The End is Nigh…

In what will have been the news of the day for many togs, Kodak announced that they are preparing to file for bankruptcy. From comments on many forums, you’d think Kodak was dead and buried. It may look like it, but they’re only preparing, not filing. The end is not here. At least, not yet. Problem is, whichever way you look at it, it’s easy to think that they’re toast.

What will happen is anyone’s guess, but my guess is that Kodak is simply too good a brand name to pass up and there’ll be vultures in the wings just waiting to pick the corpse apart. By the look of things, Kodak are struggling to find a buyer for their digital patent portfolio, which means either there’s nothing worth having (unlikely) or the vultures are waiting until Kodak stop kicking before swooping in to buy them at bargain basement prices. I would imagine that we would see the various divisions split into separate entities, so Kodak will, I’m sure, live on, but it will be a very different beast to what it has been.

A sad footnote was added to the Reuters story…
“Kodak invented the digital camera in 1975 when one of its engineers developed a prototype that was as big as a toaster and captured black and white images. But it failed to capitalize on that innovation…”

How ironic. They pioneered their own doom. Like many tech companies, Kodak failed to remain at the forefront of digital technology and their attempts to catch up were too little, too late. (Strangely, their strategy seems to have been very similar to Fuji, who somehow managed to pull it off.)

Speaking of Fuji, they marked the day by announcing a slew of compact and bridge cameras. To say they did things the same way as Kodak is a little unfair. Fuji was proactive about keeping it’s film business alive while most people were engaged in the film vs digital battle. it also pulled a rabbit out of the hat with the X100.

It doesn’t have to be bad news either. Most photographers are starting to lament the loss of Kodak film stock, but Ilford have shown you can take a loss making business and turn it into a profitable business. The right vulture could surely do the same with a brand like Kodak, couldn’t they?

No One Uses Film Anymore…

…or so say’s Nikon.

Maybe it’s the time of year getting to me, but I came across a couple of black and white competitions and decided to enter. I’m not usually one for competitions as experience has taught me that I never win them, but I this time I thought, ‘what the heck’. It’ll be an experience.
One of them happened to be Nikon’s Inframe webzine’s photo of the month competition and there was no limit to the number of pictures I could enter, as long as they were taken with a Nikon camera. So it was time to dust off my old negatives (or scans of old negatives) and submit some of my older stuff. What a surprise to learn that only images taken with a Nikon Digital SLR or Coolpix were eligible. I guess Nikon don’t think anyone uses their film cameras anymore. So that’s it then, everyone has gone digital. It’s official. Nikon say’s so!
Seems a shame for Nikon to exclude film photographers, especially since there is not shortage of buyers for Nikon SLR’s on ebay. Indeed, it would appear that despite what Nikon thinks, there are still plenty of togs shooting film.
I’ve contacted Nikon and it should be interesting to see what they say, if they respond! Until then, I’ve got a post Christmas project involving a couple of rolls of Tmax 3200 and an F301 that has been stood on my desk for far too long.

Come on Nikon. remember some of us still use film.

Why is Kodak Screwed?

While Kodak moves ever further toward becoming a supplier of cheap Ink-jet printers (was that too harsh?) It’s sad to think how one of THE photographic innovators of the past has fallen so mightily. Then I went shopping for some T-Max 3200 for a Christmas project. With 3 photographic retailers near where I work, I thought I’d see what I could find. One of them doesn’t sell film at all. The second had film but only two rolls of Kodak film, neither of which where what I wanted. The last stocked only Fuji and mostly Ilford.

So why is it so hard to find Kodak film? Why isn’t Kodak taking the initiative, like Fuji, sponsoring websites and competitions, keeping people interested in film – their film? Surely a good place to start would be making sure you got your film where people could buy it?

Thank goodness for ebay!