A stupid Question

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Keith Atkinson
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A stupid Question

Post by Keith Atkinson » Wed Mar 09, 2011 5:51 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

here is a stupid question....
how long do you think LF will continue?
The only reason I ask is that Ive recently bought my MPP MK VII. Although, quite honestly I know an LF camera is basically a box with a hole at both ends separated by replacable bellows and easily replacable lenses, I wonder..would buying a shen hao or linhof have been better? as far as I can see the issue is regarding lens boards....

Adrian Twiss
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Re: A stupid Question

Post by Adrian Twiss » Wed Mar 09, 2011 7:25 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

I am 53 years old and recon I will be long dead before LF photography becomes untenable. Remember there are people using cameras up to 100 years old. That's the beauty of wood - anyone with cabinet making skills can adapt an old camera to modern film sizes. With regards to your MPP - at the risk of stating the obvious a lens board is simply a flat piece of metal (or wood) with a hole in it. Any half decent engineering firm should be able to make one. Buy some self adhesive blacking material and you have taken care of any potential flare issues.

What will begin to bite is the increasing price of film. Silver is currently sitting at $36 per troy ounce. This is an all time high. Ilford are now expensive. Whilst Foma and Adox films are considerably cheaper at present I am not sure that they can complete with regards to consistent quality control. Don't get me wrong - neither Foma or Adox produce Rubbish but their instances of problems do seem to be a little more frequent than the other big 3.

I'm sure your MPP will give you many years of sterling service.

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IanG
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Re: A stupid Question

Post by IanG » Wed Mar 09, 2011 9:02 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

At worst I guess I'd coat my own :D

But then I used to be a photo chemist . . . . . . . . . .

Ian

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Re: A stupid Question

Post by Peter B » Wed Mar 09, 2011 9:32 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

I don't think you have much to worry about Keith, since 5x4 will probably be the last LF size to disappear. I think that this year's Ilford LF run may be quite scarily priced, but fingers crossed that it isn't too bad. I've got a wholeplate camera with some Wephota film that came with it, plus a box of Ilford bought secondhand from an earlier LF run, but it also came with a halfplate back that takes 5x7 film holders, so I'm looking to shoot 5x7 this year. I have a fond hope that some day I'll find a shot worthy of the wholeplate, but I'll need to start taking better photos first! :roll:

Keith Atkinson
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Re: A stupid Question

Post by Keith Atkinson » Thu Mar 10, 2011 2:48 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Well, heres hoping. Apparently my first roll of fujichrome, shot using a wista 6x7 back, will be in the post to me tonight, so at least I'll know if I have any light leaks.... :D

Emmanuel Bigler
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Re: A stupid Question

Post by Emmanuel Bigler » Fri Mar 11, 2011 10:15 am Etc/GMT-1+01:00

since 5x4 will probably be the last LF size to disappear.

As far as I am concerned, being an uncomproising Continental & Metric photographer, since I acquired a precision cutter/trimmer, the last format to disappear will be 9x12 (cm) and, at least for me, 9x12 (cm) will definitely outlast 5x4" by a few months :mrgreen:
However, I'm still trying to figure out how I could simply transform a 7x5" into a metric 13x18 ...

Georges Giralt
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Re: A stupid Question

Post by Georges Giralt » Sat Mar 12, 2011 12:53 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Hello Keith,
If you plan to make LF last, buy wooden MPP DDS. They're old enough to acomodate glass plate (be sure to get the metal sheat that convert them to film base, though). When the supply of film in 4x5 will fade, you could start making your own glass plates. Wet collodion seems to get a large revival these days.
IMHO I'm more concerned by the demise of roll films (135 or 120) as there is no home made substitute. So I try to keep shooting them to help the manufacturers survive.... But as my consumption is less than microscopic, I doubt they can survive with my orders...

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Re: A stupid Question

Post by timparkin » Sun Mar 13, 2011 12:34 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Large format photography will be around for the forseeable future (it has as much chance of dying out as painting & live music) however the risks are the biggest when it comes to roll films and also colour films. The main risk is that either Fuji or Kodak make stupid decisions to close down the plants that create the film - I say stupid because film sales are no longer really dropping (at least sheet film and 120 isn't) which is reflected in the fact that Kodak have release three new colour films in the last two years - you can guarantee they wouldn't be doing that if sales were plummeting.

