Email Campaign to save Kodak HIE-135

[nighthawkjw]

Originally Posted by mikebarger

I'm glad to see you've changed your campaign to a honest and up front approach rather than your early request asking people to be send Kodak a request to continue a product they actually had no interest in using.

Maybe you could have a gallery section just for prints from this product, seems like someone has stated Kodak lurks here.

Mike

Actually, I was only asking for feedback -- the email campaign has gotten a lot of attention and is continuing to gain momentum. My question was, should there be a change in tactics? And there was never anything less than "honest" about the campaign.

I do like the idea of an HIE gallery! Who is site administrator that can make that happen?

PE, that is great news from your connections with EK! I hope the efforts of all those supporting the campaign had something to do with this.

Sorry to have opened a political can of worms...

~JCW

[J.Ed]

In yesterdays' (12/30/07) Rochester Democrat & Chronicle, there was a article regarding the campaign. Sorry to report but the Company line remains "the film is no longer practical to manufacture, given the low demand and volume, the age of the product formulations and the complexity of the processes involved."

[Ken Nadvornick]

Originally Posted by Photo Engineer

He [Perez] is also impressed by the income from film, as it is selling well.

It is?

Certainly no disrespect intended, but I've been repeatedly told the market had evaporated, save for a few hardcore users - most of whom live right here. Disruptive technology, and all that.

Is it still MP film that continues to prevent a total collapse?

Ken

[Photo Engineer]

Yes Ken, AFAIK, motion picture leads the sales area, second comes color neg. B&W in the middle and E6 and Kodachrome at the tail end. And, my words "selling well" can be used against me. All things are relative. It is selling well compared to what was expected about 2 years ago or so.

PE

[AgX]

We should keep in mind that once there had been `real´ infrared films around from several manufacturers. It is not so that Kodak has got the sole knowledge on that kind of material.
It's rather an issue of economics.

[nighthawkjw]

I am writing today to enter a conclusion to this thread. I still get occasional emails regarding the campaign and still wish that things were different. Kodak made their decision and will not change it. I could not sleep at night without knowing that someone had tried to change that decision and so I took the initiative. Hundreds of photographers from around the world sent emails to Kodak, many to me.

I want to thank so many of you who helped spread the word. While the end result is not what we wanted, we let Kodak know that discontinuing HIE-135 has had an impact on the photography community and changed the future of fine art infrared photography.

The good side of this campaign is that the people still working for Kodak now know that there are many people dedicated to film photography. As long as there is a market for film and an economy to support that market, those people will still have jobs.

I spoke with a photography teacher this past week who did not know that HIE had been discontinued, which disappointed her. She told me, however, that she had heard a statistic that over half of the classes that teach digital only don't make (cancel) and that the continuing popularity of classic black and white courses are what may keep film alive and those classes continue to remain popular. I can't source that statistic, but it seems reassuring.

Finally, it is good to note that Kodak has introduced a new formulation for TMAX-400, with a much tighter grain. They also just recently introduced the new Portra 400VC and 160VC color film. Both the TMAX and Portra are quite good and I encourage all reading to try them. Additionally, since HIE was discontinued, Efke and Rollei have introduced new infrared films, in addition to other new formulations. This gives me hope that the future of film photography is not nearly as dire as it seemed. Perhaps one day a manufacturer will take the initiative to produce a film with no anti-halation backing and a sensitivity of 900nm.


Good Light,
James C. Williams

[Fintan]

Good for you James, you tried your best.
Thanks.

Fintan