What's happened to the Website Emulsive?

[Eric Rose]

It was fairly active with new content until late January. Then nothing.

Eric

 

[Film-Niko]

Maybe not enough readers anymore, as the young film photographers emulsive have mainly written for are probably preferring youtube as a medium (but that is of course just a guess by me).
And there are hundreds of youtubers concentrating on film photography (lots of low quality content, but there a few who are doing a good job).

 

[fiddle]

I have noticed the same thing.
Another site that is very similar that I look at once in a while is https://www.35mmc.com/
Very similar content. I believe there is some relation between the two.

 

[Pioneer]

I do enjoy the content on both sites. It would be a shame to lose them both to youtube but I guess it is all about what the young find interesting, not what us old farts care to see. That is why we get new film cameras that are only halfway there.

 

[Eric Rose]

I've written for both and was working on some new article ideas. Just wondering if I should spread the articles between them or forget about Emulsion. That would be sad.

eric

 

[Rob Skeoch]

I wrote one piece for Emulsion. Never received any feedback or interest in another article. Just saying.

 

[JParker]

I wrote one piece for Emulsion. Never received any feedback or interest in another article. Just saying.

Does not surprise me. A friend of mine made very bad experiences with them.

 

[rorye]

I had a feature with them and I have to say they were very nice to work with. I'm sorry to hear they're gone.

 

[AZD]

I have wondered what was going on with Emulsive. Sadly I pretty much gave up on them. I suspect that video is a more engaging medium for “First look at new film XXX,” “How to shoot XXX,” “My first roll,” and whatnot.

The website format, at least for me, is better for articles written by someone with, well, something interesting to say. I hope that doesn’t sound mean.

Even 35MMC hasn’t had as much interesting (to me) content recently. I hope this is just a lull as I rather like the site and have enjoyed many articles, especially those by Gerard Exupery and Jordi Fradera.

These sites are at their best when they provide content that is more about the meaning and value of photography rather than film and gear reviews. I suppose that’s making it sound easier than it is. Anyone can shoot a roll and post the scans, but it takes a bit more effort and perspective to create an interesting narrative. If I had the skills I’d try to help out rather than diagnose, but, well…

 

[blee1996]

Emulsive is definitely paused for more than half a year now. I don't know what is happening, but typically there is motivation issues and economic considerations.

As an alternative 35mmc is still going well, and you can publish articles there with WordPress self-submission and editing portal.

 

[Sean]

I've always wanted a new front end for Photrio (Homepage), maybe WordPress, to allow us to publish content for a more interesting home page and further reach. I'll create a poll soon and see if we have enough interest for contributors.

 

[blee1996]

In my humble opinion, WordPress is not that great for lots of concurrent users with dynamic content. At least in our experiences, the performance is lacking compared to more modern frameworks. Even 35mmc had suffered quite a lot of performance problems in recent years.

On the other hand, it does enable collaborative publishing of blog type content by community members. Very easy for content contributors to draft, edit, and submit original articles.

 

[Sean]

In my humble opinion, WordPress is not that great for lots of concurrent users with dynamic content. At least in our experiences, the performance is lacking compared to more modern frameworks. Even 35mmc had suffered quite a lot of performance problems in recent years.

On the other hand, it does enable collaborative publishing of blog type content by community members. Very easy for content contributors to draft, edit, and submit original articles.

Yeah, it's definitely quite bloaty.. I'll need to investigate some options.

 

[Angarian]

I've always wanted a new front end for Photrio (Homepage), maybe WordPress, to allow us to publish content for a more interesting home page and further reach. I'll create a poll soon and see if we have enough interest for contributors.

That would be really great!

Concerning alternative to Emulsive: I have always prefered https://casualphotophile.com/ for camera reviews. Because of higher quality in most cases.

I really like written reviews in general.

There are lots of reviews on youtube meanwhile, but only a very small percentage is really very well made and helpful for the viewer.
In most cases in 90-95% of the time you see the filmfluencers running around taking shots of boring things, underlined by fancy music. But no helpful information given.
In the rest of 5-10% of the time of the video you get information, but often quite superficial, and only subjective impressions / feelings. No hard facts, no real tests.
The ratio of spended time watching the video vs. useful information is often quite bad.

In written reviews I mostly receive more and better information, more straight to the point. And after a 3-5 minutes read I am better informed in most cases compared to most 15 min. filmfluencer videos.
There are some exceptions on youtube, like e.g. "Photography Online" (excellent), or Analog Insights (good to very good). But that are rare cases.

 

[Arthurwg]

Very sad. Emulsive has published some really great stuff, like "The Complete Guide to the Mamiya RZ67" in five parts.

 

[Oldwino]

These sites are at their best when they provide content that is more about the meaning and value of photography rather than film and gear reviews. I suppose that’s making it sound easier than it is. Anyone can shoot a roll and post the scans, but it takes a bit more effort and perspective to create an interesting narrative. If I had the skills I’d try to help out rather than diagnose, but, well…

I agree with you, but I've heard and read enough interviews with "content creators" to know that the gear review posts get the most views, and that's what counts...

 

[ZhanTeh]

Similar to other commenters I have also written for both 35mmc and Emulsive. I enjoyed the light reading both sites provided.

However, I have since given up on Emulsive for the past year or so. I do most of these reading on mobile and find the Emulsive interface to be unusable. Ads galore and difficult to navigate/find articles.

I still visit 35mmc.

 

[blee1996]

I think 35mmc strikes a good balance: if you are a contributor or subscriber, then the website is ads free; on the other hand, even casual visitors (non-subscribers) have reasonable experience. Also the site owner Hamish has other photography related business, so he has some financial flexibility and not solely relying on 35mmc as sole income. Lots of blog owners have passion about photography, but few can make it financially sustainable.

 

[Stephen Prunier]

Very sad. Emulsive has published some really great stuff, like "The Complete Guide to the Mamiya RZ67" in five parts.

Being an RZ67 owner, I've come to enjoy that guide and still refer to it when needed.

 

[Sirius Glass]

Another great photography resource bite the dust.

 

[Eric Rose]

I contacted a friend of EM for the scoop. Seems after having a kid EM has basically fallen off the planet. He is not responding to anyone. Total silence. I hope there wasn't a tragedy in EM's family.

Eric

 

[perkeleellinen]

If it's anythnig like my experience, having a kid meant I had to drop everything for the first six months, it was crazy.