The fate of 35mm

[c.cloudwalker]

The thing with film is that it is slowly degrading over those 100's of years, in even the most optimum conditions-- and there can be only 1 master copy. We all know this, but with digital, there is no degradation from making copies, and time has no impact over how 1's and 0's will behave.

Plus, there is no guarantee that film will archive well

Photography is barely 200 years old so, talking about hundreds of years is kinda ridiculous. We have no idea whatsoever how film will degrade in the longer run.

I have a few thousand glass negatives and a few hundred glass stereo slides that were rescued from attics and damp basement where they had been forgotten for many, many years. Most are in very nice shape, some have some damage and some are barely usable but considering how they were stored it is a pretty amazing deal.

I would very much like to see the shape of CDs, DVDs and hard drives stored in such horrible ways for so many years. Frankly, I do not believe there would be much to recover. Part of my belief is based on conversations with both chemical engineers (who have convinced me that part of the problem with my very old photos is probably bad processing along with the bad storage) and computer engineers (who have convinced me that digital storage media [including hard drives] will not last half as long when stored in such horrendous conditions.)

True, the storage conditions of pro photographers or artists of interest will be monitored and there is a good chance that their work will be preserved. But what happens to all the photos shot by people who don't belong to these categories?

Those will probably be lost. This is a problem I got interested in when Clint Eastwoods movies about Iwo Jima came out and it was talked about that such movies will never be made about modern wars due to the fact that soldiers don't write home anymore. They e-mail and the historical record will be lost because who saves e-mails?

Photography is looking at the same problem because, no matter how 1s and 0s are easy to save they need to be saved in the right way. And the right way is not the way most people are going to do it.

Do we care about the unknown photogs production? You bet. Most of the photographic historical record comes from the unknown photogs such as my own family's contribution to the car and specialized vehicle industry. My family's contribution to those industries is documented in a couple books with a few more coming up thanks to the unknown photogs (mostly family members who were shooting snapshots) and the younger members of the family with an interest in history who thought those photos (and other documents) were worth preserving.

But it's a lot easier to get excited about preserving history when it comes to you in the form of prints or negatives (with fairly easily recognizable images) than when you are faced with a pile of CDs, DVDs or hard drives. Which, by the way, may not even be compatible with whatever the format of the day is when they are found...

 

[kkamin]

Is your argument that we should keep shooting on film just because the retarded people aren't going to have the sense to make prints or update their archives? Sure, there will be people who store their Target photo CD' in a humid attic next to a box of magnets. But so what. People are still making archival prints.

And I don't understand the argument of incompatible file formats in the future. What are you saving your files as? Commodore 64 bitmaps? I'm fairly certain there will be somebody in the future able to convert antiquated file formats. I don't think you should lose sleep over it.

There are already media storage services on the web. I think as digital keeps growing, the consumer will become more aware of digital archival concerns and the media storage market will grow and become louder. And I think technology will improve and allow for longer shelf lives of recordable media.

 

[c.cloudwalker]

Is your argument that we should keep shooting on film just because the retarded people aren't going to have the sense to make prints or update their archives? Sure, there will be people who store their Target photo CD' in a humid attic next to a box of magnets. But so what. People are still making archival prints.

And I don't understand the argument of incompatible file formats in the future. What are you saving your files as? Commodore 64 bitmaps? I'm fairly certain there will be somebody in the future able to convert antiquated file formats. I don't think you should lose sleep over it.

There are already media storage services on the web. I think as digital keeps growing, the consumer will become more aware of digital archival concerns and the media storage market will grow and become louder. And I think technology will improve and allow for longer shelf lives of recordable media.

I am glad you don't see yourself as retarded but your post makes me think otherwise. 1/ You have not given much thought to the problem and 2/ you have not read my post very carefully.

My argument is not necessarily to keep shooting film. It is more to think of what the new technology is offering before embracing it whole heartedly.

1/ Just because things are new does not make them better.

2/ Rarely do commercial concerns (ie corporations) have our best interest in mind. They want to sell and they know we love the new stuff.

3/ Read my last post again.

