[rollei_list] AW: Re: Best wishes to Marc and 2014 Photokina news (part 1)
- From: <Dirk-Roger.Schmitt@xxxxxx>
- To: <rollei_list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 23 Sep 2014 10:00:43 +0000
Thanks for this interesting Update, Emmanuel!
Dirk-Roger Schmitt
Your message reached me while I was attending the 2014 photokina in Cologne.
I'll report here in detail about what I've seen, as soon as my films are
processed (I was probably one of the few visitors taking pictures with a film
camera ;-)) and the digitized images posted somewhere.
The short comments I can make are that photography and photographic equipment,
as seen from the 2014 Cologne fair, is a field of the industry still incredibly
dynamic and innovative, even if some people involved in the marketing of
digital SLRs mentioned to me that the market is now mature, i.e. people are not
supposed to replace their digital camera as often as in the past 10 years.
People involved in black and white film photography who were present at the
photokina telled me that business is fine for them. So I have abolutely no fear
regarding the future of B&W film & silver-halide techniques for monochrome
photography. As far as color films are concerned, Big Yellow was there and had
a booth presenting the current line of K's film products. Sure, there were
fewer people there than at the Canon or Nikon booths ;-) Fujifilm was there but
the presence of film was reduce to an A4-page listeing availble film products
...
however Fuji has introduce another small instant camera for theis instant film
system, and there were lots of teen-agers queueing at the instant photo corner
to taking "selfie" pictures that would not be sent immediately through the 'net
via their mobile phone (in Germany, people say : "handy", a typical Denglish
word of modern times ;-)
Ilford-Switzerland has found a way to re-start after insolvency, so people
using their line of fine inkjet papers, including the cibachrome-like
metallic-finish paper, will be able to continue to buy and use their favourite
products.
I had hard times finding the Meyer-Görlitz booth, the rebirth of an old German
brand from the East, since there was a minor misprint in the officiel Photokina
database, and actually only two lenses were on display in a very small hidden
corner of another booth. Nobody from the company was attending, so I could ask
no question. But the lenses are there.
Regarding Schneider-Kreuznach, the major change since 2012 is that they have
officially stopped manufacturing large format lenses for film large format
cameras; however they do continue and develop their "digital" lenses for small
digital medium format cameras. And they of course put the emphasis on digital
SLR lenses, with 3 new models introduced this year.
Rodenstock lenses, now part of a bigger company named Qioptic, did not actually
announce that they have discontinued their LF lenses for film cameras, but the
assortment is now reduced to 3 apo-sironar S. The assortment of Rodenstock
"digital" lenses however is flourishing, but the price tag for those new lenses
featuring outstanding image quality is definittely dissuasive for hobbyists.
Zeiss had a large booth and zeiss-o-philes can see the future of Zeiss lenses
from an optimistic point of view, even if the number of Zeiss photographic
lenses actually made in Germany probably reduces to the series of silver-finish
lenses in Hasselblad V-mount.
Regarding Rollei, there was no DHW booth this year due to the recent (August
2014) insolvency of the Braunschweig-based company. The Rollei brand was
present however at the MACO booth for their Rollei-branded films, and of course
at the ... Rollei (alias RCP-Technik) booth, where a Rollei TLR and a Rollei
600x were on display on top of tripods, only to remind us what Rollei used to
be .. I prefer not to comment furthrr on this subject.
More later when I have my pictures to share with you !
--
Emmanuel
---
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- » [rollei_list] AW: Re: Best wishes to Marc and 2014 Photokina news (part 1) - Dirk-Roger.Schmitt
