Think I've just shot my last E6 film!

OlyMan · Jul 26, 2018

Just too darn expensive.

Last time I shot a roll of E6 was 2005. I walked into my local photography store and purchased a roll of 36 exposure process-paid Fuji Sensia for £13.99. I think even the envelope it came with was Freepost, but that might be a lie, it's possible I may have had to shell out 30p for a first class stamp, but not exactly a drama even so.

Fast forward to 2018. £12.79 for a roll of Fuji Provia F, purchased online because nowhere locally sells E6 any more. Processing and mount = £13.19 (£10.99+VAT) at CC Imaging, actually one of the cheapest online processors I could find. And tomorrow, Royal Mail will rob me of £2.95 to post it as a parcel, because during the last ten years they've changed the rules and the package is now about 3 gnat hairs too thick to be posted as a letter. So in total: £12.79 + £13.19 + £2.95 = £28.93.

Nearly thirty quid to buy a roll of one of the cheapest 36exp slide films still available and have the mounted slides posted back to me.

Mega ouch.

railwayman3 · Jul 26, 2018

I have some old price lists in magazines from the mid-1960's which suggest that for some years the price of a 36 exp process-paid Kodachrome was around 30-shillings (£1.50). Applying the Retail Prices Index from 1965 to now makes this the equivalent of £29.46, surprisingly near to your present cost of Provia F !

Of course, thirty quid still seems exhorbitent ! And the postage on one of the little Kodachrome mailers was just "four-pence-hapenny" (less than 2p) in 1965, the equivalent of 38p now.
A bit different to £2.95, but we must understand that we have to pay the ££££££ salary of the Royal Mail chairman (in the newspaper this week that he apparently lives in Switzerland and comes into the office one day a week. Makes you )

OlyMan · Jul 26, 2018

I vaguely remember it costing my dad about £3.99 for process-paid Agfa and Fuji in the late 70s, which equates to about £20 today. Add on another 50% due to the fact barely any people are using slide film any more and that's the £30 justified I guess. But IMO it still feels like an awful lot of money.

mshchem · Jul 26, 2018

It is a lot of money . If I look at what my Dad spent for Kodachrome and 25B flashbulbs in the 50's probably pretty close to today. Flashbulbs were 10 cents a piece,90% silver dime, worth about a dollar and a quarter today. We were spoiled by mass production and cheap processing.
Prices are lower in the US. Our central bank just prints more money and we go deeper in debt, thus no VAT. I have a Fuji kit that will process film for about 3 bucks a roll but then there's the mounting. I love 6x6 slides for projection.

Poisson Du Jour · Jul 26, 2018

A roll of 35mm Provia 100F here in Australia is $28.75, less if you have a VIP account with any of the dealers where a 10% discount comes into play (and even more still if it is a quantity buy). Processing is $8.80, but no mounting is offered -- is not done anywhere in Australia now. This 135/RDPIII example adds up to $37.55, in Australian dollars, considerably less than the $51.40 total I came to in converting your expense. Even by my overly liberal standards I think you are being ripped off. The first place to start cutting the cost is mounting. If you are not projecting the slides often and frequently, just put them in PrintVue archival sleeves (they are better protected in these anyhow). Not a lot can be done about Royal Mail, but then again, we whine and gripe about Australia Post being in cahoots with eBay to monopolise postage and delivery!

Alan Edward Klein · Jul 26, 2018

They have to make a profit. Although it's high, at least it's still available.

shutterfinger · Jul 26, 2018

Shoot several rolls, buy the chemicals to process it and do it yourself.

BrianShaw · Jul 26, 2018

I’ll never forget my last...

Poisson Du Jour · Jul 26, 2018

BrianShaw said:
I’ll never forget my last...

I'll never forget my first...

PaulQ · Jul 27, 2018

Dscolourlabs website shows a develop and mount price of £9, with free postage. Not sure if that's still current ,& I can't comment on quality as I haven't used them.

railwayman3 · Jul 27, 2018

Having commented on relative prices, I'll reply to the OP.

