3 ms·

Note that "professionals" still use film, particularly in the high end art market with large format and 'view' cameras in particular. One might think that's "ni

Note that "professionals" still use film, particularly in the high end art market with large format and 'view' cameras in particular. One might think that's "niche" but there are a lot of them out there.

vanderZwan 8y ago
Heck, The Impossible Project managed to bring back polaroids. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polaroid_Originals https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polaroid_Originals
- mauvehaus 8y ago
  The Impossible Project seems to be the happy coincidence of a number of people who qualify as miracle workers and the manufacturing equipment not being scrapped. I am awed by the work they're doing, even if I've never shot a Polaroid picture in my life.
  - vanderZwan 8y ago
    Well, said miracle workers used to work at the manufacturing plant, and were the ones who ensured the manufacturing equipment didn't get scrapped. That was point of their whole initial campaign! But yes, they deserve a lot of respect for what they achieved :)
- _ph_ 8y ago
  With all the respect for their achievements, their film is far from classic Polaroid.
  - vanderZwan 8y ago
    Sure, but that's understandable no? Even if they had managed to hire all of the former engineers working at the original manufacturing plant, there was probably a ton of knowledge that was simply lost when it was closed. If they now have to rediscover all of that on their own you can't expect them to recreate a century of fine-tuned knowledge from scratch. Actually, that touches on something that really saddens me: a ton of this knowledge is just lost when a company goes bankrupt. Part of The Impossible Project was to minimise that loss: > Kaps revealed through a series of blog posts and interviews in 2016 that he had personally approached Fuji about acquiring their machinery in an attempt to to rescue their soon-to-be discontinued FP3000b and FP100b packfilm products. Kaps was unsuccessful in this pursuit, but motivated by his disappointment in Fuji's decision, he established the Analogue Product Institute (API) with the goal of "developing a NEW generation of analog instant packfilm [and] Establishing a rich network of new suppliers, manufacturers and financiers from all over the world". It's not entirely unlike relying on closed source software, I guess. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polaroid_Originals#Future_and_other_formats https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polaroid_Originals#Future_and_...
mauvehaus 8y ago
I should have been more clear: I was mostly talking about the vast majority of newspaper, magazine, online, and event photography that transitioned to digital years ago, largely for cost and workflow reasons. The people doing art professionally certainly count as pros, but (wild hand-waving), most of them probably aren't subject to the kind of turnaround requirements that drove the rest of the 35mm world to digital. I suppose I'm also excluding the medium and large-format studio folks who, besides art, shoot primarily for ... advertising? I'm totally ignorant of that side of the business.

vanderZwan 8y ago

Heck, The Impossible Project managed to bring back polaroids. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polaroid_Originals https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polaroid_Originals

mauvehaus 8y ago
The Impossible Project seems to be the happy coincidence of a number of people who qualify as miracle workers and the manufacturing equipment not being scrapped. I am awed by the work they're doing, even if I've never shot a Polaroid picture in my life.
- vanderZwan 8y ago
  Well, said miracle workers used to work at the manufacturing plant, and were the ones who ensured the manufacturing equipment didn't get scrapped. That was point of their whole initial campaign! But yes, they deserve a lot of respect for what they achieved :)
_ph_ 8y ago
With all the respect for their achievements, their film is far from classic Polaroid.
- vanderZwan 8y ago
  Sure, but that's understandable no? Even if they had managed to hire all of the former engineers working at the original manufacturing plant, there was probably a ton of knowledge that was simply lost when it was closed. If they now have to rediscover all of that on their own you can't expect them to recreate a century of fine-tuned knowledge from scratch. Actually, that touches on something that really saddens me: a ton of this knowledge is just lost when a company goes bankrupt. Part of The Impossible Project was to minimise that loss: > Kaps revealed through a series of blog posts and interviews in 2016 that he had personally approached Fuji about acquiring their machinery in an attempt to to rescue their soon-to-be discontinued FP3000b and FP100b packfilm products. Kaps was unsuccessful in this pursuit, but motivated by his disappointment in Fuji's decision, he established the Analogue Product Institute (API) with the goal of "developing a NEW generation of analog instant packfilm [and] Establishing a rich network of new suppliers, manufacturers and financiers from all over the world". It's not entirely unlike relying on closed source software, I guess. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polaroid_Originals#Future_and_other_formats https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polaroid_Originals#Future_and_...

mauvehaus 8y ago

I should have been more clear: I was mostly talking about the vast majority of newspaper, magazine, online, and event photography that transitioned to digital years ago, largely for cost and workflow reasons. The people doing art professionally certainly count as pros, but (wild hand-waving), most of them probably aren't subject to the kind of turnaround requirements that drove the rest of the 35mm world to digital. I suppose I'm also excluding the medium and large-format studio folks who, besides art, shoot primarily for ... advertising? I'm totally ignorant of that side of the business.