I’ve got three new curated film packs on sale at the Analog.Cafe’s Etsy shop, FilmBase: filmbase.etsy.com
There’s a four-pack of Lomography films, including their wild Turquoise and Purple emulsions. A two-pack of Polaroid film, including a Round Frame edition pack and a brand-new Black and White pack that features major improvements to the film’s dynamic range. And an Ilford medium format 4-pack with two rolls of Harman Phoenix and rolls of their professional Delta films.
All prices include free shipping to the US & Canada.
Thanks so much for your support and happy Wednesday!
How the Canada Post strike is affecting Analog.Cafe and other small Canadian businesses: update.
Canada Post isn’t the only courier service available here. Of course, there is DHL, UPS, and FedEx, all of which are significantly more expensive than EMS (and not necessarily better). There are also smaller, localized couriers, like Chit Chats, which I’ve been using to fulfill orders at my Etsy store (FilmBase).
Unfortunately, shipments via EMS that started before the strike are in limbo.
(This includes my customers expecting a film camera in the mail… My apologies, and thank you so much for your patience! This will eventually be resolved, but please feel free to contact me regarding your order anytime at [email protected].)
EMS is a network of local mail services, such as Canada Post, USPS, and Royal Mail, that allows us to ship using cheap, reliable, and familiar services. ems.post/en
Many shipments can’t come to Canada because the seller is shipping via EMS, blocked by Canada Post, where I live.
This means I may not get new cameras and gear for review for a long time. I’m also waiting for a component for making an instant film camera from scratch — which is suck in EMS as well. Similar issues may affect others like Flic Film, Camera Traders, Downtown Camera, and Beau.
But the good news is that there are no problems with outgoing shipments or returns. A whole bunch of gear is on sale at FilmBase until December 3: filmbase.etsy.com/ 😉
Polaroid’s new YouTube video features Fred, the puppet who freaks out when the film is about to go through an X-ray machine.
The instant film factory and brand Polaroid (a.k.a., The Impossible Project analog.cafe/r/a-brief-hist…) likes to keep its YouTube channel diverse. Every couple of months, there’s a new video that seems to have been made by a different team. They’re all pretty good.
Three new videos dropped this month. They feature a puppet character named Fred, who has a thick French accent (which sounds like “Friend” when he says it). He sings and talks about Polaroid cameras. I think it has Sesame Street vibes.
The second video of the series (youtube.com/watch?v=rmHPnE…) has Fried freak out at the airport customs when he finds out that the film is about to go through an X-ray.
X-ray exposure can damage film, depending on the type of X-ray machine used, the sensitivity of the film, and how the machine was set up. But, generally, it should be OK to send Polaroid through X-ray once or twice (as long as it’s not a CT scanner; see analog.cafe/r/air-travel-w…).
The puppet’s freakouts looked comical, perhaps in an attempt to soften the fact that Polaroid film is difficult to shoot (it has just 3.5 stops of dynamic range analog.cafe/r/polaroid-600…). Or to poke fun at pedantic photographers. WNB?
During an earning call, Eastman Kodak’s CEO Jim Continenza said, “So on film, right, we’re doing a shutdown in November, total shutdown.” (finance.yahoo.com/news/q3-…)
Jim states the “shutdown” is necessary for the factory upgrades: “…in November, we will be modernizing the plant, putting more investment within that.”
Film demand was the first item the CEO listed as a key growing product at Kodak: “As we continue to grow the different initiatives… which really comprises of film, chemicals, substrate coating for EVs…”
This summer, I estimated that film production (for still photographers alone) is a $7.2B market (analog.cafe/r/how-big-is-f…), in which Kodak is a dominant player, at least when it comes to colour.
This grabby news item generated many positive comments from the community, who were excited about an upcoming improvement to Kodak film (maybe it’ll be cheaper?) and a nice +5% bump to Kodak stock.
The Canada Post strike is delaying product shipments — including ones from Flic Film, Reveni Labs, Camera Traders, and Analog.Cafe.
Canada Post is part of an EMS system that coordinates shipments via various countries’ domestic/government mail services. It’s often the cheapest, safest, and easiest way for small businesses and individuals to ship goods. This is what I use when I ship film, cameras, books and accessories from the Analog.Cafe-associated Etsy shop, FilmBase: filmbase.etsy.com
Canadian film photography businesses you may’ve heard of that rely on EMS include Flic Film, Reveni Labs, Camera Traders, and Analog.Cafe. If you plan to shop at any of those places in the next few weeks, double-check the shipping times!
What is the best glue for fixing a leatherette on a film camera?
Pliobond 25 is highly recommended thanks to its excellent gripping power, flexibility, drying time, and solvability in rubbing alcohol for easy removal.
These properties are very important for sticking a piece of leather, which may need to be removed a few months/years later without damage. (Since leatherettes often cover screws that block repair and maintenance access — and they can also deteriorate, thus needing replacement).
