Jack Davis wrote:
How much longer will starving film cameras demand 35mm
color pos/neg films be produced? What level of
production and availability would qualify as "in
production"?
What's the likelihood of film's resuscitation through
some manner of structural breakthrough?
Un-answerable, but care to muse?
I was thinking the other day about things I remember from my childhood
(I was born in 1968):
Visiting the "As-Is" section of a local thrift store. "You can buy one
thing up to $1.00". I found some relic of a malfunctioning bellows
camera. I wonder whatever happened to that.
My first (functioning) camera: A 126 with flashcube.
Sitting in the back seat of the stationwagon while my parents pass
through the "PhotoHut" drive-through to pick up their prints and slides.
Family gatherings with the slide projector. Dad always messing around
with the focus until we were all dizzy. Slides always getting stuck in
the mechanism. Remember how they pop out of focus if they get too hot?
Our Polaroid One-Step; a photographic disappointment.
Junior High School Photography class: Developing B&W negatives and
processing my own prints. Building a pinhole camera. Opening a new
world of creativity.
Dad got himself an Olympus OM-2n and began acquiring lenses. I can
still name most of them: 50mm f/1.4, 85mm f/1.8, 135mm f/2.8, 24mm
f/2.8, 28mm f/2.8, 35-70 f/??, Vivitar teleconverter: 2x, and 1:1 macro.
I had a lot of fun with that camera too.
Taking my own slides and prints on an extended trip to Portugal
(1987-1989), with a hand-me-down Canon A1 (or something like that; a
split-image focusing camera that looked a lot like an SLR but wasn't).
My PZ-20: A chance to dig a little deeper into the hobby.
My ZX-5n: I tried new film almost every month there for awhile: Royal
Gold, Gold, Max, Porta 400VC, 160NC, Supra 100, 400, 800, NHG 800,
Superia 400, Reala 100, Tri-X, and so on... pushing, pulling, filtering,
rewinding with the leader out so I can swap but still finish the roll
later, etc.
A kid born in 2008 (when I turn 40) won't ever process his own prints,
won't experiment with film, won't pick up prints at PhotoHut, won't
watch family slide shows on a projector screen, and won't know that 24
Exposure rolls really have 25 shots on them if you're lucky. ;)