I have a considerable stock of various E6 films, 120 and 35mm, all well frozen, and sufficient to last me for several years. Hopefully processing, or home kits, will be available for long enough to allow me to use these.....I am also conscious of possible deterioration if the films are kept too long (Elitechrome from 2006 is showing very slight color shift, no problem for scanning but visible on projection if super-critical).

I may buy a small further stock while available....or I might not. I can't see the new Ektachrome being inexpensive, and Ferrania still has a long way to go to produce any color film, and (going by what has happened with P30) it could take them even longer to produce a consistent, quality, E6 film (that's not a criticism!).

OTOH, I have thousands of slides (not to mention color and B&W negs!), enough to keep me happily occupied in printing or scanning for many years, even if I never took another shot, so I'm not too worried at this time.

RattyMouse · Jul 27, 2018

Yep, E6 is just too expensive to be sustainable.

removed account4 · Jul 27, 2018

OlyMan said:
Just too darn expensive.

Last time I shot a roll of E6 was 2005. I walked into my local photography store and purchased a roll of 36 exposure process-paid Fuji Sensia for £13.99. I think even the envelope it came with was Freepost, but that might be a lie, it's possible I may have had to shell out 30p for a first class stamp, but not exactly a drama even so.

Fast forward to 2018. £12.79 for a roll of Fuji Provia F, purchased online because nowhere locally sells E6 any more. Processing and mount = £13.19 (£10.99+VAT) at CC Imaging, actually one of the cheapest online processors I could find. And tomorrow, Royal Mail will rob me of £2.95 to post it as a parcel, because during the last ten years they've changed the rules and the package is now about 3 gnat hairs too thick to be posted as a letter. So in total: £12.79 + £13.19 + £2.95 = £28.93.

Nearly thirty quid to buy a roll of one of the cheapest 36exp slide films still available and have the mounted slides posted back to me.

Mega ouch.

yeah kind of expensive.
but at least it wasn't kodachrome you bought and CANT get processed !
just think if it was the new codakhrome™ it would only be 100$ a roll not including processing
what is it they say, the only people who ask/complain about price are the
folks who can't afford it

actually i know its kind of expensive.. i won't have my chromes processed like chromes
they sip coffee with their friends and come out monochrome..

benjiboy · Jul 27, 2018

I don't worry about E6 film and processing costs because I don't drink or smoke, and my photography is the only vice I have.. I never order my slides to be mounted which makes the processing cheaper and I only mount the ones in AN glass mounts that are worth mounting for projection.

perkeleellinen · Jul 27, 2018

My uncle used a roll of Kodachrome to shoot my parents' wedding in 1966. I was projecting those slides recently and told my aunt that it must have cost my uncle a lot to buy that film in the '60s. Her reply was that she remembered he bought the roll from a work mate and it was so expensive that he waited two years for an event important enough to use it.

guangong · Jul 27, 2018

Usually have a camera or two loaded with E6 although primarily use BW. 35mm mounted or unmounted are same price. Always mount 456, 66 and 67 myself. After all, how many shots on a roll are worth projecting? Sometimes none. Any plastic art, painting, drawing, etching, sculpture, is not cheap. Musical instruments are not cheap.
The only way to save money is to be very selective when tripping the shutter, but even then few pictures pass muster.

xtolsniffer · Jul 27, 2018

I don't shoot that much colour these days, I've mostly gone monochrome, but I do use Portra for the family photos and get through a few rolls of Velvia a year. I wince at the price of both films and processing/printing, but then to be honest I always have done. Back in my student days, saving up to buy a roll of Kodachome 25 (I still miss it) was a major undertaking. I can afford to shoot much more film now than I ever could in the past but my perception is that it's always been expensive, it just seems proportionally more expensive now because each of those images costs a real tangible amount, while on digital the perception is that it's 'free' and you can take as many as you like for nothing. I just treat every little transparency frame as a small beautiful treasure, that way it seems to be worthwhile....

warden · Jul 27, 2018

shutterfinger said:
Shoot several rolls, buy the chemicals to process it and do it yourself.

