I am still super bummed about Fujifilm’s decision to stop production of FP-100C packfilm. It’s the last peel-apart instant film on the market. Once it is gone, an entire category of instant film cameras become obsolete. However, The Impossible Project, which saved Polaroid 600 instant film, is trying to save peel-apart packfilm as well.
Florian “Doc” Kaps, founder of The Impossible Project, went to Japan to meet with Fujifilm in an effort to convince the company to allow The Impossible Project to acquire its production equipment for FP-100C. You can see an update from Japan in his interview with photographer Michel Jones in the video below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTqybRVTeas&w=700&showinfo=0&rel=0
In a recent blog post that chronicles his efforts to negotiate with Fujifilm, Kaps says:
The most positive outcome of this journey so far is the fact that there have been 2 official proposals of how to keep this material alive and an impressive amount of signatures personally handed over to the Fuji management. Hopefully they can NOW no longer continue like there is no interest or chance for this material any longer.
You can join the effort to save packfilm at savepackfilm.net.
[via PetaPixel]
Having The Impossible Project “save” FP-100C is like asking Hannibal Lecter to operate on your wife.
TIP’s version of Polaroid integral materials is a disaster. Whether this is because TIP doesn’t know what it’s doing, or because there are hidden, proprietary “gotchas” in the manufacturing process, I don’t know.
But given TIP’s track record, the odds are in favor of a poor product that TIP promotes as a form of artistic expression.
I’m going to call 3M again, and suggest a second time that they look into producing peel-apart materials.
First, Florian Kaps is driving this effort- not TIP. Second, to haters of TIP, they built something in 5 years that took Polaroid (and the driving genius, Dr. Land) 22 years to develop- all with different chemicals than Polaroid. I can only hope someone as pioneering and risk taking as impossible will pursue it- even if they don’t hit the mark right out of the gate.
The headline reads “Impossible Project is Trying to Save Fujifilm Packfilm”.
My understanding was that the only chemical TIP was obliged to find a substitute for was the premium-grade titanium dioxide that was no longer available. Nothing was ever said about TIP having to re-engineer the chemistry from scratch. Why should they have? Don’t the patents explain everything?
Polaroid went through a lot of tsuris developing instant color photography. The final solution turned out to be so ridiculously obvious (on paper, anyway), that Land must have heard Rogers banging his head against the wall. So I can understand TIP not hitting the mark right out of the gate.
But TIP didn’t miss the mark just a little. It was more like aiming at the Moon and hitting Pluto. The TIP integral material is awful. And expensive.
My guess is that FP-100C is more-complex than TZ Supercolor. I’m not holding my breath. If Mr Kaps would care to send samples, I will be happy to test them. (I’ve been taking instant photos for almost 50 years.)
My understanding, and it is based on speculation and what the media has told us, is that several chemicals in the supply chain were discontinued or were not available due to changing standards(polaroid would have grandfathered their chemicals and developed a supply chain over their 30 plus years of innovation.
Also, I doubt that the first Polaroid innovation(roll/packfilm) is more sophisticated than integral. It is basically a very refined contact print.
All Polaroid print materials are DTR (diffusion transfer reversal). (This process was not Polaroid’s invention. Agfa had been working on it as a system for document copying.) It uses a strong developer that rapidly reduces the exposed silver. The unexposed grains are dissolved by the fixer, and diffuse towards the receptor sheet. The receptor converts them into metallic silver, forming the final image.
Color materials (both integral and peel-apart) are conceptually similar. Each layer has a “dye-developer” of the complimentary color. Developer molecules that encounter exposed silver reduce it and are immobilized. Those that don’t diffuse to the receptor sheet, where the dye component of the molecules bonds with a mordant. The integral materials are only slightly more complex, with an opacifying layer (TiO2+indicator dye), plus an acid layer that halts development.
As far as I know, FP-100C includes the acid layer, so that development automatically halts. Regardless, it has the widest tonal range and most-accurate color of any peel-apart material I’ve seen. Anyone attempting to duplicate it has a very high standard to live up to.
I wish someone would bring back ProVivid.
I would love to see TIP to be able save Fuji 100 pack film for the Polaroid pack cameras because I have 2 polaroid cameras they work great with Fuji 100 pack films. So please continue trying to save the 100 pack films Glenn
Please continue trying to save polaroid 108 film for polaroid pack cameras the FP 100 works great in polaroid pack cameras it would fulfill the complete the whole reviving effort of polaroid cameras. thank you Glenn