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Fujifilm to End B&W Film and Paper Production

Jorgen Udvang

Subscriber Member
Except for those using Velvia, I don't see this as a problem. It will strengthen the market for the remaining film manufacturers, and since Fuji has been moving away from film lately to several other areas, inluding pharmaceuticals and cosmetics, this is a natural move for them. Nowadays, their strongest analogue imaging business are Instax cameras and film, which are aparently selling like hotcakes.
 

Shashin

Well-known member
Well, Fuji is not ending their color film. But to say that one manufacturer cannot make B&W film profitable is good for others is a little odd. Sure Fuji customers will go to their competitors, but that just becomes the process of attrition. With less film production, that makes material suppliers have fewer companies to work with and Fuji probably has a greater distribution network than the remaining film manufacturers. With less demand, comes higher prices. This is not good news.

Fuji was not moving away from film, the film market was shrinking. They entered other areas to survive. Kodak was not able to do that.
 

Qamaro

Member
The common consensus is that Fuji made the choice to exit the film market before the film resurgence started (i.e. to dismantle their film business). If that is the case everything we are buying right now is all pre-produced stock and all Fuji films with the exception of Instax will eventually be phased out as all stored stocks are depleted. Here was a good article on it recently:

https://studioc41.net/2018/03/30/understanding-fujinotfilm/

Of course with the announcement all the speculators and hordes have been buying up the existing stock, there fore those that like Acros are having a hard time finding it. In the USA Adorama / B&H and Freestyle are out of 120 and 4x5 at this point. not sure what the replenishment / repurchase cycle will be for them but if its like FP-100c then it should still be in the stores after the restock, like it is today.
 

Paratom

Well-known member
my feeling is film is seeing still a lot of interest for several reasons, also from young people I believe it is sad for every single film disappearing from the market.
I am not sure if this is a clever move from fuji.
 

chrism

Well-known member
I never used Neopan 1600, and I have a good stock of Neopan 400 and Acros 100 in 35mm. I suspect that one day I shall regret not having some Acros 100 in sheet film, where the absence of reciprocity failure will be missed. I don't believe there is another B&W film stock with such reciprocity. Perhaps we should lobby Fuji to release the secret so other manufacturers can use it?

C.
 

Oren Grad

Active member
Delta 100, TMX and TMY all have superior reciprocity characteristics compared to traditional-grain films like HP5 Plus and TXP, if not quite in the same league as Acros.
 
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