On the other hand there are several small (mostly old pre-WWII Kodak) film plants around the world that make nothing but B&W products. They will probably still be in business when Kodak, Fuji, and Agfa (remember Agfa already has tried to sell off its film devision with no takers) drop out of film altogether. Ilford is iffy because they have been raising their prices slowly, maybe they will find an equilibrium that will allow them to remain profitable.
And actually both B&W and Slide Film are already niche markets here in the US. They may not drop a great deal in use as a result of digital. Color negative which is currently the biggest market will continue to be hit hard. As long as there are processing machines that handle both film and digital it will remain viable, but eventually they will be replaced by digital only, or even disappear as it gets easier and cheaper for users to print their own digit shots at home.
Unfortunately there are no longer the consumer protection laws that require them to produce film for 7 years after they quit making the cameras. Fortunately 35mm, 120, and 4x5 have become the standards in the past 50 years and those formats probably will be around for at least another decade. Betting on them being around longer than that is a fools bet if there ever was one. Because by then digital cameras will be cheaper than film cameras and only old die-hards will even consider using film.
TV remains the standard that the public compares images to. How many times have you been in someones house where the TV showed green faces and purple grass and it did not bother the viewer at all? Digital has no problem matching that quality with even the cheapest cameras.
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Anders Hultman wrote:
On Mon, 27 Oct 2003, graywolf wrote:
My prediction? Color film will be hard to find in 5 years.
Have you taken into account that 35 mm film is used in cinema as well? There will eventually be a shift to digital there as well, but hardly in five years time.
anders ------------------------- http://anders.hultman.nu/
-- graywolf http://graywolfphoto.com
"You might as well accept people as they are, you are not going to be able to change them anyway."
