We have seen erratic behaviours from them: Frist they waste money in the Ektachrome discontinuation, later they spend money in launching it again, with years of sells lost, instead promoting well the product. Same with Fuji, they discontinued Neopan, now they want to launch it again, also having lost years of sells. If thay had priced the product correctly then they would have saved a lot of money.
In the sheet pricing they are also wrong, ilford and foma are way smarter.
These materials are remarkably flexible in terms of over exposure.
Most of my users are not using advanced metering techniques, nor do they have a super great understanding of the meters in their cameras (or their pockets). These materials are remarkably flexible in terms of over exposure.
Adrian, Ektar is a different animal. If someone can expose chromes correctly, Ektar should be no problem, except that there needs to be more attention paid to color temp situations out of whack. But even wide-latitude CN films like used for movies get carefully balanced by proper filtration and precise metering when pro results are mandatory. I've been explained that in detail by Hollywood cameramen who are expected to get it right the first time, everytime, who in fact set me on the right track in principle with Ektar. They can't afford to wing it or make shoot from the hip guesses about latitude or color temp crossover, and then expect someone to iron it out afterwards, even though that is the one industry far better than any other at post-correction. I've spent a lot of time and money learning certain things the hard way; and when 8x10 was the primary format involved, that was indeed a very painful way to learn how Ektar truly behaves. Most (not all) people on a forum like this do not have optimized expectations, or generally even understand how to objectively aim for that. But it truly is a high-performance film capable of more accurate hue rendering in certain categories that other CN films, but not entirely free from certain idiosyncrasies too. And it's only after learning what these are and how to contend with them that one can go back and realistically identify some of the reasons for these in the respective dye curves. A lot of the problem in discussions like this is that people confuse mere saturation for the topic of hue purity. It's easy to hyper-saturate certain colors, especially nowadays; but choreographing a wide gamut of hues and neutrals in the same image is an entirely different game.
Well, hopefully someday we'll link up to compare actual visual results, especially where different corrective filters were involved right at the time of the Ektar shot. I was hoping to get a jump start on RA4 printing early this season due to the drought, since I drum process outdoors due to being slightly allergic to RA4 chem; but this kind of respiratory irritation seems to makes me a bit more susceptible to anything like a cold, and there's obviously a much more serious virus getting around, so I think I'll stick with b&w printing awhile longer until that threat has passed. But I do have a lot of previous print examples showing just how clean color neg can come out when it's truly optimized, or rather, the entire workflow optimized.
We do not know the numbers for pre-discontinuation Ektachrome sales/ post-resurrection Ektachrome sales, nor do we know the manufacturing costs or the carrying costs. They may have decided that sales were sufficiently low that they were throwing away more than half of what they produced every year due to slow sales, so they discontinued the products.
This is true, and its easier to judge that pitfall now than when the decision was taken, of course. But what's clear that Ektachrome discontinuation is related to a series of mistakes: not promoting well the product, not anticipating present film persistence in the market.
For Kodak present flim flourisment is a total surprise, I guess they were making plans to close product lines.
It is known that Kodak paid some marketing experts for writting reports about what would happen with film photography. An important report about LF concluded that it was not known at what pace LF photography were to disapear, so recommendation was to not make any effort to conserve customer base and taking all money possible from "captive" customers before they abandoned LF. The idea was that film price was irrelevant for LF shooters anyway, ans a 200% price compared to 120 was recommended.
Ilford smiled, they took a big share of the LF kodak market share. Market changed, commercial LF photography disapeared but cheap user gear allowed many enthusiats (me I'm one) and artists engage.
Those reports are flawed because or several points:
> Market analysis made by experts in gear marketing that saw a demolition his product range sells: expensive cameras and glass, as top notch used gear was sold near for free at ebay.
> Not anticipating that new LF/glass camera owners were enthusiats and artists, instead commercial photographers
> Not anticipating that new film community would be die hard film lovers that would be able to promote that subculture. (It's LOL that I've film images at flicker sporting 14k views and digital friends that are x10 better photographers than me can only gather 30 views...)
That kind of mentality ended with Fuji/Kodak floowing strategies for LF oriented to take most money possible before closing product lines, the surpise was that the product continued having demand beyond they expected, and that ilford was treasuring new customers from them, so basicly their policy was incorrect.
Today (B&H) TMY 8x10 sheets are priced $8.5 each. In 2017 I gathered US film prices in all formats, and a sheet was $10.35, funny it's like this after those price increases:
View attachment 241759 View attachment 241760
(For the record, 2017 film prices for different formats, second numeric column from left is price per 80sq in)
A problem for marketing staff at kodak/fuji is that they don't understand that LF market reacts slow to price changes. Engaging/disengaging 35mm is fast, while engaging/disengaging LF is quite slow.
Will they make money if selling a single 300€ box per year of 8x10 Portra in the UE?
Me, if I was the boss I would promote 8x10 usage, now probably it's a line producing no profit. By promoting 8x10" (king size) amazing artists would show impressing/unique 8x10 works to the community, which it would be a powerful promotion of general film usage.
