The rapid growth of the digital world has attracted companies to join the market. Photo pioneer Kodak, whose income has suffered as a result of the digital revolution, has adjusted by offering a service called Kodak Picture Kiosk.

Simply by inserting a memory card or thumb drive, users can choose which picture to print for album by themselves.

Digital cameras arrived in Thailand in 2002 and last year the total number, forecasted by GFK Thailand, was around 1.18 million units, with a projection of 1.35 million units by the end of this year, a 15 percent growth.

On top of this, there are an estimated 44 million mobile phones in Thailand, 18 million of which can take photos.

According to research by Kodak, Thai people took five rolls of photo film a year per person, or 180 pictures per camera per year.

The number of photo files has increased by about 1 billion each year. And these are the target of photo printing business.

Kodak (Thailand) officially introduced the kiosk-based photo printing three years ago with the expectation that the service would gain market popularity by this year.

“The kiosk service actually launched here seven years ago, but it was kept in the back of photo shops as merchants just used the machines for printing ID photos,” said Somsak Chuasukontip, Kodak (Thailand) sales manager Consumers Digital Imaging Group.

He said the conventional photo lap owners earlier were uncomfortable to adjust to the new wave of technology, but now they all realised that the traditional photo film absolutely taken over by the digital.

The kiosk offers self-service photo printing for those who take photographs and want to see the pictures immediately. They just plug in the memory card or their thumb drives on the kiosk’s slot and choose the pictures that they would like to print, select the size, choose the background, template and edit the file as necessary.

The kiosk allow users to add various patterns or compile a collage. Consumers can choose the photo book in three sizes – 4×6, 6×8 or 8×12.

“Photo printing today is not just for memories but also for entertainment, and when comparing with print at home, the price of printing photos through a kiosk service is cheaper because consumers need not to invest on the machine or ink,” the sales manager said.

Currently, Kodak has collaborated with Photo Hut to provide a picture kiosk in 30 locations.

The company plans to have around 80 kiosk service locations by the end of this year.

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