Future Kodachrome Colour Developing

[PKM-25]

PKM-25 . . . .

Regarding that project for the paintings recreation thing . . . How about shooting on 8x10" color neg? There would be fewer contrast and lighting struggles, and final images could go directly to RA4 paper. An analogue process from end to end with potentially gorgeous final quality and still available using US sourced materials, if that makes a difference to the sponsors. That way you get to do the project just before the end of the materials instead of just after . . .

While it might be possible to replicate the look, Kodachome had a special look to it that when everything came together in terms of lighting and nuance, it looked like an Old Master's painting.

So in a way, this was a Kodachrome only idea. I am ready to move on from it for good now given the tone of this topic...

 

[PKM-25]

They were left over, I paid for about 20 rolls of the last batch to shore up film needs once I went well beyond the deadline....

When did you acquire 60 extra rolls? Was it after 2010?


~Stone

The Noteworthy Ones - Mamiya: 7 II, RZ67 Pro II / Canon: 1V, AE-1 / Kodak: No 1 Pocket Autographic, No 1A Pocket Autographic

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[PKM-25]

I'll contact him too, as a long time Shuttle fan, I would be willing to chip in some money to see him get those last reels souped.

Hopefully Stephen can help him and this thread will at least have some form of happy ending.

I think Steve should seriously look at helping this poor person who is struggling to produce a film dedicated to the space shuttle, he shot it on kodachrome and he has a few undeveloped rolls left that never made it to dwaynes.
His site is:
http://shuttlelaunchfilm.com/

I should try and put Stephen in contact with him.

 

[Photo Engineer]

There is an APUG policy not to post anything from PMs or E-Mails in public here.

I bring this up only to ask that the moderators NOT enforce that rule here. Please. The subject matter is so central to what is going on that it must be left up and not be deleted or altered. We need this to understand both the anguish of losing Kodachrome and the difficulty in processing it as well as the cost.

My best wishes to all concerned. I understand both sides of the story.

PE

 

[PKM-25]

There is an APUG policy not to post anything from PMs or E-Mails in public here.

I bring this up only to ask that the moderators NOT enforce that rule here. Please. The subject matter is so central to what is going on that it must be left up and not be deleted or altered. We need this to understand bot the anguish of losing Kodachrome and the difficulty in processing it as well as the cost.

My best wishes to all concerned. I understand both sides of the story.

PE

And normally I would have reported that too, but I agree 100% on this and feel for Stephen as he tries to sort through this now. I have liked the Shuttle Launch Film Facebook page, wrote to the owner that I want to support his goal, I might suggest some others do the same....it embodies the spirit of what The Kodachrome Project is about...

This gentleman has some 9 rolls of motion picuture stock and 37 rolls of still Kodachrome in 35mm, 120 and 126 to soup...it will be interesting to see how this plays out considering Stephen's apparent limitations of scale...

 

[Prof_Pixel]

... 37 rolls of still Kodachrome in 35mm, 120 and 126 to soup...

126 ????

 

[railwayman3]

126 ????

Could be, Kodachrome 64 was available in 126 size (and 110).

 

[wogster]

60 rolls of the film would take me in excess of 120 hours to process from start to finish. With 260 dollars being the cost of materials only and not my time The cost to me would be 3 -4 weeks of unpaid work in my lab schedule.

May I ask dumb question number 18,446,744,073,709,551,616?

Why the heck did you post a price, where you were doing the lab work for free? First rule of any business, whether it's a real business or a thing on the side, pay yourself first. If a reasonable lab rate is $50/hr and it take 2¼ hours to do a roll, then you take the cost of materials, $260, plus the cost of lab time, $112.50 add on another $7.50 for sundries and you have $380, not $260. Hey why not make it an even $400....

 

[Stephen Frizza]

Thanks for the business advice I have been successfully running a completely analog pro lab for almost 8 years now, no easy feat in the current photographic climate. My first post was simply a question of a would any one pay $260 for the process with a minimum of five rolls...I NEVER SAID "I am launching this process and this is the cost" I was simply testing the waters to public reaction of the base cost of materials to do it.
This being said if something of enough historical significance presents itself then yes I would be happy to share my time and knowledge for histories sake if the person applying could cover the costs.

While it is my own fault, Im starting to get quite sick of the direction this has gone in. I regret ever expressing how much at absolute minimum this process would cost to do as of 2012.

