Goodbye Film - End Of An Era

I've worked in the photo lab industry for over 20 years. The last 12 at a pro photo lab Qube visual, formerly know as Cies Sexton or Photobition. The other day was the last run of film processing for this business. I wrote this note to the other employees who may not have realized how much the photo industry has changed because of the digital revolution.

Hey, all. Thought I'd share some history of this place we call the Qube.

As most of you know the film department is being shut down today for good. It’s truly the end of an era for this place, and Denver really. Sign of the times though, like the music industry facing changes with digital music, the photo industry must change also. Face it, our life styles are ever changing as certain aspects become more and more convenient with digital cameras and mp3 players, etc.

(If some of my numbers are off here I apologize-Ray and Brent can maybe correct me). This place has been one of the most respected and largest professional photo labs in the country for the last 25 plus years. The film processing and photo services carried this place financially a good deal of that time. When I started working here 12 years ago we had 5 people working 2 shifts in the film department alone. I believe we averaged taking in $100,000 a month at times...just the film department! We had over 100 employees here, about half of which worked only in the photo side of things processing film, making photographic prints or taking in film related orders. The Customer Service department had over 10 folks (?) alone mostly taking care of the 100’s of photographers that used our services. I just checked that plastic slide mounter in the film department and over 58,600,000 35mm slides had been mounted on that machine alone in the last 10 years. Holy crap! That’s a lot of film! That’s not even counting the other formats that have gone through those machines.

So, I bid the end of that era a fond farewell here and look forward to what the future brings us. I’m still proud to be part of this place even though the times, they have a changed...and will continue to do so. Change is good as they say. :)

Best of 2007

Happy New Year! To wrap up the year thought I'd list some favorite recordings:

In no particular order:

Porcupine Tree - Fear of a Blank Planet (Another classic in my book)
Porcupine Tree - Nil Recurring EP (Fantastic companion release to FOABP)
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum - In Glorious Times (Perhaps SGM's "proggiest" release yet)
Future Kings of England - The Fate of Old Mother Orvis (Their 2nd CD. A wonderful blend of early era Pink Floyd and Gabriel era Genesis)
Ian Neal - The Lake EP (Prog-tronic? Cool blend of prog and modern electronic stylings)
Saturation Point - Three (Post-rock with electronic elements)
Riverside - Rapid Eye Movement (Wow! These guys can do no wrong. Bookend to their Reality Dream Trilogy)
Saga - 10,000 Days (Send off to Michael Sadler. Done right!)
God Is An Astronaut - Far From Refuge (Post rock with keyboards and piano added)
Radio Massacre International - Rain Falls In Grey (Tribute to Syd Barret. Awesome!)
Flower Kings - Sum of No Evil (Roine said they were going to do an overtly prog album...nicely done!)
Marillion - Somewhere Else (Another fan polarizing CD. I' m on the side who likes it!)
Tuner - Pole (Pat Mastlotto and Markus Reuter's latest. "Modernistic rock")
Steve Moore - The Henge (Zombi Keyboardist's first solo CD. Great electronic effort)
Hiromi - Time Control (Super fusion album for this Japanese keyboardist)
Alan Pasqua - The Antisocial Club (Another great fusion album)
The Gourishankar - 2nd Hands (Interesting modern prog from the Russian Federation)


Best show would have to go to Genesis. Never seen them in person before. The guys can still bring it. Even though we sat way in the back of the Pepsi Center, the sound was great and the visual effects mind boggling. I thought they did a fantastic blend of their pop and more "artful" material. The Rockies won their playoff round against the Phillies that night too, making the evening even more enjoyable!