This is an opportunity they are clearly missing.
In similar terms, what is a 8x10" velvia sheet? The most impresive imaging system on earth. This would be a corporate flagship, Fuji should be proud to source that world class medium, and now it looks like if they don't want to sell it.
Just my point of view.
I’m not unfamiliar with Ektar. I just recently made a new scanning profile for it for my setup. I generated all new characteristic curves for each color channel from -6 to +9 in full stop increments, and generated a hue and saturation map specifically for it. I did that because what you say is true. It is a different animal, and my generic C-41 profile, while looks good, doesn’t cut the mustard for me when it comes to Ektar. Does it look like Ektar printed on RA-4 paper? No. I didn’t model RA-4, I went for colorimetric accuracy in my chosen color space.
Essentially, the published curve set for Ektar .....seems to suggest that you get about 7 stops of straight line,
Ektar : No way you get 7 stops linearity if you expect clean dye curve independence; crossover will set in one extreme, shouldering the other. I'd say realistically, no more than one stop either side of what you'd normally expect from a mid-contrast chrome film like Provia or E100. One of the hardest conditions to correct is split lighting under deep blue sky where the sunny area fine, but you get an exaggerated cyan blue in deep shadows. I have a flashing filter containing a diffuser sheet, a strong warming filter, and an ND amounting to about two stops, and use this to flash the exposure using an 18% gray disc, so effectively a Zone III warm flash involving mainly the shadows. In other cases a warming filter alone works, depending on the exact scene hues affected. Of course, if the color temp is affected all across the board, like under an overcast sky, simple warming filtration at the time of the shot works. Trying to post-correct it might become a nightmare because there will be a range of values already cross-contaminated. It's very difficult to un-mix mud once it's made, if you will excuse my personal term for that predicament. The published curves only take you so far, and then you need to understand in a practical manner the dye idiosyncrasies. But those curves themselves do give a strong clue just how different this film is from traditional color neg films. Most people who see my own Ektar prints don't even believe a color neg film was involved. And it's not just a matter of saturation. Lots of previous CN films have been souped up to deliver certain hues more brilliantly, but always at the expense of something else. Ektar is quite a step ahead in terms of overall control, though not a perfect replacement for chrome films by any means, yet in other ways, even better. For example, the extra margin of exposure range is truly helpful. And married to current RA4 papers, it's certainly easier to tame than printing chromes on Cibachrome was.
Ektar : No way you get 7 stops linearity if you expect clean dye curve independence; crossover will set in one extreme.
more saturation might look like there's more contrast - compare the characteristic curves for Portra 160 NC and VC and you'll see that sensitometrically they essentially match, yet in use you would think that VC is 'contrastier'.
you might get why Ektachrome went. .... Furthermore, the couplers used in Ektachrome still needed a stabiliser with Formalin in it. Reformulation of the product line to solve these issues was likely to have been felt to be too great relative to the
same financial pressures relative to the costs of re-formulation to remove environmentally problematic components. End of story.
You still haven't given a clear reason why you personally need 8x10 colour film at below market price. Everyone else who uses it seems to understand the specialty nature of the product.
@Lachlan Young Do you have any indications that the current Ektachrome E100 dyes don't need stabilization and the reformulation took care of this? Or if any current E6 film doesn't?
I don't recall anything like that. IIRC, PE had commented that E6 still needs formaldehyde in one form or another for dye stability. It used to be that it was an ingredient in the stabilizer bath up until the early 2000s or so, but being a gas dissolved in a solution, it was an occupational hazard for those involved in film processing. The solution to this was the replacement of the stabiliser with a final rinse bath that has a fungicide and wetting agent, but formaldehyde was kept in the form of a formaldehyde-bisulfite adduct in the pre-bleach bath. It is just as effective, but much less of an occupational hazard.I think it was commented on both by Kodak (in interviews I recall) and by Ron that the couplers were re-built to allow compatibility with a formalin free stabiliser - I think Fuji rebuilt their E-6 films in the early 2000's. You still need a stabiliser, it's just much less nasty than in the past.
PE had commented that E6 still needs formaldehyde in one form or another for dye stability.
That was for C41, not for E6.I think it was commented on both by Kodak (in interviews I recall) and by Ron that the couplers were re-built to allow compatibility with a formalin free stabiliser - I think Fuji rebuilt their E-6 films in the early 2000's. You still need a stabiliser, it's just much less nasty than in the past.
I don't recall anything like that. IIRC, PE had commented that E6 still needs formaldehyde in one form or another for dye stability. It used to be that it was an ingredient in the stabilizer bath up until the early 2000s or so, but being a gas dissolved in a solution, it was an occupational hazard for those involved in film processing. The solution to this was the replacement of the stabiliser with a final rinse bath that has a fungicide and wetting agent, but formaldehyde was kept in the form of a formaldehyde-bisulfite adduct in the pre-bleach bath. It is just as effective, but much less of an occupational hazard.
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