 

[Roger Cole]

I'd blame this on part on the policy here (and also on a couple of other photo forums I'm on but NOT on any of the pilot forums I'm on, thus it seems weird to me) of not being able to edit your own post after a fairly brief period of time passes. Otherwise, once you saw how people were running off the end of the earth with it (and you are right, you didn't say you were ready to roll with offering this, just asking if anyone would pay that much) you could have simply edited the original, which at least would have stopped folks continuing to discover the thread and getting excited about it without reading far enough down to see the clarification.

Maybe a mod would agree to add your clarification to the original post?

 

[shuttlelaunchfilm]

Thanks for the interest everyone- My project has literally been frozen for a year and suddenly I've got many new facebook likes- very cool.

So yes, a few years ago I began documenting the Space Shuttle launches on Kodachrome. As a filmmaker I fell in love with the idea that both the subject (the shuttle launches) and the medium (Kodachrome) were coming to an end after decades of fanfare, market superiority and cultural admiration. When I started, all the final launches were slated to end before Dwayne's final date- but that didn't work out.

Still, I figured there some geniuses out there might one day crack the code and that I should continue to document this great experience as I had started.

With my Nikons, some specialty cameras and my Super16 motion picture camera I shot 4 rolls of 100’ 16mm, 2 rolls of 50’ 16mm, 3 rolls of Super8, 34 rolls of 35mm, 2 rolls of 120, and 1 roll of 126 over the next three launches- one of which was inside Kennedy Space Center with the rest of the media folks- needless to say I was the only film camera there, let alone four film cameras and the Super16.

From the start, my effort has been to tell the story of the atmosphere and people who congregate in the name of science and exploration. Instead of a tailgate party for the Dallas Cowboys, it’s a huge tailgate party for science, which I loved.

Of course the big moment of the launch was covered in Super16mm, but the bulk of the photos (and some of my motion picture stock) is about the people who come to watch and what they do until that big moment happens.

The film was shot intending to be a combination of stills and moving pictures in a Ken Burns-style presentation (pans and fades of stills), no intereviews or dialogue, just the images and great music.

I have a facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/Shuttle-Launch-Film/156663554369586

I certainly hope we can bring these images out and celebrate the film and the Space Shuttle again.

Thank you all so much for the shared interests, it's very inspiring and I'm very eager to move forward with the community.

 

[Sal Santamaura]

I'd blame this on part on the policy here...of not being able to edit your own post after a fairly brief period of time passes...

It's an excellent policy, designed to avoid having replies look stupid and disjointed if someone goes back and changes things in the posts being replied to. The time limit should encourage thinking things out thoroughly before posting.

...you could have simply edited the original, which at least would have stopped folks continuing to discover the thread and getting excited about it without reading far enough down to see the clarification...

In my opinion, posting ought not be allowed unless one is willing to check a box certifying that they have read the entire thread first.

...Maybe a mod would agree to add your clarification to the original post?

I hope not; it would ruin the flow/history of this thread.

 

[PKM-25]

I have to confess I am a little depressed about all of this...while the notion of what else is going on is a positive thing, I am left feeling kind of flat.

Both Jeff Jacobson and my self are still looking for publishers, Jeff is having a print auction soon so he might be able to self publish, I am just wanting to maybe put back even a little bit of the 60 grand I spent doing my project in the bank so maybe I can buy a home instead of renting with having a fine art darkroom crammed into a 66" x 71" storage closet in my 880 square foot apartment. I gave away a fair amount of film while on the road to those who could not afford it or find it anymore, found Jeff most of his KL200....Jeff is the photographer who started his project called "The Last Roll" from his bedside while recovering from Lymphoma...

I guess this pattern of emotional emptiness started a few hours ago when one of the people that I was supposed to meet with in LA called tonight to express her disbelief after reading this thread....
It just sickens us for a host of reasons I don't want to even get into on here. Lets just say she felt very strongly about our goals as being historical too as there were parts of it I did not disclose that are still rather proprietary to it all in terms of who would be Aristotle, Boy in Blue or Pallas Athena....

I often have to bow out of these forums for a time when it gets to be too much...this is one of those times.

I just need to get the hell off of here and remind Jeff that we need to get our books out before, well....who the hell knows at this point. Whatever this all is, it seems to be some kind of invite only, maybe, I don't know, you are not good enough, not historical enough or not important enough gentlemen's club and I am pretty sure I want no part in it...