 

[c.cloudwalker]

Btw, web storage is great for anyone to steal your info. Whichever info you are storing there. :lmao:

 

[kkamin]

I'm sorry I didn't address the romantic ideas of unearthing photographs of cars in the future or finding war time love letters so somebody can write "The Notebook part 2".

There is always resistance as one technology takes over another. And I imagine romantic concerns such as these often come tethered to the resistance. Vinyl to cassette to CD to mp3. Paper books to ebooks. Stove top reheating to microwave ovens. Standard def to HDTV. Video rental stores to Netflix to eventually internet streaming. Times are changing, bro. There will always be some kind of trade off with new technologies, but peoples needs will find a way to be met. Because if people need something, someone will sell it to them.

 

[Overread17 5]

And yet communal storage of data online is one of the safer approaches to data storage in terms of the data remaining stored - since one would use a professional backup company which would have their own protections in place as well.

Long term of course once the fees are no longer paid this data is dumped - however I suspect that one day the net will be the best place to store "history" in the terms that you're describing.
Consider a raid setup between harddrives - its not impossible to consider that as the net becomes more key in modern society and its use upgraded over and over that in the future it would be possible to setup a raid storage system between a whole network of computers (this assumes that storage space becomes - effectivly - a null limitation in the future). Of course security would be the weakpoint but for the general storage of archival data it would be the most long term secure method provided that society and technology remain stable.

Past that the only effective long term store I can think of is prints - digital is too easily damaged and the ability to access and read it too quick to change and be lost (can you imagine trying to rebuild access to a harddrive starting from the 0 and 1s). Whilst film is also suseptable to longer term damage. Prints can also be damaged however and unless people pay now for expensive archival paper and inks to be used even basic sunlight can destroy a print in a year (know this from printing some bird cage lables - any lable in sunlight was quickly destroyed when printed with regular home inks)

 

[Overread17 5]

Paper books to ebooks.

Pffft you'll never ever ever convince me that an ebook is better than a good hardback!!!!! The rest is fine - but not books I say!

 

[kkamin]

I love paperback books. I mark them up and like holding them. I've never used a Kindle. But someday soon, if I have a choice between a $25 hardcover and a $10 digital copy. Probably digital book. Of course there will always be children's books until they can make an unbreakable ipad.

 

[Overread17 5]

I'm just old school then - I prefer solid products.
Even though I use online downloads - even for games these days - I find that I just prefer to have a physical item. I've had too many harddives die on my to really trust that anything stored on them is safe (where as I've only one CD I can't access anymore - sadly its one of my favourite old games......)

book wise the price of paper will have to go up a LOT to make me shift to ebooks. Its the sort of thing I might get for travels (when carrying loads of books is impratical) but not main time reading. Even then I will demand a decent page size (a nintendo DS is not big enough to read on!)

 

[Proteus617]

True enough, film is dead; killed by a superior technology. After all, there hasn't been any great oil paintings since Niepce. No need to paint once you could take a photograph. Hell, they don't even make oil paints anymore! No money in it.

 

[Big]

I've thought his would happen some day. It's sad because I would love to use my grandfather's camera but I have no idea how to develop film on my own.

 

[kkamin]

I'm pretty sure painting still has its place. And I'm fairly certain there has been good painters since Niepce: Monet, Manet, Matisse, and Picasso to name a few. The invention of photography forced painting to redefine itself. But photography is a different medium.

 

[kkamin]

I've thought his would happen some day. It's sad because I would love to use my grandfather's camera but I have no idea how to develop film on my own.

It's not very hard to learn. Regardless if this was 1970 or 2010, you probably aren't going to build a darkroom in your house in order to fiddle with a film camera. Just find an operating darkroom in your area. There are less now but they are still around. Art photograhers are still going at it; especially medium format and large format shooters. Until large format digital cameras don't cost a billion dollars, people will still be shooting with 8"x10" negatives.

 

[Mike_E]

What's wrong with photos dissolving into the mists of time? Just how many photos really deserve to last centuries? I can just see a small galaxy's worth of information devoted to aunt Nelly playing frisby in her MuMu.

