With today’s prices, film photography may feel like a luxury. But has it *really* been cheap, ever?
Annoyingly, the real answer is, “it depends.”
Seeing a favourite roll of film selling for a few bucks more than the last month isn’t an indicator of an average film price. There are hundreds of film brands out there (analog.cafe/app/all-film), and they all have distinct logistics, pricing, delivery fees, taxes, etc. It’s a complicated world.
I’ve been tracking an average price of 135/36exp. film rolls across various stores in the US/Canada, Europe, and HK since 2018, in a graph that visualizes those trends (analog.cafe/app/film-price…). It’s the only one of this kind. But even this graph is incomplete: it doesn’t factor in the inflation.
For example, the average price of film went from $10.77 in April 2020 to $16.17 in July 2025 (+50%), but when adjusted for the US inflation in the same date range, the price increase is 25% (or 5% per year).
An inflation-adjusted average film price increase of 5% per year for the past five years is not insignificant.
Still, I’d like to reiterate how complex the world of film prices is: the actual price effects you’re feeling will depend on the currency you buy it with, where you live, and which brands you choose. For example, the same data in Euros (using historical currency conversion adjusted at record time) shows an increase of the average film price from €9.97 in 2020 to €13.89 in 2025 (+39%), which’s a lot less than it is in the US when adjusted for inflation: 3.2%.
Given the rise of film photography’s popularity and demand in the past five years (analog.cafe/r/a-beginners-…), it shouldn’t be surprising that the prices are going up. But that also suggests that we’re in a transition period: from the near death of the medium to its complete revival. This takes investment and comes with a delayed response to market demands. In other words, the price increases we see now can be attributed to “growing pains”.
But what if we looked back further to see what our parents or our younger selves would’ve paid for film in its heyday, say in the 1990s?
I’ve recently come across an article that reported the price of Kodak Gold 100 (24exp.) costing $4.60 in the year 1990 (upi.com/Archives/1990/12/1…). In 2025 dollars, this is $11.40, which is on par with today’s average price of Kodak Gold 200 ($11.35) — or less, once we factor in the fact that 36-exposure rolls cost more (currently, a 24-exposure roll of Kodak Gold is $7 at B&H).
In other words, film is cheaper to shoot in 2025 than it was in 1990.
I’m hesitant to put any numbers on the above claim, given how complex the picture is and how limited the historical data is. Still, I think it’s helpful to see how valuable our medium has been, even at its peak production time.
Perhaps today’s film prices aren’t as bad as those who “used to shoot it back in the day” would claim.
If I understand this correctly, Dupli would be a distributor in the EU and the UK, and Fotoimplex may be dealing with them to obtain the chemistry instead of shipping from the US. I hope that this will make the chemicals cheaper, as distributors should be streamlining the shipping and warehousing processes.
Polaroid to launch a new Now camera and I-Type frames design in collaboration with Thrasher skate mag this Tuesday.
A legendary skateboarding publication got its mark in the lineup of new instant cameras with dip-dyed paint designs on Polaroid Now Generation 3 – Thrasher Edition (polaroid.com/pages/thrashe…) and rad new frames (11 designs): polaroid.com/pages/thrashe….
Both will be available starting September 16. $150 for the camera and $22 for the film.
Kodak Flexicolor (now, Kodak Colour Negative Chemistry) is back! — in Europe.
Dupli is an official distributor of Kodak film development chemistry that’s been gradually returning to the market following a hiatus due to supply and other challenges.
The US distribution resumed last year by Dupli in collaboration with CineStill. Starting today, the European Dupli store and local suppliers will begin selling Kodak’s colour negative development chemistry (previously named Flexicolor, rebranded to Kodak Colour Negative Chemistry).
Dupli describes Kodak Colour Negative Chemistry as “trusted… used by generations of photographers to produce vibrant, true-to-life colour prints. Designed for both minilab and professional operations, Kodak Colour Negative Chemistry offers the consistency, reliability, and image quality that analogue photographers expect.”