I think I will go pour my self a glass of Jack my wife likes to cook with.....I don't drink by the way.

Signing off for a few months, it will do me some good...

 

[StoneNYC]

I have to confess I am a little depressed about all of this...while the notion of what else is going on is a positive thing, I am left feeling kind of flat.

Both Jeff Jacobson and my self are still looking for publishers, Jeff is having a print auction soon so he might be able to self publish, I am just wanting to maybe put back even a little bit of the 60 grand I spent doing my project in the bank so maybe I can buy a home instead of renting with having a fine art darkroom crammed into a 66" x 71" storage closet in my 880 square foot apartment. I gave away a fair amount of film while on the road to those who could not afford it or find it anymore, found Jeff most of his KL200....Jeff is the photographer who started his project called "The Last Roll" from his bedside while recovering from Lymphoma...

I guess this pattern of emotional emptiness started a few hours ago when one of the people that I was supposed to meet with in LA called tonight to express her disbelief after reading this thread....
It just sickens us for a host of reasons I don't want to even get into on here. Lets just say she felt very strongly about our goals as being historical too as there were parts of it I did not disclose that are still rather proprietary to it all in terms of who would be Aristotle, Boy in Blue or Pallas Athena....

I often have to bow out of these forums for a time when it gets to be too much...this is one of those times.

I just need to get the hell off of here and remind Jeff that we need to get our books out before, well....who the hell knows at this point. Whatever this all is, it seems to be some kind of invite only, maybe, I don't know, you are not good enough, not historical enough or not important enough gentlemen's club and I am pretty sure I want no part in it...

I think I will go pour my self a glass of Jack my wife likes to cook with.....I don't drink by the way.

Signing off for a few months, it will do me some good...

More in response to others then to Dan, you have to remember they Dan spent like, I forget but probably more than 6 years shooting nothing but Kodachrome while working with Kodak and Dwayne's and documenting life and history etc. to say he isn't historical enough can be very hard to hear.

I agree that we need to just push forward and publish our books (mine too), I'm not anywhere near Dan's status, but I took a whole month and covered all of New England, Washington DC, Key West FL, Seattle WA, All over Colorado, Los Angeles, The Grand Canyon, and Kansas (around Dwayne's) which put me in 2 year of financial debt as I didn't have any help/funding and that I've JUST recovered from now. And I haven't even begun to get much printed, I have only been able to scan 30 images (that I payed someone else to do in high resolution, I've finally bought a scanner this month of my own to start scanning, I hope the epson is good enough at least for now....

The point is, a few of us have a lot more at stake than just "some photos we'd like developed" there are some VERY specific shots I missed that leave me feeling incomplete and I have 6 rolls of Kodachrome that I know is good that I COULD shoot with and get those images that would complete my work.

Also remember the film isn't being made anymore and it is getting older and older, and so the "good" film that is out there IS historically important because its very limited and will contain great and beautiful imagery because it will be cared for and carefully done and because of that BECOME significant historically.

So think about all that, before you cut us down, those who might note in your eyes "worthy" of doing it.

Please reconsider that maybe you as a lab will also become historically significant the way Dwayne's has because you were able to save the "lost images" of Kodachrome. But you won't do it with shuttle launches alone, and Dan of anyone here would be someone you should help get stuff processed as his embodied work of Kodachrome is already in the history books and more to come as its published...


~Stone

The Noteworthy Ones - Mamiya: 7 II, RZ67 Pro II / Canon: 1V, AE-1 / Kodak: No 1 Pocket Autographic, No 1A Pocket Autographic

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Photo Engineer]

Dan;

If you can get the chemistry (even if it is just the couplers and color developing agents), I will be happy to teach you the entire Kodachrome process. It will probably take a dozen rolls of test film and a lot of trial and error. If Steve were willing to help in any way it would speed things up.

I will NOT do any processing of film beyond the test shots necessary for setup.

PE

 

[Stephen Frizza]

Im happy to share my knowledge in the same manner as photo engineer.

 

[Roger Cole]

Thanks for the interest everyone- My project has literally been frozen for a year and suddenly I've got many new facebook likes- very cool.

So yes, a few years ago I began documenting the Space Shuttle launches on Kodachrome. As a filmmaker I fell in love with the idea that both the subject (the shuttle launches) and the medium (Kodachrome) were coming to an end after decades of fanfare, market superiority and cultural admiration. When I started, all the final launches were slated to end before Dwayne's final date- but that didn't work out.