Yes, it does seem the OP has chosen the most expensive way to enjoy E6. Doing it yourself isn't for everyone but it saves a lot of money if you're a regular shooter.

destroya · Jul 27, 2018

the cost is an issue, but if you want "those" results that you can only get from shooting slide film, than you gotta deal with it. I usually save up my shot rolls and do a twice or three times a year developing marathon when i have 12-18 rolls saved up. if you develop yourself, the cost is less. it's nice when hang your film to dry and go back a few weeks or months and remember the location or event that you shot. Kind of makes it worth while, the waiting for developing (at least thats what I tell myself to justify it).

the cost per roll here in the US is not that bad. Velvia 50 in 120 is only about $2 more than ektar and if you do your own developing, it works out to about $4-5 a roll depending on which kit you use, either tetenal or fuji hunt.

slide film is a very small niche market and those, like me, who appreciate the end results will shoot slides as long as its viable.

Sirius Glass · Jul 27, 2018

I am glad that there are still slide films available especially as long as it does not include Cockroachrome.

lantau · Jul 27, 2018

The guys from Photoklassik keep telling us that slide is cheaper than shooting and printing negative film. And they are probably right, at least if you print large to compete with projection.

From what I see any commercial development in the US is very expensive and in the UK, well, what isn't expensive there. I pay €5,68 for processing a 35mm roll. 120 film is cheaper: €4.63. Those prices include 19% VAT, but shipping is extra at roughly €3.50.

After my recent holiday I sent all slide film of this year out for development (shipping out cost me €2.60). 19 rolls in total. I paid €106,39, including VAT and return shipping. That also included 2x push development (50% surcharge) and one roll was TMY (120) developed in the Scala process.

I'd say that is some money but a fair price. I sent out the envelope so that it arrived on Monday, which is the day on which they do the weekly Scala run. E6 is done all day, every day. The slides were in my mailbox on Wednesday (they must have been busy and shipped out on Tuesday).

If there is no competitive service in the UK it might be cheaper to use a service on the continent. Though, the whole shipping thing will become more complicated/less convenient some time next year.

Shawn Rahman · Jul 27, 2018

Yes - it is expensive, even in the U.S. About $25 a roll sounds about right, all in, for mounted slides returned to you.

BUT... no other photographic endeavor I've ever undertaken has matched the breathtaking wonder of looking at a well-exposed slide on a good loupe and lightbox. My print film and digital experience has never even come close.

lantau · Jul 27, 2018

I forgot to mention that above prices are without mounting. The service seems to be offered, but I want film strips back. I only mount selected frames after I (eventually) digitise them first. Like any film I put the strips on a light plate and anti newton glas on top and then digi repro them. That way film is perfectly flat and the slide frames would prevent that.

bestbefore1978 · Jul 27, 2018

We offer E6 processing at silverpan.co.uk £6 processed and returned unmounted or £11 mounted (its the relative availability and cost of mounts that makes it more expensive these days) - free return postage

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pentaxuser · Jul 28, 2018

OlyMan, have a look at AGPhotolab as well as silverpan. It is difficult to tell which is the cheaper as it would appear that AGPhotolab will give you a Freepost label for sending film in and charge £3.49 for its return whereas silverpan does not offer Freepost labels but it isn't clear to me if its price includes free delivery. It would seem unlikely but I may be doing it a disservice with such speculation.

There may be delays in processing at silverpan as it is done in batches. If there is a similar delay at AGPhotolab then this is not obvious. Certainly I know that AGPhotolab does a good job but I have no knowledge of silverpan.

Both would certainly appear to be a lot cheaper than your current price.

pentaxuser

Think I've just shot my last E6 film!

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