I would say the biggest risk is to Fuji as their management is unpredictable at best and it isn't beyond them to shut down a profitable line and out of pride, refuse to sell the equipment and knowledge to a third party.

Given their big move to repackage all of their sheet film into 20 sheet boxes, they obviously see a profitable future (otherwise they'd just up the price of the 10 sheet boxes until they became untenable).

It is rumoured that Kodak are going to sell of their film division (this has been rumoured quite often though). As the film industry is still tightly bound to 'film', the chances of this going bump are minimal. In order to digital to take over, all of the small cinemas in third world countries would have to be converted to digital (not going to happen until good projectors go past commodity items and end up as almost throwaway items).

It is more likely that the film unit is for sale as part of a corporate 'split' in order to financially isolate systems from risk (i.e. to stop a sudden collapse in film from affecting other portions of the company).

All sales of film related items point to a very strong film scene, second hand prices are going up - new film cameras are being produced (by Fuji for heavens sake! why would they make a brand new 120 film camera and then kill off 120 film!!).

The very worst case scenario is that both Fuji and Kodak shut down and a chinese plant reverse engineers the technology for colour film. It won't be the same, but it won't be dead either.

Black and white film is like home cooking in comparison to mass catering that is colour film. As long as their is a small amount of interests, films will be produced.

If I were to put money on colour film being around, I'd happily bet a few thousand on an evens bet that we'll have at least velvia and portra around until the late 2020s

At which point I'll have my black and white darkroom set up in the shed :-)

Tim
Waiting for the developing bill - 2 hours (and it's so small now!)

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Re: A stupid Question

Post by mark e mark » Sun Mar 13, 2011 12:55 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

MPP VII is a great camera, I have had mine for ~4 years. Join the MPP users club http://www.mppusers.com, and they should be able to provide you with new boards. The engineering on the MPP is more like the linhof than the shen hao.

Some day there maybe a 5x4 digital back you can slap on the back of the MPP - film will seem cheap in comparison :D
MPP VII and VIII user + Walker XL 57

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Thingy
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Re: A stupid Question

Post by Thingy » Mon Mar 14, 2011 4:58 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Maybe we'll have migrated to something one of these.... but all self contained like the Hasselblad digital backs.....

http://www.betterlight.com/products4X5.html
Love is an Ebony mounted with a Cooke PS945.......

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Re: A stupid Question

Post by Marizu » Mon Mar 21, 2011 1:40 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Georges Giralt wrote:When the supply of film in 4x5 will fade, you could start making your own glass plates. Wet collodion seems to get a large revival these days.
Georges is absolutely correct.
With wet plate large format can not die out until the silver nitrate runs out :)
Actually, wet plate could help it to flourish. I would never even have considered ULF but now I'm wondering about it because the wet plate allows me to cut the sizes of glass that I want as I need it. I don't need to stock film in different sizes, just sheets of glass to cut as I need them.

As for film, there are a number of small scale manufacturers making b&w film so I think that the future is bright on that front.
The longer term risk is probably with colour. The complexities of multiple coating seem to make this difficult on a smaller scale.
Take a listen to the interviews with Ron Mowrey on the Inside Analog Radio podcasts for more information on the issues relating to film production.

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Re: A stupid Question

Post by CarlRadford » Wed Apr 13, 2011 12:32 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Kodak had Keith Canham on their stand at one the the photo annual shows in the USA this year. Kodak seem pretty commited to colour and b&w film for the forseeable future. And like Marizu has said - join in the wet plate revival fun otherwise!

Neil Barnes
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Re: A stupid Question

Post by Neil Barnes » Sun Apr 24, 2011 9:42 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00

Having looked at the price for a box of FP4+ recently, I was a little shocked to discover it was a quid a sheet... mind you, the local Jessops had exactly seventeen packets of film of any type in the store, and no chemistry...

B&H have FP4+ at ninety bucks for a box of 100, but I'm not flying in and out of NYC these days.

The problem is, colour films get all the silver back once the processing's finished - you just rent it for a while and trade it for some dye, really - but us poor b&w types can only recycle what's left in the fixer... and of course we *love* those rich deep blacks... (thinks - so most of the silver in the negative ends up in the fixer, I'm guessing somewhat under a tenth of a gram for a 4x5 print... time to start recycling!)

Neil

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