ADVANCED Photo System, or APS, uses "electronically enhanced" film. The alliance behind it believes APS will replace 35 millimetre film, a workhorse introduced in the 1920s. In the past, the smaller 24mm film size produced poorer resolution than larger formats. But APS film is reported to be equal in picture quality, and uses a polyethylene napthalate base stronger than current materials.
Its magnetic coating captures data about lighting and exposure for each frame, enabling new photo finishing equipment to correct the photographer's errors automatically. Users will also be able to display photographs on TV sets and input images into their personal computers.
The new system will allow easier enlargements and protect negatives, which will be encased in a drop loading cassette requiring no threading. It will encode the digital information across each frame of film, which will enable photo finishing equipment to develop each frame at the right exposure and speed, eliminating lost exposures.
APS will also be able to print captions about time and other details. For example Fuji's new camera, called Epion in Japanese and Endeavor in English, will enable users to print 30 different messages on the back of the picture.
But APS camera, films and processing equipment will not be compatible with existing equipment, and the technology could face an uphill battle. "No one wanted another Betamax VHS war," one analyst warned last week. The pocket sized disc camera introduced by Kodak in 1982, and Photo CD in the early 1990s, both failed to find a home with consumers.
"Most people are satisfied with the current films and cameras," said Kazuya Honjo of the Tokyo Research Institute think tank. "The advanced system will offer few merits to ordinary consumers, or even to manufacturers," he said. "The new system is like an invention of mini size audio cassettes, not that of compact discs that revolutionised the audio equipment industry."
Another analyst said "The fun for photos is seeing them in an album with families and friends."