On Saturday, August 27, 2005, at 02:31 AM, Gautam Sarup wrote:
Got me wondering what it takes to manufacture film.
The raw material could hardly be expensive (is that
assumption wrong?) so the cost/difficulty must be in
the machinery or the process.
The backing material is acetate or a polymer. Nothing exotic there.
Photographic gelatin is a very different thing from grocery store Knox
gelatin, and will probably become more expensive as demand declines. I
believe all or most of it comes from India. The emulsion is pure
chemistry, and pretty complex to make. Each manufacturer closely
guards their own recipes.
Coating machinery is quite expensive.
I've toured Kodak, Ilford, Agfa and Ferrania, and seen basically
similar production at all of them. When production volume drops below
a certain tipping point it becomes very difficult to keep such a
production line running. Pure Gladwell. Predictions of how soon we
reach that tipping point are constantly being revised, always toward
sooner rather than later.
I figure the last people who will still be making film will be those
smaller companies in eastern Europe from formerly communist economies.
We reached that tipping point on glass plates a few years ago, even
though they were crucial for some types of scientific research.
Bob
