Kodak discontinues black-and-white photo paper — This was just a matter of time.
ROCHESTER, JUNE 16: Ending a century-old tradition, Eastman Kodak Co will soon stop making black-and-white photographic paper, a niche product for fine-art photographers and hobbyists that is rapidly being supplanted by digital-imaging systems.
Kodak said on Wednesday it will discontinue production of the paper, specially designed for black-and-white film, at the end of this year. But the world’s biggest film manufacturer will continue to make black-and-white film and chemicals for processing. “It’s a shame to see it go,” said Bill Schiffner, editor of Imaging Business magazine in Melville, New York. “Digital has done a lot of good things for the industry but it’s done some bad things too. It’s making a lot of these processes obsolete.” The paper is manufactured at a plant in Brazil.
Ugh.
Does any good news national news ever come out of this darn city?
It’s a pity, though… Maybe they could keep it as a high-margin product? They couldn’t be selling 0 dollars of it….
That’s my exact thought Miguel.
How can they discontinue black and white paper if they’re still selling black and white film? I am confused. Seems to me, if they stopped with the b&w film, then there’d be no NEED for the paper……
or am I missing something?
The only need for black and white paper is if you develop the prints yourself, either in a darkroom at home, or in a photography class. I run an independent camera store/photofinisher, and we rarely sell B&W paper anymore. Most good photofinishing locations can process C-41 Black and White film (B&W, but using color chemicals). As for “true” B&W (TMax, Tri-X, etc.), a lot of places still hand process them now and then. My little store doesn’t do enough to do that, so we send that stuff out to another lab that processes it.
So, you can still get B&W prints from B&W film, without using the B&W paper, and that’s what most people are doing now.
True you can print b&w on color print paper … BUT … what about archival properties? Color paper does not have the archival properties of b&w. And what about artisitic values? There are many b&w photo artists that use b&w media for their artwork! This is a said day if Kodak cannot find some kind of market that is willing to support b&w photography.
That may be true you can send your pictures out to another lab. However I am a Photography High School Teacher. With Kodak out of the picture we have to turn to Illford. The only problem is that it is to expensive, and we do not have the money in out budget.