Lomography, the popular analogue photography brand, has revealed some interesting statistics for its film-sales in the UK, and across the globe.
Heidi Mace, Online Manager for Lomography UK, told us, "Film sales are growing month on month, film for us is our biggest selling category by quantity, in every country."
Looking at sales figures, Lomography sold 10,793 rolls of film in the UK in December 2011, an increase from 9, 576 in the same month of 2010. "On average we sold 348 rolls of film per day - there's plenty of call for it and we don't see that easing off at all right now."
Mace also said that Lomography worldwide sales across all departments grew 15% in the last year. Lomography introduced its own processing lab in March 2010, and has since processed 10,748 rolls of film across its 3 UK stores and online.
To celebrate, Lomo has released some interesting stats about its lab. It uses a Fuji Frontier 375 printer, Fuji FP363SC film processor and Fuji SP300 scanner. It also uses an Epson V700 flatbed to scan films that are shot on a Spinner 360 camera.
Stats
It gets through 1,116 metres of photographic paper each month, along with 300/400 litres of photographic chemistry a month.
Lomography has also revealed that people like to, er, reveal a little too much. "People seem to enjoy taking their Diana F+ into the shower with them, not recommended!" said one of the Lomo lab workers.
Meanwhile, the company is keen to point out, despite the resurgence in film popularity of late, it is not trying to compete with digital.
Speaking to TechRadar, Mark Appleton, Key Accounts Manager for Lomography UK, said "We're not trying to say digital is bad, so you should throw away your digital cameras, they work hand in hand."
Lomo has produced several adapters and products that work in conjunction with digital cameras and smartphones, such as the Diana lens for DSLR, and the recently announced iPhone holder for the Lomokino which allows (moving) films to be digitised.
Appleton continued, "We're really not trying to compete with them, and there's no denying it's very useful having the images straightaway [from digital], but we're trying to bring the roots of analogue photography back."
Hardcore
With three standalone stores in the UK alone, and a series of planned pop-up shops planned for 2012, Lomo as a brand is increasing is seemingly ever increasing in popularity, with Appleton saying that some users do become "hardcore Lomographers" and go completely analogue.
Film is currently enjoying a resurgence, with Fujifilm telling us that the decline in film sales had slowed down in the past six months, while Kodak, who announced it was filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last week still maintained that its film business was one of the only areas of the company that was still turning a profit.
Lomo has a wide variety of cameras, which accept 35mm or 120mm film, with each characterised by unpredictable effects such as light-leaks, strange colours and blurry images. Appleton also told us that he believe that people were "bored" by digital photography and its reliable nature.
Your comments (3) Click to add a new comment
colornerd
January 25th
3. Amy - these figures are interesting. It shows that film is not dead, but it is clearly in the boutique category.
By way of comparison, in the height of film use in the US in the late 90's, your average overnight consumer photolab would process between 20 and 40 thousand rolls of film per night. There were about 50 such labs owned by Kodak/Qualex, 35 owned by Fujifilm, 20 or so owned by Konica/Photomat, and probably another 40-50 independents of similar size. That's 150 locations across the country that processed in two *hours* what Lomo has taken over the counter in two *years*.
Also for comparison - your average Wal*Mart would process around 100 rolls of film on site a day. Lomo's 11k rolls across three locations in 22 months yields about 20 rolls per day per site.
Having spent 20 years in the photoprocessing, I can tell you these are not numbers that are indicative of any kind of 'resurgence'. It is easy to get the impression that these numbers are significant without perspective on the history of the industry. It is also easy to have your perspective skewed when your sole source is a company whose lifeblood is a largely outmoded product.
I really enjoy Lomo's products and continue to shoot in experimental and artistic ways, so I am gratified to know there will still be shops that will cater to this boutique niche of artists. At the same time, I would caution against getting too excited about a film renaissance. It's just not happening.
Alert a moderator
amydavies
January 24th
2. Nothing- after hearing from Kodak and Fujifilm that film sales were not on the decline, I decided it would be interesting to speak to Lomography, who, whether you like them or not, are very popular at the moment.
You only have to look at the fact that they have 4 UK shops to see that. And the fact that they were able to supply us with actual sales figures as well was very interesting - I for one certainly didn't expect the figures to be so high.
All the time, we are told that digital has killed off film, when in reality, especially at the moment, that's just not true. It's therefore interesting, from anyone who shoots both digitally or traditionally, what the current state of the market is.
Alert a moderator
oracle
January 24th
1. If you want to shoot film go buy one of the excellent Nikons from Ebay and get some Fuji film rather than mess about this this fashion photography nonsense.
How much did they pay techrader for the infomercial?
Alert a moderator
Tell us what you think
You need to Log in or register to post comments