ColumnsBy FilmFocus
As Film Photography Booms Again, Attitudes Toward Negatives Are Changing
This is an AI translation of an article originally published in Japanese. If anything reads oddly, the Japanese original is the authoritative version.
The New York Times has published an interview with Silvio Cohen, owner of 42nd Street Photo in Manhattan, New York. Founded in 1965, 42nd Street Photo is a long-established business that still sells film photography equipment and develops film today.
In the interview, Cohen touches on the recent film boom but also describes a shift in behavior: far fewer people are coming in to pick up their developed film (that is, their negatives). Back when scanning film to digitize it wasn't common practice, customers always came to collect their developed film. But now that scanning negatives has become the norm and digital files are easy to get, interest in film as the physical medium that holds the photograph seems to be fading.
The article also includes a striking account from the owner of Bleeker Digital Solutions, another film developer in Manhattan. So much film goes uncollected that the shop has adopted a rule of keeping film for only 30 days.
The return of film is clearly a real trend, but people's attitudes toward negatives appear to have changed a great deal from what they once were. Negatives have a distinct appeal in that they record the moment a photo was taken chemically and physically, but will that appeal ever be "rediscovered"? Fujifilm has also published guidance on organizing negatives, and if ways of organizing them that suit the way we live now catch on, this trend may start to shift as well.