Citing Requests From People, FujiFilm Decides To Bring Back Its Black and White Film (dpreview.com) 74
AmiMoJo shares a report: Fujifilm has announced it will re-start black and white film manufacturing this year and will bring out a new version of its former Acros film. The new NEOPAN Acros 100 II will feature finer grain and the company claims it will be the sharpest black and white film on the market. The film will initially go on sale in Japan, with expansion to other markets depending on demand. In a press release on the Fujifilm Japan website, President Kenji Sono explains that after the company stopped production of monochrome film last year many of its users asked for production to be started again. Part of the issue for the company, he says, was that some raw materials in the film were hard to source. For the new film alternatives have been found and the production process radically changed to account for them.
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Surely you must see (Score:3, Funny)
Millennials want to return to America's Golden Age (Score:1)
What this all comes down to is the Millennial generation's subconscious desire to return to when America was a much better place to live in, with more freedom and better economic conditions, and when these older technologies were commonplace.
The problem is that these Millennials don't realize that their left wing politics are causing the very problems they're now trying to flee from by desiring older technologies from America's Golden Age.
Millennials push for open borders, not realizing that flooding Americ
Re: Millennials want to return to America's Golden (Score:1)
You should try talking to some older black Americans. Ones who were adults before 1960. They'll tell you all about how things were improving for them up until the Californian leftist radicals started trying to stir up racial tensions. These older black Americans will dispel many of the myths that the political left has since spread. These older black Americans know the role of leftists in the crack cocaine epidemic of the 1970s and 1980s, which was only halted thanks to Republican President Reagan's efforts
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For most, and on average.
How many young people can afford a home today?
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Socialism is theft as a system of government, so it can't be anything but evil.
The fact that you think the United States is a democracy disqualifies you from commenting on politics.
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Re:Surely you must see (Score:5, Insightful)
Photos are cool because they have great resolution, and if you print them on good paper, they can last incredibly long — longer than most types of digital storage media. Black and white is cool because you can develop it yourself at home with relatively benign chemicals, and simple equipment. Tube amps are perfectly valid, so long as you don't think they have more accurate sound. But vinyl is just nostalgia.
Re:Surely you must see (Score:4, Interesting)
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But vinyl is just nostalgia.
That's for sure. I'm just old enough to remember the dying days of vinyl and the emergence of CDs. Before CDs the people that wanted quality music that lasted bought their music on open reel tapes. The people that just wanted music got it on vinyl, because it was cheap. The compact cassette was a compromise for the people that wanted music on the go, because open reel was too big and vinyl couldn't take bouncing down the road.
The more interesting ways to get music on the go were just things I read about
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I also don't understand why a company doesn't release vinyl FLAC files. Capture it at like 24bit/96khz with the finest ADC and turntable that money can buy and the laws of physics dictate you're getting just as good of an experience.
Whatever "Warmth" or "Dimension" that vinyl offers will be perfectly captured in the FLAC file.
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longer than most types of digital storage media.
The ability to copy bit perfect however trumps any longevity of negatives as you can keep an ever new copy on current media.
Black and white is cool because you can develop it yourself at home with relatively benign chemicals, and simple equipment.
There is absolutely nothing benign about black and white developers. For that matter they are no better or worse for safety than colour chemicals, a process which is nothing more than repeating the black and white process 3 times, and having a waterbath prepared to ensure all developers are at the same temperature. Colour developing is easily done at home, and with either process glove
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"Relatively benign" was the statement, and B&W chemicals *are* relatively benign, compared to colour chemicals, which are quite nasty.
Perhaps it would be better to say that B&W chemicals are *less* dangerous than colour.
I think it was only kodachrome that had the three-step process for colour development. It had to be re-exposed to coloured light during one phase of development.
Colour neg and paper went: first developer, stop, colour developer, stop, bleach, fix, wash. They were also *relatively* fo
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I just remembered - reversal film has a final stage after wash. It's a rinse in a "stabiliser" solution which contained formaldehyde - more of a preservative treatment, but I guess "stabiliser" sounds less scary.
