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Topic: Paramount kills off 35mm in the US
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 11-26-2013 12:21 PM
quote: Bobby Henderson
35mm negative film is made on different production lines.
Some of the processes are common to all motion picture and still film, film base casting and slitting being the main ones. So when motion picture print stock production ends, the infrastructure cost of these common processes will have to be distributed over a much smaller volume of remaining sales.
The emulsion "brewing" and coating is unique to each stock type, which is why there are already very long waiting lists for many of the lesser used intermediate and master stocks, while Kodak accumulates enough orders to justify a production run. Apparently (I wasn't there, but am reporting what was told to me by someone who was), a Kodak executive speaking at the AMIA conference earlier this month said that each production batch of a given stock type has a retail value, at current price lists, of several million $$, and they need orders in place for most it before the production can take place. Needless to say, archives are having the biggest problems here, because they are about the only customers left who want, say, b/w optical negative recording stock or orthochromatic fine grain pos in 16mm, etc. etc. (in production, DI work has taken over the functions these stocks used to be used for), and the world's archives simply aren't in the market for enough stock to enable continuous production at Rochester and for Kodak to hold ongoing inventories.
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Terry Lynn-Stevens
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1081
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Dec 2012
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posted 11-26-2013 03:25 PM
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quote: Scott Norwood
In (possibly) related news, Kodak has announced a price increase on nearly all of its motion-picture products. Estimate is about a 10% increase. This takes effect on January 1.
Here is some more related news.
Eastman Kodak Co. has laid off roughly 40 Rochester workers, most of them employed in film manufacturing
The layoffs in recent days mark perhaps the first sizable job cuts at the Rochester-based printing company post bankruptcy. Kodak exited its 20-month Chapter 11 bankruptcy in September. And that bankruptcy saw the company make numerous deep cuts in its workforce, as well as sell off a number of businesses, as it worked to get costs under control and to streamline itself.
In a statement, Kodak said Tuesday that it has consistently indicated that as motion picture film volumes continue to decline, “We will continue to make adjustments to keep our scale in line with the decline.”
The company ended 2012 with roughly 3,500 employees locally. That number is now far smaller, as 2013 saw Kodak continue to cut costs and also sell its Personalized Imaging and Document Imaging businesses, which employed roughly 700 locally. Kodak said it would have updated local employment numbers after the end of the year.
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/story/money/business/2013/11/26/kodak-lays-off-40-film-workers/3758641/
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 11-28-2013 02:36 PM
A one-off filmmaker, no matter how much (s)he loves the medium, is not going to be able to use it if the stock, the processing chemistry and the infrastructure needed to shoot, process and print it are no longer available. And between them, these filmmakers (plus the other people left buying film stock and chemistry, which means mainly archives) cannot generate the volume of sales necessary for it to be worth Kodak's while keeping their infrastructure in operation.
As an earlier poster pointed out, Hollywood would like to avoid the negative publicity that would result from articles on the big news sites about mom-and-pop theatres being forced to close. Likewise, Kodak doesn't want the reaction from Spielberg, Nolan, Tacita Dean and all the usual suspects that would result if they announced an end date for color film stock here and now. It's brand management 101. The end of Kodachrome was bad enough for them, with endless stories about a heartless corporate gorilla killing off a cultural icon, blah blah blah. They don't want to go there again.
So it's just going to be wound down, slowly and with as little attention as Kodak can engineer. Their spokespeople will be issuing statements about how they're going to stand behind movie makers who wish to continue shooting on film, and the archives, right up until the last minute when their sales department answers the phone and says "Sorry, we don't offer that line anymore".
If it were possible to produce color film and the chemistry needed to process it in small volumes and not make a loss, Fuji and whoever now owns the Agfa brand name wouldn't have quit the business in recent years.
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Marcel Birgelen
Film God
Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 12-02-2013 03:16 AM
quote: Leo Enticknap
From what I've read and been told, the cost, complexity and criticality of quality control in the production of dye coupler/chromogenic colour photographic emulsions, and the kit chemistry needed to process them, is such that the cost involved is approaching rocket science territory.
From what I've been told by some film and photography "geeks", the major problem seems to be getting the raw materials at acceptable prices and indeed, getting the quality of the whole process right. For that, you need qualified people and time, hence money.
All you're currently buying is essentially re-bagged stock originating from Kodak and Fuji, that will eventually run out.
It's hard for me to size the potential market, but if you could get it running, it sounds to me like you could be a defacto monopolist in a very lucrative niche.
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