper were not cheap, though you could score some I interesting deals at Freestyle!
That's pretty nifty. Thanks for sharing. For a bit of fun I had a quick glance to see how much the relative expense has really changed.
After adjusting for inflation, factoring in the increase of the average disposable income since then, changes in local taxes, and considering what was once a mainstream consumable is now a niche product, the variance is not as eye watering as it first appears. Though, the increase in various Californian taxes since then is pretty horrific. Good thing California is one of the most affluent States in the U.S
What a shame to have lost such variety in films and papers!
After adjusting for inflation, factoring in the increase of the average disposable income since then, changes in local taxes, and considering what was once a mainstream consumable is now a niche product, the variance is not as eye watering as it first appears. Though, the increase in various Californian taxes since then is pretty horrific. Good thing California is one of the most affluent States in the U.S
What a shame to have lost such variety in films and papers!
Well, that fits with what I remember, more or less. The cost of a roll of film relative to the paychecks I collected in 1980 vs. the paychecks I collect now (adjusted for the fact I've now got almost thirteen years in on a technical job, compared to then being a college freshman in a college town) isn't much different.
On the other hand, my car is paid off, I don't pay for a landline phone or TV cable (but, in relative terms, I do pay about as much for Internet and cell service as I would have paid for phone and TV in 1980), I'm well past 25 with no points on my driver's license (so my car insurance is as low as it'll get in this state) -- in other words, I'm in general much better off than I was forty years ago. Well, aside from being old.
On the other hand, my car is paid off, I don't pay for a landline phone or TV cable (but, in relative terms, I do pay about as much for Internet and cell service as I would have paid for phone and TV in 1980), I'm well past 25 with no points on my driver's license (so my car insurance is as low as it'll get in this state) -- in other words, I'm in general much better off than I was forty years ago. Well, aside from being old.
Funnily enough I was browsing through an old copy of Black and White Photography magazine from December 2007 and some of prices caught my eye
It was an advert for Calumet. Tmax 100 in 120 was about £ 2.40 per roll as was Tmax 400 in 120 but the winner by quite some way was Acros 100 in 120 whose price was - wait for it - a jaw dropping ....£1.75
At the boring rate of inflation since 2007 and not the sort of exciting hipster way of comparing value with the big Mac, prices have risen in the U.K. by about 40% so Acros and TMax have of course risen in price. So any one fancy Acros for about £2.45 and TMax for about £3.36? Sounds good - even me.
Anybody found any Acros or TMax for anything close to those prices? I suppose value for money and whether anything is expensive relative to something else depends on the time period chosen and what the something else is. A big Mac may be an important economic measure of wellbeing in the U.S. or at least important for what the author believes is the market at which the article was aimed.
Maybe I need to adopt the kind of laid back spirit that brings a happy ending epitomised by the song Escape ( the pina colada song) by Robert Holmes. I have since discovered he was British born but he may have taken my laid-back genes with him
pentaxuser.
It was an advert for Calumet. Tmax 100 in 120 was about £ 2.40 per roll as was Tmax 400 in 120 but the winner by quite some way was Acros 100 in 120 whose price was - wait for it - a jaw dropping ....£1.75
At the boring rate of inflation since 2007 and not the sort of exciting hipster way of comparing value with the big Mac, prices have risen in the U.K. by about 40% so Acros and TMax have of course risen in price. So any one fancy Acros for about £2.45 and TMax for about £3.36? Sounds good - even me.
Anybody found any Acros or TMax for anything close to those prices? I suppose value for money and whether anything is expensive relative to something else depends on the time period chosen and what the something else is. A big Mac may be an important economic measure of wellbeing in the U.S. or at least important for what the author believes is the market at which the article was aimed.
Maybe I need to adopt the kind of laid back spirit that brings a happy ending epitomised by the song Escape ( the pina colada song) by Robert Holmes. I have since discovered he was British born but he may have taken my laid-back genes with him
pentaxuser.
This entire conversation of film prices can be summed up in one simple sentence - "if you aren't sleeping with me, or paying my bills, what does it matter?"
However, shooting film is not as detrimental to your health as that side of fries. Especially if you shoot as much film as I do.
Brings back the times when I ordered supplies from ads like these. Wish I could remember the Florida company I bought paper from back in the late 70s/early 80s. Ten sheets of 16x20 Portriga Rapid III for twenty bucks.
I'd stock up on film. For all the printing of money the government is doing, inflation is going to double film's prices.
I gave this some thought, Christopher but strangely enough despite not sleeping with you or paying your bills it still seems to matter to me.
On a more personal note: Do you like pina coladas and getting caught in the rain and are you into yoga?
pentaxuser
Changed my mind -- one of yours and one of Allen's!
