Fujichrome, Kodachrome, Ektachrome...

mehguy · Sep 2, 2016

What is with names of films and other photographic materials? They all have the same suffixes depending on the film/paper type.

Fujichrome, Kodachrome, Agfachrome, Ilfochrome, Cibachrome, Ektachrome, Elitechrome, Scotchchrome... all these "chrome" names...

As for BW paper, we have

Kodabrome, Ilfobrom, and Fomabrom

moose10101 · Sep 2, 2016

mehguy said:
What is with names of films and other photographic materials? They all have the same suffixes depending on the film/paper type.

Fujichrome, Kodachrome, Agfachrome, Ilfochrome, Cibachrome, Ektachrome, Elitechrome, Scotchchrome... all these "chrome" names...

I'd like to know how/why Verichrome got its name.

Prest_400 · Sep 2, 2016

Then for color negative: Kodacolor, Fujicolor, Agfacolor, Konicacolor.

I recall seeing some 1990s Japanese ads and their pronunciation made the monotonic color termination fun.

moose10101 said:
I'd like to know how/why Verichrome got its name.

IIRC because it was a panchromatic film and it rendered all colours in their respective shade of gray. I began shooting long after it was discontinued and many here might have the correct answer.

benjiboy · Sep 2, 2016

Prest_400 said:
Then for color negative: Kodacolor, Fujicolor, Agfacolor, Konicacolor.

I recall seeing some 1990s Japanese ads and their pronunciation made the monotonic color termination fun.

IIRC because it was a panchromatic film and it rendered all colours in their respective shade of gray. I began shooting long after it was discontinued and many here might have the correct answer.

It was because as you write it was to give it it's full title Kodak Verichrome Panchromatic ( sensitive to all colours, although in fact it was oversensitive to blue light) previously most monochrome films were orthochromatic (more sensitive to red ). Unfortunately I'm old enough to have used it

railwayman3 · Sep 2, 2016

My impression was that the earliest "modern generation" colour (transparency) films in the 1930's were Kodachrome and Agfacolor.

Kodak seemed to then continue a convention of using the -chrome suffix for transparency films and -color for negative, and this was, to an extent, followed by some other makers, e.g. Ektachrome, Kodacolor, Fujichrome and Fujicolor, Sakurachrome and Sakuracolor, etc.

A few makers followed the Agfacolor naming (e.g. Ferraniacolor), but this seemed less used, and Agfa themselves used Agfachrome for later slide films.

AgX · Sep 2, 2016

Chrome means Colour. Two designations for the same thing.

In Germany and other countries Chrome is spelled Chrom. And as such the latter form was in the beginnging used there as film-name suffix. Only later the english version was taken over, to unify designations.

That -chrome refers to reversal colour film and -color to colour negative film is a late unification of designations, following the Kodak style of designating.

Before that both versions were used deliberately. And -chrome/-chrom also for b&w films, hinting at their extended (for that period) spectral sensitization.

Sirius Glass · Sep 3, 2016

mehguy said:
What is with names of films and other photographic materials? They all have the same suffixes depending on the film/paper type.

Fujichrome, Kodachrome, Agfachrome, Ilfochrome, Cibachrome, Ektachrome, Elitechrome, Scotchchrome... all these "chrome" names...

As for BW paper, we have

Kodabrome, Ilfobrom, and Fomabrom

And of course there was the black & white Kodak Verichome Pan that many of us used growing up.

miha · Sep 3, 2016

benjiboy said:
It was because as you write it was to give it it's full title Kodak Verichrome Panchromatic ( sensitive to all colours, although in fact it was oversensitive to blue light) previously most monochrome films were orthochromatic (more sensitive to red ). Unfortunately I'm old enough to have used it

The other way around.

Ian Grant · Sep 3, 2016

moose10101 said:
I'd like to know how/why Verichrome got its name.

1907/8 when Wratten and Wainwright introduce a range a of plates with better chromaticb responses, Verichrome was one of them, Mees revived the name later when he was head of Research at Eastman Kodak. Ilford's Selochrome was their equivalent of Verichrome.

Autochrome was Lumiere's colour reversal plate introduced in 1903.

Ian

jeffreyg · Sep 3, 2016

Otherwise Paul Simon would never have written the song.

http://www.jeffreyglasser.com/

foc · Sep 4, 2016

railwayman3 said:
My impression was that the earliest "modern generation" colour (transparency) films in the 1930's were Kodachrome and Agfacolor.

Kodak seemed to then continue a convention of using the -chrome suffix for transparency films and -color for negative, and this was, to an extent, followed by some other makers, e.g. Ektachrome, Kodacolor, Fujichrome and Fujicolor, Sakurachrome and Sakuracolor, etc.

A few makers followed the Agfacolor naming (e.g. Ferraniacolor), but this seemed less used, and Agfa themselves used Agfachrome for later slide films.

Agfa seemed to have their own naming structure. There was Agfacolor Neu in 1936 a reversal film, then in 1940/50's there was Agfacolor type T & K colour negative, then Agfacolor CN17 and then Agfacolor CNS again colour negative but Agfa CNS process (not C41). Yet when they introduced their first C41 film in 1978 they still had the CNS in the name Agfacolor CNS 400. Only later did they change (Agfacolor 100 etc) when 100 & 200 were introduced.

It's an interesting subject if you are so inclined.

AgX · Sep 4, 2016

foc said:
Agfa seemed to have their own naming structure.

As I said above, in the whole industry the designation was long time deliberately. Let us not make a science out of it.