B&W process doesn't have that. B&W images are formed by metallic silver, colour films & prints have the silver bleached out, and what remains is dye - which will degrade much faster if it isn't given the preservative treatment. Metallic silver doesn't need a preservative.
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Some manufacturers of color negative/print chemicals went to a lot of trouble to simplify and speed up the process, dropping the stop bath and combining bleach and fix into a single step.
Anscochrome color reversal film had as a last step a stabilizer that included formaldehyde. Ciba had an ultra-stable color reversal paper process so toxic that they included a special chemical in the amateur processing kit, to be mixed with the other chemicals after use to detoxify them.
On the black and white side, underexp
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It's becoming more difficult to find film data sheets these days, but you would do well to read some.. The resolution figures are poor (in comparison to digital) for any film that isn't so slow that it's inconvenient to use.
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In the 35mm world, yes. Not so for medium and large format film.
Anyway, how many people (outside commercial photographers) own printers that can print at raw resolution levels? Very few - so most of that detail is thrown away when the image is printed.
And let's not forget the resolution of computer monitors, that carry even less detail.
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Most black and white photos are of still subjects, and film speed is of no consequence. For color, of course I use digital.
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I was the guy who set up Tim Burton's Corpse Bride to shoot on consumer digital still cameras instead of motion picture film. In the process of testing cameras, we compiled a reel with similar short animations shot with all the cool digital SLRs of the day (this was like 2003) . As a control, we shot the same animation with the film camera. We sent all the digital frames to film, and printed them and the film originated clip to be reasonable similar in color and exposure. We put them up in the s
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Vinyl records, tube amps, and now this? Surely people must see this is a sign of our brains devolving into mush.
So if someone wanted to:
Own and use a flintlock rifle
Restore a 1938 Ford Coupe
Play guitar on a 1955 Gibson Goldtop
That means their brains are mush?
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That means their brains are mush?
That or prepping for the coming EMP attack.
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Continuing to manufacture very mature technology, because some people prefer it over semi-finished "modern" stuff? You still use a manual hammer occasionally, do you? You know, there are "modern" alternatives available. Why do you not use them? Right.
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Vinyl records, tube amps, and now this? Surely people must see this is a sign of our brains devolving into mush.
I see it different. To play with the old stuff kinda says you're not a muggle. To be fair, to build the new stuff you can't be a muggle either.
To stream takes no talent. To play it on a boombox or phone with earphones takes no talent.
To play records takes a good turntable, and that's not plug-an-play-set-and-forget. Hi-fi is a very nerdy hobby, fiddly, and if playing with tubes, potentially lethal. It requires mechanical sensitivity and .. well, nerdy skills. It also requires inquisitiveness (isn't th
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Did you say Nipkow disk? http://www.televisionexperimen... [television...enters.com]
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The Fuji B&W stuff is really excellent (Score:2)
A while ago I used to shoot the APC format (film in cartridges). Fuji made some nice higher ISO film but they also made some really excellent B&W film that had a great look.
I still will not go back to film personally but I can for sure understand why anyone with a slight interest in film photography would want Fuji to make that film...
Problem #2 -- Where to develop it? (Score:1)
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Not the filters modern camera systems have.
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A fool and their money are soon parted.
It is foolish to engage in a hobby you enjoy in your own way?
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Perhaps those who've never experienced the "old" technology are feeling defensive about their ignorance of it. Digital image technology is fantastic, but then so is using a film camera. They scratch different itches. Show a monorail plate camera to a digital elitist and watch the confusion on their face.
Also, watching a print form in the developer bath is better watching it emerge from an inkjet. Why? You'd have to experience both to understand.
Darkroom magic (Score:4, Insightful)
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It is magic.
I used to shoot 2 1/4 film and did a lot of editing/placement under the enlarger.
Watching the image appear when the paper is immersed in developer is really amazing.
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The act of actually sitting down and going through a stack, the tactil
I still miss Agfapan 25 (Score:2)