The end of the world as we know it.

[oldRoger]

I have been using Kodachrome since Kodachrome 10. What will we do?

Eastman Kodak Co. said Monday it will discontinue its iconic Kodachrome color film this year due to tumbling sales as photographers embrace newer Kodak films or digital-imaging technology.

Is this what progress looks like? Surely a bailout is possible.

 

[smith revolver cop]

Will Paul Simon have to re-record his classic song? Somehow, "SD Card" just doesn't seem as lyrical!

(My slide film of choice has actually been discontinued for years- Agfachrome 50!)

 

[Joni_Lynn]

I'll miss it.
It's going to be sad when I can't get any decent film for my Canon F1.

 

[Spotteddog]

All of the camera stuff my Dad was so into, obsolete. B&W enlarger, reporters camera, etc., etc. all now useless. Kinda makes you feel the way folks must have at the transition from flintlock to the percussion cap. Then percussion cap to metallic cartridges. Followed by smokeless replacing black powder. Horse to automobile. US into USSR? (couldn't resist! Sorry?)

 

[cshoff]

When I was still using film, I had already made the switch from Kodakrome to either Fujicolor 100, or Fujicolor Superia 200, depending on what the subject was. As I recall, their Nexia line of films were pretty good too. Nobody made a better B&W film than Kodak, at least none that I had ever used.

 

[scooter123]

DON'T BUY ANY STOCK IN KODAK.

Those idiots don't realise that they just passed up a niche market where people would have been willing to pay 20 dollars per roll. All they had to do was keep one small line running and one processing center running and they would have had an endless revenue stream. Because it's a simple fact, Kodachrome was the FINEST color film that has ever been made. I once snapped an informal pic of my Father on 120 format K64 using a Mamiya C220 and the detail in that 11 x 17 print has to be seen to be believed. In another 100 years people will look at Cibachrome prints made from Kodachrome slides and wonder how it was done.

 

[Gutpile Charlie]

My first job as a kid was working for a photographer. We used 4x5 Crown Graphics, Roliflexs and the occasinal Lecia rangerfinder.

Ninety-nine percent of everything we did was with the 4x5. We even used it for portraits in a camera that would hold up to 8x10 sheet film.

The guy I worked for started in the photo business in 1905. He called all us young whippersnappers..."moderns"! Yuppers.

This guy was so old fashioned that "back in the day" he used flashpowder. He had to cameras he called "circuit cameras" that took the panoramic pictures you see in museums. While I was working for him in the early fifties, he even used them a couple of times on jobs. The jobs I remember were Phillips Petroleum Company stockholder meetings.

One of these cameras used a five inch wide, paper backed, roll film and the other used the same type film in seven inch width.

The original films for these cameras, Eastman Kodak had since quit manufacturing, however he modified them to use a film that had been developed prior to WWII for use in the big, aerial cameras.

We printed these long negatives on a home made contact printer.

I remember the "original" Kodachrome quite well. I loved the color temperature of it. It had an ASA of 10, and then in the fifties they made one at 25. It was just not the same.

I never like Ektachorme. It had a too blueish-green color temperature.

Remember the old Ansco color film? It was very "warm", as well as the Agfa.

Today, I have no photo equipment except digital. I loved the old, quality cameras. They just seem so useless today.

I miss them...but I got rid of all of mine.

 

[CJofWolfcreek]

I have fond memories of developing and printing B&W film. My girlfriend and I were both on the high school yearbook photography staff and well to keep people from walking in and destroying film the door just had to be locked.

 

[jag312]

I went into mourning whan Kodak stopped making Kodachrome in 120 size for my Mamiya RB67. Someone stole the last 19 rolls that I had. I used it for photographing racing cars. The color was unbelievable.

 

[Bullet Bob]

Kodachrome might no longer be made, but the slides we have will outlive us, unlike the digital formats subject to data rot. People will still be making color prints from Kodachrome slides 100 years from now.

 

[perrazi]

progress,or more change we can't believe in?

 

[oldRoger]

Reading these posts gave me a brilliant idea:

We persuade Obama to hint that he is open to congress regulating film cameras, especially those dangerous 36 shot attack cameras loaded with 36mm Kodachrome.

All it would take is money in the right hands in Chicago.

 

[biggs357]

they say you can get a better phot with digi,but beg to differ.I have been photographing now since the early eighties with 400 speed black and white,but last year i found out that all the walmarts had quit carrying and at the end of this year they won't develop film at all.You can still have them send it off but they won't have the one hour photo labs.Tell me you can get photo's like this with digital.

 

[SWID]

Data rot?

Here's a link:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090622/ap_on_re_us/us_kodachrome_s_demise

 

[Andy Griffith]

I guess I'm going to cry when they quit making the T-Max 100 for my old 120 Agfa. Or have they already? I've gotten some amazing shots with that old thing.

Shhh!
I'm going to go buy a case of it, and hoard it.

Light bulbs, film, leaded gasoline....it's a conspiracy I tell ya!

 

[oldRoger]

I have a Nikon D-3, clearly it will not capture all of the information that I can get on a well exposed 35mm Kodachrome Slide. Sure Fugi and Kodak make some very good E-6 processed stuff, but it ain't the same.
It's like any dumbing down process, in a few years no one will know the difference.
Really good B&W photos are going the same way.

With Kodachrome, when the lab closes we are out of luck, it's one of those things you can't do at home.

 

[esterroid]

I spent ten years as a photojournalist. Used to buy bulk tri-X by the case: 50 100' cans of 35mm film. Shot a lot of kodachrome as well.

Also worked as a production manager in a photofinishing plant. Processing kodachrome is much different than processing ektachrome. e-6 and c-41 process film contains the dyes in the unexposed film. kodachrome is really just a fancy three layer black and white film. The dyes are added as the film is processed.

That process [was it k12?] is far more critical than the e6 process which one can do at home. It is only economically viable when large quantities of film are being processed.

On occasion, when the kids are home, we take out the old projector and stacks of trays and have an old fashioned slide show. The colors are still as they were 20-40 years ago when I had the film processed.

Unfortunately, I've learned that even under ideal storage conditions in terms of heat and humidity that various little critters and fugi have taken a liking to the gelatine that forms the base for photographic emulsions.

Now to make prints I have to digitize the slides and clean them up with photoshop...

I don't think I've exposed a frame of kodachrome in over twenty years...

time marches on, folks!

 

[RonJ]

Biggs357,
Exif data says all but your last picture was shot with a Fuji A805 digital camera.
Were you trying to make a point?

 

[robertrwalsh]

Fujichrome is still around, as is Ektachrome. I liked both Kodachrome and Agfachrome too, but life is hard and often unfair and you can't always get what you want. I shot a roll of Kodachrome about 3 years ago to test a light meter in a Leicaflex. I still have one roll left and one mailer. Bummer.

 

[pps]

Going to miss K64