Orwo for instance only followed the Kodak designation as late as 1991 by changing the suffix from -chrom to -chrome.

mehguy · Sep 5, 2016

I'm assuming companies just eventually followed the Kodak branding because of their near monopoly on the film market?

AgX · Sep 5, 2016

Yes, that was likely the reason.
Though Kodak had not a monopoly but was far ahead of both their strongest competitors Agfa (West) and Gevaert, which was one reason for this two equal firms to merge, by this gaining a 1/4 position against Kodak.

In a discussion on trade names one should not forget though that share in total industry revenue was not identical to share in local markets. And that is where tradenames are of importance.

LAG · Sep 6, 2016

Excuse me

mehguy said:
What is with names of films and other photographic materials? They all have the same suffixes depending on the film/paper type.

Fujichrome, Kodachrome, Agfachrome, Ilfochrome, Cibachrome, Ektachrome, Elitechrome, Scotchchrome... all these "chrome" names...

As for BW paper, we have

Kodabrome, Ilfobrom, and Fomabrom

-Chrome has not always been referred to a reversal process material, and same thing happened with -Color, not always referred to a negative. The difference lies is how colour is treated.

-Brom(e) refers to the "Bromide" Salts.

moose10101 said:
I'd like to know how/why Verichrome got its name.

Some of the films first names (and suffixes) come from different sources while taking account of the specific characteristics of each material, and also taking care not to generate false matches or conflicts between trademarks. One of those sources (specially from Kodak) are the slogans or the marketing subjects. Although it's true that in majority of cases that "designation thing" was not revealed (leaving that issue to suppositions)

Verichrome (April 1931) marketing used the words "Verified or Verification" (V for its verified), just to announce a finer detail with "certainty". In fact, the film in 1931 was sold with both ends "checkered" stripes in their boxes that "identified" it (in 1956 those stripes continued).

Ian Grant said:
... Autochrome was Lumiere's colour reversal plate introduced in 1903.

That transparency invention was introduced in 1903 (17th Dec), but in that date did not have that "Autochrome" name yet.

AgX · Sep 6, 2016

LAG said:
Verichrome (April 1931) marketing used the words "Verified or Verification" (V for its verified), just to announce a finer detail with "certainty".

As these film designations typically were based on greek and latin terms, that prefix likely is based on the Latin verus (=true).
Maybe hinting at better ("true") translation of colours into grey-tones.

Likely a matter of science guys giving the name and marketing people explaining it to the consumer...

But as you already hinted at, it woukld be intersing to know who at a manufacturer actually devised a film name.

MattKing · Sep 6, 2016

mehguy probably isn't old enough to have a good sense of what the market was like when these films received their names. In those days, people got their information from salespeople in camera stores, advertisements and articles in magazines, and places like film counters at drug stores.

It was a lot easier to sell something if it was put up against a known quantity. And in those parts of the world where Kodak's products were entrenched, so were Kodak's naming conventions. So those naming conventions were "borrowed" by the competitors.

You see some of the same thing with now with automobiles - how many "SE" models are on the road.

Wallendo · Sep 9, 2016

Unfortunately, Lomography hasn't gotten the message (or maybe they've gone so far retro that the conventions don't apply) : LomoChrome Purple is a C-41 film.

Larry the sailor · Sep 9, 2016

It's all Greek to me.

Or maybe Latin as well.

Sirius Glass · Sep 10, 2016

Actually it is all Geek to me.

LAG · Sep 12, 2016

AgX said:
As these film designations typically were based on greek and latin terms ....

Excuse me

As you said before that statement would be mean "making a science out of it" as well.

Ekta, Ektar, Plus-X, Tri-X, T-max ... (and the Kodak name itself) ... HP, FP (and Ilford name itself) ... Velvia (and Fuji it self) ... APX, ... (and Agfa name itself) ... it's quite clear that some of the names have a well-defined origin "out of its etymological greek or latin" derivation (by the way, why speak only of both origins?)

AgX · Sep 12, 2016

The name-givers seemingly tried to make it it look a scientific or educated thing.
What I meant was that we ourselves should not consider a science behind that name-giving.

I do not understand what you mean by Kodak/Ilford/Agfa name itself .

LAG · Sep 12, 2016

AgX said:
The name-givers seemingly tried to make it it look a scientific or educated thing.
What I meant was that we ourselves should not consider a science behind that name-giving.

Sure, I agree! we should not consider that a science, but also not consider that "not all" those names-giving have mystery behind or suppositions only, nor typically based on greek or latin terms either.

AgX said:
I do not understand what you mean by Kodak/Ilford/Agfa name itself .

Just wanted to show that those names, clearly, do not come from that typically base. I'm sorry if I did not explain it right.

timmct · Sep 12, 2016

Try...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chroma

Silver bromides in the emulsions on printing out paper.

removed account4 · Sep 12, 2016

timmct said:
Try...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chroma

Silver bromides in the emulsions on printing out paper.

what he said

and ...

moose10101 said:
I'd like to know how/why Verichrome got its name.

there were 2 verichromes
verichrome ( orthCROMATIC ) film
and verichrome pam (PANCHROMATIC ) film

the orthochromatic film was from 1931 -56
the panchromatic film was from 1956 - whenever it was discontinued

veri- was a prefix lensmakers like wollenak used all the time
to signify truthfulness &c and in the case of verichrome/verchromepan
it had nothing to do with positive film but the truthful representation of color on orthochromatic ( and later panchromatic ) film

Fujichrome, Kodachrome, Ektachrome...

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