Film Photography News — July 2025 Recap

☞ This is the 76th monthly Analog.Cafe Newsletter with the latest film photography lore. Sign up to get it via email on the last Tuesday of every month (it’s free).

What’s new?

The average price of a roll of 35mm film has gone up 9% in the past six months — but it’s not all bad, as there are still deals to be had and a new, cheap, and great-looking film is about to land from China: 乐凯C200 (Lucky C200). This is in addition to the German ORWO NC200, sold as OptiColour 200 and KONO Color 200 — I’ve shot it, samples below.

Not to forget the Harman Phoenix II launch, Adox Color Mission update, and the free film I’m giving away to lucky GOLD members. Oh, and we also tried to “fake” CineStill 800T by pre-washing the remjet, with unexpected results.

💛 GOLD members get to read about our efforts to “fake” CineStill’s 800T film, download, and print the internet’s most complete “Guide to Film Photography,” invert film negatives online with film Q, and, sometimes, win free film!

🎁 Try GOLD free for 14 days! In this newsletter: What’s new? A first look at the new colour-negative film from Germany: ORWO NC 200 / OptiColour 200 / KONO COLOR 200. We made “fake” CineStill 800T. Analog.Cafe Podcast S1:E2. New colour film from China: Lucky C2000 Harman Phoenix II. Adox Color Mission. Film prices up 9%. Free film! Latest on Analog.Cafe. Support this blog & get premium features with GOLD memberships!

A first look at the new colour-negative film from Germany: ORWO NC 200 / OptiColour 200 / KONO COLOR 200.

ORWO has been quietly shipping their ISO 200 colour-negative film since the beginning of the year. Yet it hasn’t been officially released under its brand.

You won’t find this film at the ORWO shop in any format. But images shot on this emulsion continue to drip on the web, and as of late, there’s a way to get your hands on some in two repackaged varieties: OptiColour 200 and KONO COLOR 200 (currently sold out). I’ve shot a roll of the latter.

There is a lot of film-related news to get to in this newsletter — this is not a complete review of this film by any measure (visit Analog.Cafe in late August for a complete write-up).

But I’m sure you can glean the resemblance to ORWO’s first colour film in decades, the NC 500 and its cousin Lomochrome Color’92 — as well as the improvements over the original.

The NC200 is still a very grainy film, but there is a notable improvement in colour, particularly the saturation and the variability of the green tones. Plus, this version appears to render strong halations, which weren’t a part of the previous iterations.

Speaking of halations,

We made “fake” CineStill 800T.

CineStill is just Kodak Vision 3 film with the remjet pre-washed, right? At least, that’s what the internet has been saying for the past 13 years.

Strangely, there are no independent attempts to verify that claim. In fact, it goes further, suggesting that the Kodak Vision 3 500T is the emulsion behind the 800T, and the increased ISO is either due to “stronger” C-41 developer or the light bouncing off a pressure plate.

But this month, I’ve learned exactly what it takes to pre-wash the remjet (spoiler: it’s insane) and compared my “fake CineStill 800T,” cooked according to the internet’s recipe, to the genuine product and the normally developed Vision 3 film — all in C-41.

This was a monumentous effort, and it wouldn’t be possible without help from the Vancouver photographers Daren and Yvonne, joined by Shawna in front of the camera. We’ve shot five rolls of film in three cameras and completely wasted a roll of Kodak Vision 3 film during this project. This does not include film used to make product photos (like the one above). I’ve also completely blacked out my room and even built a contraption with a hairdryer.

Read the article and see detailed side-by-side comparisons here.

What I loved about this experiment was the discovery and the firsthand experience of modifying an existing film, then learning more about the process than I ever could without diving deep. The science of photography is complex, extensive, and fascinating — and I’m so here for it.

Analog.Cafe Podcast S1:E2.

After all that work, Daren and I sat down to chat about the results and the ongoing changes at Kodak and film photography as a whole in our second episode of the Analog.Cafe Podcast.

You can find it on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, and Overcast.

Here’s something I said Daren thought was worth a chuckle: “We’re always going to have sick people, why can’t we also have sick film?” — I was talking about Fujifilm and their ongoing abolishment of film production in favour of the much more profitable pharmaceutical products and projects.

New colour film from China: Lucky C200

If the new ORWO NC200 is too funky for your needs, new colour-negative film samples from the Chinese social media app, Little Red Book (小红书), may offer hope for a fine-grained, colour-accurate film that isn’t Kodak.

Lucky C200, manufactured in China, is made at the same factory that produced colour film for Kodak back in the day.

The film is currently in a limited local release/test phase, with wider distribution across China planned later this year. With development, a roll of this film is priced at 59 RMB, equivalent to approximately $8.20 USD.

International release dates and prices aren’t yet clear, but I suspect it won’t be long until we get to try this film outside the mainland.

Follow this link to the original post on 小红书, with several great-looking samples. Note that the website makes it difficult to view the images without signing up; this Reddit post has a copy of those images. Also, this post on Photrio has samples shot in this film and enlarged in a darkroom (then scanned).

Harman Phoenix II.

Harman Phoenix, the first colour film product manufactured at the UK factory since the 1960s, has got a major update and a name bump this month. The changes to this film were extensive enough to significantly alter how the colour mask behaves.

The negatives now look thinner, and it’s harder to process this film as a positive, but the advantages are improved colour accuracy, dynamic range, grain, and halation. That’s virtually every visually important aspect of an emulsion!

The release got a lot of buzz and mostly positive reviews, though I haven’t had a chance to test a roll yet. Would love to know what you think about the progress of this project at Harman.

Adox Color Mission.

Remember Adox Color Mission?

It’s a film that Adox (Fotoimplex) announced as their keystone colour-negative film project back in 2022. I shot and reviewed the first batch of this film, which was produced by a defunct business that Adox has purchased, along with the IP.

Unfortunately, that first batch of film was not matched with their follow-up limited release last year. The 2024 Color Mission looked orange and had an effective ISO of 1.5.

But the July 24, 2025, samples shown on Adox’ Instagram page paint a fabulous picture. This new film appears colour-correct, with slightly chunkier grain and a very pleasing palette. What I saw in those tiny images reminded me of the original Color Mission batch, though the best way to understand this new film is to try it first-hand. It’s on the list.

Film prices up 9%.

All that innovation came at a price this year. A combination of currency volatility and overall price increases on Fujifilm and Ilford products has pushed the average price of a single 35mm film roll from $14.83 at the beginning of 2025 to $16.17 in July for US customers.

Thankfully, some films like Kodak Tri-X remained at the pre-2022 levels.

Free film!

I’ve been giving away film to GOLD members at the end of each month all summer.

This July, Nicholas gets three 35mm 36exp. Cinema Shorts-branded Kodak Vision 3 film rolls (with remjet and instructions for removal) — Congrats!

The next winner will be announced same time next month.

Thank you for reading. 👋