Both film and digital are tools and neither are going away so long as there are artisans willing to pay to use them. (except film of course since anyone with a good chemistry set can make their own )

 

[c.cloudwalker]

I'm sorry I didn't address the romantic ideas of unearthing photographs of cars in the future or finding war time love letters so somebody can write "The Notebook part 2".

There is always resistance as one technology takes over another. And I imagine romantic concerns such as these often come tethered to the resistance. Vinyl to cassette to CD to mp3. Paper books to ebooks. Stove top reheating to microwave ovens. Standard def to HDTV. Video rental stores to Netflix to eventually internet streaming. Times are changing, bro. There will always be some kind of trade off with new technologies, but peoples needs will find a way to be met. Because if people need something, someone will sell it to them.

I am not your bro and the fact that you use that term makes me think you are a would be hipster more into technology than quality or reality.

I love reading but I am not about to read on a computer. Also, I rarely pay more than $10 for a book. I buy used and that is not a new concept. Average price is $1 for a paperback and $2 for a hardback. Why would I pay $10?

I also love music and I love CDs for what they allowed me to discover in old albums, stuff we couldn't hear on the vinyl version. However I prefer the sound of vinyl and, as far as I am concerned, MP3s are about as good as cassettes. If you can't hear the difference you either don't have the right stereo gear or you don't have the ear.

No resistance from me where digital photo is concerned. The studio I'm opening will be 100% digital as far as my commercial work is concerned. But my personal work will be film. Market vs personal likes.

Times are changing? They always are. You sound like an ad for a corporation selling us one more thing we don't need. "Because if people need something, someone will sell it to them." Very true. Also very true that most corporations work very hard and spend a lot of money telling us what we need. If you don't know that, I'm sorry.

I'm also sorry that you don't care for the romantic side of life but, in the meantime, I'm making money off of it and you're not since you don't recognize it exists.

And yet communal storage of data online is one of the safer approaches to data storage in terms of the data remaining stored - since one would use a professional backup company which would have their own protections in place as well.

Long term of course once the fees are no longer paid this data is dumped - however I suspect that one day the net will be the best place to store "history" in the terms that you're describing.
Consider a raid setup between harddrives - its not impossible to consider that as the net becomes more key in modern society and its use upgraded over and over that in the future it would be possible to setup a raid storage system between a whole network of computers (this assumes that storage space becomes - effectivly - a null limitation in the future). Of course security would be the weakpoint but for the general storage of archival data it would be the most long term secure method provided that society and technology remain stable.

Past that the only effective long term store I can think of is prints - digital is too easily damaged and the ability to access and read it too quick to change and be lost (can you imagine trying to rebuild access to a harddrive starting from the 0 and 1s). Whilst film is also suseptable to longer term damage. Prints can also be damaged however and unless people pay now for expensive archival paper and inks to be used even basic sunlight can destroy a print in a year (know this from printing some bird cage lables - any lable in sunlight was quickly destroyed when printed with regular home inks)

You forgot the scenario where the company goes out of business and your photos are never to be seen again. Companies have folded and left their customers in a hell-hole for a long time. There is nothing in the way of doing business of corporations that says "we care about our customers." They don't, get over it. The only safe storage is the one you do yourself.

The only positive of web storage is the redundancy. Many sites offering the same info. Are you going to store your photos on many different storage sites? And unless you pay for that storage, most info being stored is the one that is appealing today. What about tomorrow?

One of the big promise of the computer world was the paperless office. How are we doing there? The last study I read on the subject talked about how we are using way more paper today than we used to before computers...

I'm pretty sure painting still has its place. And I'm fairly certain there has been good painters since Niepce: Monet, Manet, Matisse, and Picasso to name a few. The invention of photography forced painting to redefine itself. But photography is a different medium.

I believe Proteus was being ironic. "Hell, they don't even make oil paints anymore!" should be a clue.

What's wrong with photos dissolving into the mists of time? Just how many photos really deserve to last centuries? I can just see a small galaxy's worth of information devoted to aunt Nelly playing frisby in her MuMu.

You are right in a way. Who cares about preserving a lot of snapshots? The problem is that today's snapshot could be tomorrow's piece of history. At the same time, reading your post, I can't help but wonder why we americans are jealous of the old world history yet we keep on bulldozing our own