It seems that every week or two, someone on the Internet is proclaiming photographic film to be dead. I won’t bother helping the authors’ cause by hyperlinking the articles; it won’t be hard to find them if you really want to find them.
It turns out that they’re wrong.
First: I’ll unabashedly proclaim my addiction to film photography. Computers are a terrific hobby of mine, but I learned photography on film and I don’t want to spend my photographic time at a computer. (That, and I’d need to spend almost three grand to get a digital SLR that can shoot with my wide-angle lenses without turning them into boring normal lenses.)
I’ll cite this as some of the best evidence that film is still alive: Kodak, only months ago, released its newest colour film Ektar 100. After a successful introduction in 35mm, Kodak released it in 120 last summer and now has released it in sheet film sizes. (What? They still make sheet film cameras? Yes, and I bought a new one – one of theirs – only two summers ago.)
To be truthful, it’s getting tougher to be a film shooter. Local stores don’t stock film as much, and lab availability is decreasing. Why, my local lab’s E6 (slide) lab shut down earlier this year so I’ll have to mail my reversal films for processing (not that that’s a big problem).
But when so many companies still around why not shoot some of their silver products and get back to the basics? It’s fun!