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Funnily enough I was browsing through an old copy of Black and White Photography magazine from December 2007 and some of prices caught my eye
It was an advert for Calumet. Tmax 100 in 120 was about £ 2.40 per roll as was Tmax 400 in 120 but the winner by quite some way was Acros 100 in 120 whose price was - wait for it - a jaw dropping ....£1.75
At the boring rate of inflation since 2007 and not the sort of exciting hipster way of comparing value with the big Mac, prices have risen in the U.K. by about 40% so Acros and TMax have of course risen in price. So any one fancy Acros for about £2.45 and TMax for about £3.36? Sounds good - even me.
Anybody found any Acros or TMax for anything close to those prices? I suppose value for money and whether anything is expensive relative to something else depends on the time period chosen and what the something else is. A big Mac may be an important economic measure of wellbeing in the U.S. or at least important for what the author believes is the market at which the article was aimed.
Maybe I need to adopt the kind of laid back spirit that brings a happy ending epitomised by the song Escape ( the pina colada song) by Robert Holmes. I have since discovered he was British born but he may have taken my laid-back genes with him
pentaxuser.
I deliberately focused on California for comparison! The U.K is in a microcosm when it comes to film prices.
Even if the per capita demand for film in the U.K may be be comparable to the U.S, there is simply less of us. Heck, by 2050 I think I'll be pouring my own plates. I hope the situation never gets to bad that I have to pick up a charcoal pencil! Instead of a Jetsons era, the future will be filled with better light bulbs and longer queues!
That depends. Did we have dinner first?
And I'm not that flexible, but I'll try anything once.
In old good days I was using few rolls of film per year. And potato was main food source for many. Nobody knew about french fries back then. It was not western world. One year they send us to collect potatoes and it was next to only food. I stopped eating potatoes after it for some time.
I started to use a lot of film in 2013. Kentmere bulks were 29 USD. Now it is 67 USD.
I guess, french fries prices also went up 2.4 times since 2013 as well.
I never been into junk food and now using less film.
I started to use a lot of film in 2013. Kentmere bulks were 29 USD. Now it is 67 USD.
I guess, french fries prices also went up 2.4 times since 2013 as well.
I never been into junk food and now using less film.
The only arrow left in the quiver!
Film will almost certainly steadily go up in price. I still think film is a miraculous product. Nothing else can compare to polyester base black and white film for storing images, newspapers, everything.
I'm not that ambitious but film/gold ratio would be interesting too.
You trying telling the youth of that today, and they won't believe you.
Considering how much the value of silver has increased since 1970, it's amazing film prices today are as low as they are. Bearing that in mind, with improved mechanisation and higher individual productivity, this has likely led to fewer humans involved in the production production of such an amazing medium.
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An interesting source for historical information is that books.google.com has a large collection of scanned issues of Popular Photography, with ads, for example here's Jan 1981: https://books.google.com/books?id=rzH31j84pn8C
In the US, official inflation was a factor of 6.6x from 1970 to 2019. Meaning that the price of both film and Big Macs has increased faster than official inflation, but only by a factor of 1.6x or so. The official inflation index includes a variety of goods and services, and some of those things probably got cheaper over time (eg electronics), more so than the cost of film manufacturing and distribution.
When you start comparing more specific things like price of Japanese-made goods in the US or UK at a specific time, then you get into exchange rate change (and sometimes tariffs). The number of JPY per USD fell by a factor of 2.5-3 from 1970 to 1990, and has been roughly constant since then. https://www.macrotrends.net/2550/dollar-yen-exchange-rate-historical-chart So it's not a surprise if Japanese-made film got more expensive.
In the US, official inflation was a factor of 6.6x from 1970 to 2019. Meaning that the price of both film and Big Macs has increased faster than official inflation, but only by a factor of 1.6x or so. The official inflation index includes a variety of goods and services, and some of those things probably got cheaper over time (eg electronics), more so than the cost of film manufacturing and distribution.
When you start comparing more specific things like price of Japanese-made goods in the US or UK at a specific time, then you get into exchange rate change (and sometimes tariffs). The number of JPY per USD fell by a factor of 2.5-3 from 1970 to 1990, and has been roughly constant since then. https://www.macrotrends.net/2550/dollar-yen-exchange-rate-historical-chart So it's not a surprise if Japanese-made film got more expensive.
It wasn't uncommon in the period, that even the US Federal Reserve Bank calls "the Great Inflation", for people in the US to buy a Japanese car, and sell it 3 years later at 80-90% of what they paid originally. This was referred to as having a "better resale value" it was nothing more than the collapse of the dollar and the rise of the Yen. This is what spurred the building of assembly and fabrication plants in the US, especially in the southeast region of the US to take advantage of low cost labor.
Malt stop bath is the best!
Can I just add that occasionally I buy old rolls of film on ebay if they're cheap and exotic. I never use them, I just like to look at them. Anyway, I got this roll of Dia Direct which expired July 1994. Look at the cost - £10.95 - that's a high street price rather than a bulk mail order place. Twenty five years ago I was earning about 1/3 of my current wage; sort of makes the price of Velvia 50 more palatable.
X-ray imaging is the most successful solution to this problem.
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