End of film?

So usually I joke about the end of the world according to the Mayans. Anyone who actually looks into it will know that the Mayans did not predict anything of the sort, and yet there is one thing that may be ending sooner than expected for many, and I honestly am surprised it took this long before we started hearing about it in the news.

The end of film as we know it.

Or at least the physical medium of film. According to an article I read recently (http://m.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/paramount-exec-announces-end-of-film-could-be-tomorrow/), the future of the physical medium of film, you know, the stuff they make movies with, and which camera used to use, is about to come to an end. I have already been personally effected by this years ago when I was working at the National Geographic Society HQ imaging department. We used to have 2 black rooms, one of which was dedicated to developing film, and the other for a special kind of printer (called a Lambda printer, which uses light sensitive paper). While I was the, the film development machine was turned off, the chemicals drained, and the room emptied and opened up. No longer sporting a dark room, film at Nat Geo had officially gone digital. And so has everyone else. Professional photographers all use DSLR (digital single lens reflex) camera, and everyday people rely on cell phones and snap-shot digital camera for their pictures. Film died in the world of Photography a long time ago. The biggest worry for Photographers was where to develop their old images and how to transition to the new digital world. All but one or two major development labs in the country shut down back then, and I would be surprised if there are any left at all now.

The problem with this wasn't that it was hard or expensive to develop, or even that film didn't produce amazing results (because it still rivals and often exceeds digital photographs), but just that the companies that made the film you put into the camera, aka Kodak and Fuji to make a few, had started to shut down their film making process. There was just no way to buy film anymore. Film was dead.

And yet now, movie companies are finally becoming painfully aware of the impending doom of film for the industry, Almost all movies made in the past decade have had some sort of digital processing done to them, and all haven been converted to a digital medium at some point, even if they were shot with film. And there is a very different visual look to film versus a digitally captured image. Film grain is a topic I could go on and on about, and how many people have strived to eliminate or reduce it but that it is actually the film grain that gives film it's unique high quality images and details. Digital images don't have a traditional film grain, but they do have a sort of dither or digitally introduced noise. The result is very different from grain.

But I digress.

It appears that the last of the film producing companies are finally facing the end of their production. Kodak has been under bankrupt protection for years and is under the control of the government now, and could pull the plug on film production at any time,. Other companies are starting to wind down their processes, and have stopped taking orders. We really are facing the end folks. The Mayans were right.

Digital "film" has now taken over, and has a promising start. While not everyone likes the look of digital over film, it is something we are all going to have to get used to. The end of an era has come, and most people aren't even going to realize it.

But this isn't a bad thing, really. The film industry has always been a leading industry, creating new technologies and adapting. When photography was first invented by Nicéphore Niépce in 1825, it didn't take long before Eadweard Muybridge started to take successive pictures of a running horse to make a form of motion picture in 1877. Ever since then, film has been making strides and leaps in technology, with better quality images, motion, sound, color, aspect ratios, animation, acting, broadcasting, and so much more. This is just the next step in the evolution of what is the Great Image Experiment. An experiment in capturing what it is to be human, what it is to be an artist.

Film may be dead, but movies and pictures will continue to evolve and define the human experience in a way no other art form can. Just remember that changes like this are a part of the innovation of such industries.

Film is dead. Long live the (digital) film!