On the website, it adds: “This new kit is an excellent replacement for the now defunct Tetenal Colortec C-41 Kit. Perfect for fast and hassle free home development of your colour films.”
The instructions sheet with the developer lists 3:15 as a development time (with a temperature range of 37-39℃) and 6:30 for both bleach and fixer. You can download it here: dupli.co.uk/product/attach… or find all the product listings on the Dupli website: dupli.co.uk/dupli-shop/ana…
The chemicals are available in various configurations, including giant, 40-litre replenisher packs for lab use.
Analogue Amsterdam just posted an update about their new point-and-shoot film camera, teasing a reveal on September 30th.
Making film cameras, particularly the high-end automatic point-and-shoots, is so difficult that any new business entering the space is often met with strong skepticism. That is still the case for Analogue Amsterdam, a European business that has found a factory capable of building a brand-new, fully featured point-and-shoot camera in 2025.
The skepticism is understandable, given the current track record of zero such cameras produced in the past decade that could match the pinnacle of the Minolta TC-1 (analog.cafe/r/minolta-tc-1…) or the ultra-thin design of the Ricoh GR1 (analog.cafe/r/ricoh-gr1gr1…). Even simpler designs, such as that of the Olympus Mju I (analog.cafe/r/olympus-mju-…), haven’t had the chance to return to the shelves yet.
Analogue aF-1 is like the Mju I in many ways: a €399/$412 camera with a six-element 35mm 𝒇2.8 lens, a Lidar autofocus, autoexposure, motorized film transport, shutter speed up to 1/1000, flash, and a DX-code reader.
The difference between Olympus in the 1990s and Analogue Amsterdam is that the former is a famous multinational Japanese corporation that’s been making film cameras for decades, whereas the latter is a relatively unknown photography shop and a design agency. That’s where the skepticism came for Analogue, with the doubts rising as the company missed their self-imposed deadlines by five months.
So far, Analogue has released a handful of very short video clips, some of which were taken on a factory floor and others highlighting the internal workings of their camera.
Their newest post, instagram.com/p/DObKah5jH_f, is a teaser of an upcoming demo unit that we may see on September 30th.
This doesn’t mean that the camera will be available for sale on the same day (or even that the final product will look and work the same). Still, that would be a huge boost of confidence in the project that I would love to see.
RETO launches a tiny KODAK CHARMERA digital 1.6MP keychain camera.
This is the first digital product for RETO, who’s been selling film and making film cameras since 2019. CHARMERAs are Kodak-branded, pendant-sized, and sold in blind boxes (so you’ll never know which of the 7 designs you’ll get). Or you can get a set of all six (minus the limited edition one) for $180. Singles are $30.
RETO says that CHARMERA’s design is inspired by Kodak Fling, which was Kodak’s first 110 disposable camera, released in the 1980s.
CHARMERA’s quarter-inch CMOS sensor uses a 35mm 𝒇2.4 lens to store 1.6MP 1440x1080 JPEGs or 30 fps AVI movies on a Micro SD card, powered by a USB-C rechargeable 200mAh battery. The entire thing is 58mm × 24.5mm × 20mm and weighs 30g. You will need to supply your own memory card (1GB-128GB).
I’m attaching a few nice samples I received from RETO below.
Love how small and colourful these things are. RETO has certainly taken the good parts of the vintage Kodak packaging/print design.
I don’t need another tiny digital camera right now, so I am very proud of myself for resisting this one (it’s so tempting!) But if I did, I’d probably immediately start playing with filters and borders until settling on the default.
Besides, I’m still playing with RETO PANO (analog.cafe/r/reto-pano-re…), which has proven to render some excellent images, particularly with high-contrast black-and-white films.
Bugfixes and easier film development with Film Log.
Analog.Cafe v3.30.91 adds a link to the Massive Dev Chart next to the Dilution Calculator and Chemistry Manager in the Film Log app (analog.cafe/app/film-log) to complete the list of resources needed to develop black-and-white film.
Other fixes and features in version 3.30.91:
- Fixed a crash in the Film Log app that appeared in a few rare scenarios.
- Fixed the News page design for items that are replies to featured articles.
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