Week #13 - Kodak Signet and Kodak Colorplus - The Final Kodak Moment

The Final Kodak Moment…

As you all know, I have been shooting Kodak film on Kodak cameras for the month of March.  It has been a bittersweet month, as I got to know each camera I thought to myself.. “What ever happened to Kodak?”  They have these incredible cameras, and they really are!  But today they have become a complete joke.  Gearing their digital cameras as just Point And Shoot jobbies that ended up costing them hundreds of millions. Trying to get into the Inkjet market was also another severe blunder as their printers were mediocre at best, and were against the Printing giants like Canon, and Epson, who have the market cornerstoned for Ink Jet printers.
But enough negativity, as this post is very sad… I decided to visit the old Kodak plant in Toronto on Photography Drive.  Employing over 5000 people at the pinnacle of its business, it collapsed into ruin at the turn of the 21st century.  Laying off thousands in the mid-90s and finally completely closing in 2005.
My wife, who worked there until 2003, was working in the Silver Gelatin B&W photopaper section under a red-light packing the boxes with the coated paper for shipping.

Today, the plant is nothing more than a desolate wasteland, with  mud, dirt, small pond-like puddles, contaminated soil, and tall grass and weeds covering much of the property.
Huge holes in the ground where they had their big chemical storage tanks stationed now dot the landscape, including barrels filled with unknown substances.

Even the old guard house is just a burned out husk.  Graffiti has coated its walls, and firebugs have lit countless fires to this hut.  The timbers are badly charred, and there is enough twisted blackened metal inside to give its story of its death throes…

Age, time, vandalism and arson has taken its toll on the building, and gives it a atmosphere of complete total desolation, and abandonment.
Not sure who owns this land today, if it’s still Kodak, or some other developer, but after the old chemical processing plants and warehouses came down, it has stood dormant and vacant for nearly 7 years.

From a place of abundance and a population rivaling a small town, it has become a scene from the hit Game Series Fallout.  Almost like a post-apocalyptic wasteland, it stands… barren… desolate… and decaying.

Perhaps it is a post apocalyptic scene…

A sign of what is to come….

To this, fellow readers… I say that my journey with Kodak has come full circle.  The first three cameras I used for this month were all manufactured at this very location.  The Duaflex IV, the Brownie Bulls-Eye, and the Jiffy Six-16 were all made in the Toronto plant for Kodak.  The last camera, the Signet 35, was manufactured in Rochester New York, and has come to document the end of an era…
The last… and final.. Kodak Moment..
Captured, and stored for eternity..

And for this, I say…  Keep those shutters firing!  May Kodak be like the Phoenix, and arise from the ashes.. stronger, smarter, and more vibrant than ever!