Re: Seattle Film Works

[P3D <TimMaf@xxxxxxx>]

In a message dated 12/26/96 1:12:57 PM, you wrote:

>It's both negatives and release-print stock that have this problem.
>There are archivally stable stocks available, but they're not used
>much due to the increased cost.  You'd think that the film
>industry would flock to a more stable camera negative, but they
>haven't.  I don't know how much extra Kodak charges for their
>archival negative vs. their standard negative films, but it must
>be a high enough premium to deter usage.  Perhaps one of our list
>members who is heavy into 35mm film stocks could give us some idea
>of just how much the price difference is??
> 
It is true Negative and Print stocks from both Fuji and Eastman
(Agfa got out of the motion picture stock business) have
problems with archival stability. Neither Kodak nor Fuji make
what is considered an archivaly stable color neg or print stock. Nor
is one considered to be better than the others. Kodak does offer
some print and intermediate stocks on an Estar (as in polyEster) 
base as well as a normal base. Estar is supposed to be more durable
and less likely to shrink. It does cost more but has little to do with 
color stability. However, color of all flavors are considered to have
improved stability considerably over the last 10 to 15 years.

So, for those who have used SFW in the past (before the film made
in Germany) or the others, you face potential color fading
problems. Perhaps made worse by the fact that Kodak never
approved using it's motion picture stocks this way and therefore
never sold the film to SFW (told this by former employee). They had
to buy it indirectly which could mean some batches were 
worse than others.

Still camera films are generally considered to be much more stable.
But don't get too excited about the "Made in Germany" film as Agfa's
film (assumption here) is generally considered the poorest archivally
speaking. Fuji is generally the best with Kodak a close second and, of
course, Kodachrome is the single most archivally stable film (if
you don't project it).

As a final point the most stable motion picture color process was
the original 3 strip type Technicolor. The Technicolor prints
were essentially dye-transfer prints which have proven both
in stills and movies to be very long lasting (I suspect that adding
dyes rather than their being developed does something to improve
stability hence Kodachrome's stability). On the neg. film side the
original 3 strip process actually shot 3 strips of B&W film
simultaneously and in the '50's they made B&W separation negs
from the single strip Eastman color neg. B&W separation negs
of course don't fade (although they do have shrinkage problems).
Technicolor is working to reintroduce its IB (dye-transfer) films
and some prints of the restored "Giant" were made using the
new version of an old process. But sep negs. are expensive as
I guess Technicolor IB will be and the bottom line is more 
important (as is give Jim Carry $20million).

Tim Maffia
making an only semi-3d related reply but who got some great
(hopefully) 3d photos of today's rare snow storm in
Seattle


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