thoughts on the announced Kodak film price increase?

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BrianShaw

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It wasn’t much of a memo if you can’t even figure out who wrote it. Lol.
 

MattKing

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BrianShaw

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Well here’s a clue.

The title was “Kodak FC Product List”

A quick search:
FC Group is the preferred supplier and dealer for all Kodak CTP products in strategic African countries,

https://fcexports.co.uk/
 

eli griggs

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I liked that I could buy Kodak, Ilford and other maker's 100' bulk loads without difficulty, without internet, and I didn't feel like I was paying too much for quality B&W and Colour Slide film.

I think a large part of how I feel now is the fact that Kodak was bought by people looking to their goal of taking profits at the cost of seriously damaging the Core Company film producing abilities.
 
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faberryman

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eli griggs said:
I think a large part of how I feel now is the fact that Kodak was bought by people looking to their goal of taking profits at the cost of seriously damaging the Core Company film producing abilities.
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Who was Kodak bought by and how did they seriously damage their film producing abilities?
 
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Sirius Glass

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MattKing said:
I've deleted a bunch of posts that are mostly people arguing about other people.
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If that were done more often the self appointed thread destroyers, aka thread killers, would stop because they would then see such actions can reduce their thread counts.
 

Helios 1984

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The Kodak Gold 200 3-pack has gone up to 16.98$, at my local Walmart. The price has increased by 4.10$ during the past 15 months or so.
 

removed account4

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thanks matt!
I didn't see destroya's post and someone alluded to "post 21" and I couldn't find it !
btw psychic's don't rely on written notes they are mental notes! there was an X-Files episode on this very thing..
the 2nd part of that bit was "so many psychics have gone out of business these days, you'd think they would have known". ..
http://instantrimshot.com
 

destroya

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i got it from a friend who knows i shoot film who got it from another friend (u can see where this is going) who lives in the UK. i take it a face value, more as a potential pricing than anything else. I was informed that the product numbers are real.

didn't mean to raise a stink, just wanted to pass along what I had, which was just a little more than hearsay

john
 

MattKing

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eli griggs said:
I think a large part of how I feel now is the fact that Kodak was bought by people looking to their goal of taking profits at the cost of seriously damaging the Core Company film producing abilities.
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Way back when, before the bankruptcy, Eastman Kodak was already owned by the sorts of institutional investors who cared about long term return plus short term profits - not film.
When profits plummeted, Eastman Kodak thrashed around seeking something that would at least approximate the margins and returns that the shareholders had enjoyed for decades.
They never found a replacement for those lost profits, used up a huge surplus of cash, and went into bankruptcy.
One of their better investments was in CREO - a commercial printing asset that was local to our area and had been both flexible and likely to be very profitable into the future.
The takeover by Eastman Kodak appears to have ended most of that flexibility.
The film business sunk to a tiny fraction of what it was, but it seems to be stable and growing slightly from that fraction, so there is hope.
The previous investors? They lost just about everything. Some of the creditors got some of their money in the form of shares.
 

markjwyatt

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Helios 1984 said:
The Kodak Gold 200 3-pack has gone up to 16.98$, at my local Walmart. The price has increased by 4.10$ during the past 15 months or so.
Click to expand...

I noted elsewhere that I saw a 3-pack of 135-36 Fujicolor Superia 400 XTRA for $40 (Rite Aid).
 
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warden

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eli griggs said:
.... Kodak was bought by people looking to their goal of taking profits at the cost of seriously damaging the Core Company film producing abilities.
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What film producing abilities have been damaged? I keep hearing that Kodak is making the finest films they have ever made.
 

eli griggs

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Well, for starters, they shut down and shed machinery/lines, which seems to be needed now but they simply do no have and I doubt, will replace, ever.
 

warden

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eli griggs said:
Well, for starters, they shut down and shed machinery/lines, which seems to be needed now but they simply do no have and I doubt, will replace, ever.
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I'm still not sure what you're talking about. They downsized, yes, because they had to. What specific machines/lines do they need but not have?
 

markjwyatt

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I think Kodak and Fuji are still making high quality films (professional color films, a few others join them to some degree in B&W). I do not think there is a lot of effort in research and development towards next generation photographic products. That said, the state of the art we are left with is a very high technology state, and the products produced are at the peak of where film development more or less ended. It will take some impetus for that development to restart. I am not sure where that impetus will come from, or if it will even come. If it does not come, Kodak and Fuji may find it increasingly harder to maintain that state of the art, and the cost of doing so will increase.
 
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eli griggs

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QUOTE="Kodachromeguy, post: 2481056, member: 80844"]What is the data that supports this? What do the annual reports state? How about Forbes, Economist, or Fortune?[/QUOTE]
warden said:
I'm still not sure what you're talking about. They downsized, yes, because they had to. What specific machines/lines do they need but not have?
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You'll have to read some of the many articles and reports about their operations and see what is being said as excuses by the company to explain why they can no keep up with demand.
 

removed account4

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eli griggs said:
Kodak was bought by people looking to their goal of taking profits at the cost of seriously damaging the Core Company film producing abilities.
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the inability to make film at a small scale is what damaged the Core Company's film producing ability not so much with what you have alluded to. Other companies were able to scale back their operations, Eastman Kodak wasn't able to do that, Ron Mowery spoke about this often. Apuggers who who toured the Harman / Ilford Plant saw the coating facility which by all reports was small, compared to an Building 38 at Kodak Park.
 
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markjwyatt

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Making Kodak Film, Robert Shanebrook, 2nd ed. has a lot of info. on what went into developing the current Porta 400.

I suspect since that time R&D efforts at Kodak (or Fuji) for photographic film have slowed considerably, and even during that time were slowing since the late 1990s early 2000s.

You can argue Porta 400 is not "better" than say VPS III, but that becomes a statement of your personal tastes, and that is valid. Unless you are doing techncial photography, older film stocks may be more suited to your artistic inclinations. Fortunately, at least for B&W film, there is some availibility of older style film stocks, but perhaps not the ones that many want (say Plus-X, Pan- X, etc.). Some people are not as hot on tabular grain technology; though it weas a very significant development effort by Kodak (and others) to develop and implement it, and it offers benefits per some metrics (e.g., granularity for instance). I think tabular grain is creeeping into some older film stocks. Some people even say that Tri-X has some tabular grain in it now.
 
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Helios 1984

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markjwyatt said:
I noted elsewhere that I saw a 3-pack of 135-36 Fujicolor Superia 400 XTRA for $40 (Rite Aid).
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The nearest drugstore used to sell the 3-pack at 38.99$ before ditching films about a year ago. There's another drugstore in the vicinity that sells Kodak Ultramax 400 1x24exp at 9.95$.
 
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