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!

Can Kodak save itself?

The news for Kodak is not looking good. They managed to sell part of their business to raise cash, but I wonder how long they can keep things going. They are making a loss, and it seems they’re printer business is the only area with real growth.

Kodak however could do one thing to turn things around. Stop focusing your business on compact cameras and get into the system camera business, and they don;t even need to create a CSC, or mirrorless or whatever they’re calling them these days (My personal favourite is Electronic Viewfinder Interchangeable Lens – that’s a good acronym.) All Kodak have to do is retro fit a manual focus camera with Pentax K mount. (I’d go with something like the ME-Super). Slap a good APS-C sized sensor in it, and you have a manual focus digital SLR with access to cheap and plentiful PK mount lenses. Now that would be fantastic. Price it the same as an entry level Digital SLR and it would fly off the shelves.

Next you fit one with a full frame sensor and charge more and with all the hype, Kodak become relevant as an imaging company once more. Fuji have kind of caught the vision for this with the X100 and the X10. The X100 was a gamble, but it is one that seems to have gone down well with photographers. Their next gamble will be the new mirrorless system and it will be interesting to see if Fuji can pull it off.

Only time will tell if Kodak pull a rabbit out of the fiscal hat in the next year or two, but one thing is for sure, I don’t see them creating the killer camera.

Long Live Film. Long Live Digital

Thinking about film got me thinking about the old film vs digital debates that have gone on over the last few years. I’ve never seen it as a vs situation.
There are things I like about both formats. With film, I hit a comfort zone. I was good at black and white. I could see in monochrome and that worked for me. I experimented with a few films and found my favourites; the ones that gave me the kind of results I liked. I found a groove and stuck with it. I also liked the fact that I knew my camera would last. I had Nikon F100 with an F80 as backup and they were great cameras. I also had an F301 manual focus camera which I still have. It’s about 25 years old now and still working fine. Can’t imagine saying that about my D90 25 years from now.
Digital feels like starting over for me. Gone is the safety net of knowing how the image will look on a certain type of film. Gone is the skill of using a certain type of film to get a certain type of result. Now I have to deal with colour and white balance and stuff. Yet, with it comes a certain freedom that I’m really enjoying. I can afford to be creative, to experiment, to play and not have to worry about wasting film. I can see instantly if the composition worked, or if I missed something, or something might inspire me to do it differently while looking at the LCD. I may have lost some of the discipline I gained as a film photographer, but that freedom to play has brought a new sense of enjoyment to my photography. (The images used for my blog banner are a great example of this. Just messing around and looking at the patterns on the LCD. Could never have done that with film.)
Plus, with digital photography comes a new set of skills. The skills of the darkroom are now replaced with the skills of the lightroom, and best of all, I don’t have to worry about dust like I used to. (Anyone remember having a perfect print ruined by a spec of dust on the negative?)
I still have a soft spot for film; always will and I hope I can keep dipping into film photography for many more years. But digital has given me a new photographic lease of life and a renewed enthusiasm for the craft. So long live film and long live digital.