Kodak is gone from the Imagination Pavilion.

[homercrispy]

I for one will not miss the kodak pre-show.

 

[nytimez]

The disposable digitals currently in development are actually becoming cheaper for companies to manufacture and can hold more pictures than the film equivalent.

They can then sell the camera for less than the film equivalent, to the consumer.

In addition, the consumer doesn't have to pay for film processing (which they DO have to pay for with a disposable film camera). You only have to pay for prints. And many of the disposables being proposed (and a couple that have already been brought to market) include the option to delete unwanted pictures. Which means you don't pay for anything you don't want. The net is the consumer pays considerably less money for those prints (in total cost), and gets more "good pictures" in the end, to boot.

And, as far as the consumer is concerned, they function no different than a film disposable. Drop the camera off to the photo lab. You get your prints and a photoCD (included..no extra cost) of your pictures returned to you. The only difference is: Your bill is less the film processing fee and you don't get NEGATIVES back.

You don't see many disposable digitals on the market, yet, because the one hold up is the LCD preview screen (quality vs effective/cheap production), but that's quickly becoming less of an issue. There have been a few (some as cheap as $10) over the years, with decent quality pictures..but they had grainy LCD screens (both Ritz/Wolfe and CVS offered them, not long ago).

The film disposables have a market, for now...and they do have some nice convenience advantages in certain situations. But that market is shrinking. And there's a good chance that market will pretty much disappear within the next 3 - 5 years as other, more cost effective and feature rich, options come to mass market.

If you're returning the disposable digital for "processing" anyway, why can't they reuse the screens? And why do you need that extra step -- why can't you just plug it into your own computer and skip the "processing" step completely? And once you do that, when does it cease to become "disposable?"

 

[ChrisFL]

 

[mousermerf]

Is this really still being debated?

Eastman Kodak's sponsorship of the Imagination pavilion ended at the end of June. For questions or concerns, please contact David Lanzillo of the Eastman Kodak Company david.lanzillo@kodak.com