However, Pliobond 25 is hard to find and expensive to ship. According to @the120ist on YouTube, the best alternative is either E6000 or a specific double-sided tape: youtube.com/watch?v=cBM0dH…
I’ve used tape before, though it seems that E6000 is easy to find in North America — plus, there’s just one kind — instead of the vast variety of double-sided tapes on the market. For consistency’s sake, this sounds like the best option.
A quick search confirms that E6000 will soften when soaked in rubbing alcohol (although it’s fully dissolvable in acetone). I think this will be my leatherette glue of choice.
Update: I’ve been working on the gingerbread camera article for the past few weeks, and it looks like I’ll need to push it until December.
Since I started writing it, I’ve decided to remake it to be more helpful. So, instead of just describing how the gingerbread camera was made, the article will show practical designs for creating a simple instant camera using sugar lens optics and an advanced version with instant film.
Unfortunately, the materials needed to build the above new cameras for this article will come too late for me to finish it in time.
Instead, I’ll release an app this November for better tracking of development chemicals. This member-only feature will help you calculate chemical exhaustion more accurately.
Amateur Photographer opens Inaugural Film Photographer of the Year competition for UK residents.
The UK’s biggest-selling photography magazine is now taking free entries to their first analogue-centric competition, sponsored by Kodak, Analogue Wonderland, and Ricoh Imaging.
Deadline: 5th January 2025, 11:59 pm GMT.
Submission: 5 images shot on film in 2024 (some editing allowed).
Prizes: the winner will get a brand new Pentax 17 film camera, a year’s supply of Kodak film (I’m curious to see what they consider a year’s supply, given that we all shoot at different rates), a year’s supply of film developing and scanning with the Analogue Wonderland lab, and a limited edition Pentax t-shirt and baseball cap. There will also be two runner-ups with smaller prizes.
Another chance to get free gear and film is great news for everyone in the UK.
For everyone else, this can be read as a sign of the continuing growth of analogue photography’s popularity — an offline craft advanced by the extremely online generation of photographers. Film has been in resurgence for over a decade — almost immediately after crashing in the early 2020s — yet I don’t think its new popularity has peaked.
Я вставляю текст который написал и не могу затем выйти из графического редактора, а если просто закрываю то остаётся заголовок и два предложения… сколько я не мучался над этой проблемой так и не смог найти выход из этой ситуации. Это мне непонятно, почему так происходит. И загружается только одно фото, и нет возможности загрузить еще. Наверное я что-то не так делаю, вполне возможно, но я по разному пытался это сделать, но к сожалению результатов нет положительных…
Уважаемый Дмитрий добрый вечер! Наконец-то собрался с духом и написал обзор на мой первый опыт и фотокамеру 120 формата Минольтафлекс 2, но к сожалению так и не смог Вам отправить. Не могу понять как это делать, хотя следовал всём советам, но увы, видимо я что то не смог сделать, хотя и заголовок написал и статью и фото попытался приложить, да только одно и прошло… видимо не судьба, хотя я старался…
How well do you think you know your colour films? Can you guess if something was shot on Ektar, Portra, or Velvia?
Daren (instagram.com/learnfilm.ph…), Yvonne (instagram.com/yvonne), and I are building a game that will test your knowledge of films. It’s based on the popular “What the Film?!” game (featured on PetaPixel and 35mmc). WTF?! was made for black-and-white film. The new one will focus on colour. 🌈
Once we have enough images, we’ll build the game. Your name and profile will be featured under each photo, and we may also feature you in the videos about the game. You will also get to play the game with a slight advantage and have your name listed in the Top 100 Rankings table!
New search tools and recommendations live on Analog.Cafe!
This blog hosts over 630 long-form articles and thousands of notes like this one. Some are reviews, others are essays, guides, apps, community, or editorials. You could always use the search function on Analog.Cafe (analog.cafe/search), but it wasn’t custom-built for this blog — it’s a Google bolt-on service that works OK, but it can’t distinguish various types of content, and it would often surface unhelpful pages.
This weekend, I built a new search engine and a recommendation tool that should help you get more out of this website:
You can now refine your article searches by limiting your results to specific sections (film, cameras, guides, books, apps, essays, etc.) and perform separate comment and long-form article searches.
You can also like & reply to comments right in the search results.
This new search engine also now powers relevant recommendations below each article and comments like this one.
I hope these new tools help you find the right stuff and discover new reads about your favourite films and film cameras. Let me know if you see any bugs or have ideas on how to improve things.
I’m also curious if you find updates like this one helpful. Do you?
Dmitri Nov 27, ‘24
Dmitri Nov 26, ‘24
Dmitri Nov 21, ‘24
Dmitri Nov 20, ‘24
Dmitri Nov 15, ‘24
Dmitri Nov 13, ‘24
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vladimir.zhurnalist… Nov 5, ‘24
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Dmitri Nov 5, ‘24
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vladimir.zhurnalist… Nov 5, ‘24
Dmitri Nov 4, ‘24
vladimir.zhurnalist… Nov 4, ‘24
Dmitri Nov 4, ‘24, edited on Nov 4, ‘24
Dmitri Nov 3, ‘24, edited on May 5, ‘25
Dmitri Nov 2, ‘24