I'm questioning the ability of Adox to produce any kind of real color film themselves; Mirko has said in a talk that it would take hundreds of millions and many engineers to come up with a film that might even compare to a Ferrania film.
Suddenly they have couplers, sensitizers and all the other jazz figured out? At least be honest if you've got a few vats of chemicals that you've got laying around and now are making some kind of film concoction and try to make some money out of it (fairly so, I want Adox to succeed); but at least be honest towards the people that are asking the questions. And maybe also let your most loyal darkroom printers know wether we will be seeing MCC/PWE paper anywhere in the upcoming 5 years.
We never claimed that we are at this point able to manufacture color film fully in house. In fact what we claimed is that HELIOS is from the COLOR MISSION series and it is very clear what´s the purpose of this "endavour" or "adventure" and this is to
become capable in the future to manufacture a proper color film and by buying a roll you support us in this mainly financially. Anything released under the COLOR MISSION label are steps in this direction. We will not disclose all details but we can and will of course be frank about those informations which are of understandable interest to the potential buyer.
About Helios I stated three main technical aspects:
1) It is produced with a
higher (not full) in house depth of manufacturing than COLOR MISSION I
2) It is a simplified color emulsion which could be manufactured in larger amounts and at a lower price
3) It is not as user-friendly as "regular" color film or COLOR MISSION I and some sacrifces will need to be made by the users BUT they can get high quality color images from this film if done so.
I also stated that we have much more of this film than we have from COLOR MISSION I and that we thus release it through the dealers and make it available worldwide as well as that we can finish this material (once all finishing machines are repaired) in all formats up to 4x5".
If we are able to keep financing the project and we make further success we will be releasing more COLOR MISSION and most likely each one will have a higher manufacturing depth and while we do so we learn. At the very end we will be hopefully "self-sustainable".
The last is to be understood as capable of making the respective dispersions/"emulsions", coating and finishing the film.
There are tremendous challenges even in the last part only (finishing).
HELIOS as it is is a one-time stock and it is unique. If we are to proceed this route with these color couplers a possible next candidate will have a higher speed (means changing the emulsions!) and we will be implementing on the fly QC so that we can correct a color shift
during the coating and do not end up with a lot of material off specs.
We did underestimate the demand for COLOR MISSION I a lot. Of HELIOS we have enough to release 20 times more then of COLOR MISSION I.
Since it is not as user friendly as COLOR MISSION I and since we have 20 times more and because it has such a low speed that it can be stored indefinitely, we expect this film to be around for a long time (>4 years).
We are happy about anyone who feels like supporting us in this by buying HELIOS and creating nice images on it. Our promise holds up that we reinvest all profits into film R&D.
If it is absolutley necessary for anyone to know exactly what we did, when and with whom, in order to buy an attractively priced roll of color film, I suggest to ignore this stock and continue with other material.
We cannot and will not be releasing confidential informations about the manufacturing process, ingredients and cooperations. No manufacturer does this for good reasons.