Still, I figured there some geniuses out there might one day crack the code and that I should continue to document this great experience as I had started.

With my Nikons, some specialty cameras and my Super16 motion picture camera I shot 4 rolls of 100’ 16mm, 2 rolls of 50’ 16mm, 3 rolls of Super8, 34 rolls of 35mm, 2 rolls of 120, and 1 roll of 126 over the next three launches- one of which was inside Kennedy Space Center with the rest of the media folks- needless to say I was the only film camera there, let alone four film cameras and the Super16.

From the start, my effort has been to tell the story of the atmosphere and people who congregate in the name of science and exploration. Instead of a tailgate party for the Dallas Cowboys, it’s a huge tailgate party for science, which I loved.

Of course the big moment of the launch was covered in Super16mm, but the bulk of the photos (and some of my motion picture stock) is about the people who come to watch and what they do until that big moment happens.

The film was shot intending to be a combination of stills and moving pictures in a Ken Burns-style presentation (pans and fades of stills), no intereviews or dialogue, just the images and great music.

I have a facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/Shuttle-Launch-Film/156663554369586

I certainly hope we can bring these images out and celebrate the film and the Space Shuttle again.

Thank you all so much for the shared interests, it's very inspiring and I'm very eager to move forward with the community.

What an awesome project. I sincerely hope you are able to get that film processed effectively.

 

[nickrapak]

If it comes to the point where processing is a possibility, I have a K-14 control strip that I'd be willing to loan anyone making a go of it.

 

[BradleyK]

If it comes to the point where processing is a possibility, I have a K-14 control strip that I'd be willing to loan anyone making a go of it.

...and I have a brick of deep-frozen (-20/-25C) KM that I am willing to donate...:munch:

 

[Photo Engineer]

Thanks Steve, and thank you all.

Over to you Dan!

PE

 

[Nzoomed]

Im happy to share my knowledge in the same manner as photo engineer.

Thats great to hear.

If you do so, it would be great if you could post any of your knowledge on my Wiki, http://kodachromia.wikia.com/

Its designed to document each step of the process, right down to the exact chemistry and chemicals used to help others who may be interested in processing.

While i dont have the resources to process kodachrome myself, i would like to help out in the best way i can, i dont know how much your process differs than k-14, but i feel we should now give it a new name like K-15 or something, unless we can replicate the exact chemistry used for the K-lab, we cant call any other process K-14.

I have a great interest in the process, and if nothing else its good for educational purposes.

I think Dan should look at working with Kelvin Kittles' K-lab and sourcing the chemistry for it, this would be the most economical way to process the film, but is only a viable option if the chemistry can be obtained.

How much does your chemistry differ Steve than what Kodak would have used in the K-lab?
Would it be easy enough to obtain, compared to the chemicals you are using, which i understand are not 100% the same couplers that Kodak used?

Im sure there are others who could help Kelvin in the US rather than getting Steve to travel over there.

 

[StoneNYC]

Dan may have turned off his email notifications, he did say he was stepping back from the forum for a while, I'll call him.


~Stone

The Noteworthy Ones - Mamiya: 7 II, RZ67 Pro II / Canon: 1V, AE-1 / Kodak: No 1 Pocket Autographic, No 1A Pocket Autographic

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[PKM-25]

Thanks for the call Stone, I appreciate the heads up and don't want to let thanks go un-given. So thanks to PE, Stone, etc for the offer, but I think I want to just stick to what I have the time to do and what I know best and that is shooting..

Or you could come up with an original idea. http://www.joseffischnaller.com/, http://www.rainerelstermann.de/, http://joannagoddard.blogspot.com/2012/01/paintings-vs-photographs.html

Greg, great links, thanks for showing them, I had no idea that work was out there. My idea was posted on my blog in early 2010 then I sat on it a bit, a couple of the paintings I had in mind shown:

http://kodachromeproject.com/blog/archives/229

As far as originality, I was looking at challenging my self to recreate exact works of specific paintings which will require bulletproof casting, set building, costume design and utterly masterful lighting. If I were hell bent on this no matter what and had all the aforementioned lined up, I have a couple of packs of 220 Astia that *might* come close...but not as close as Kodachrome. I have seen that kind of light in the natural world, not on a set, it seems to only be revealed by Kodachrome unless painted. The attached image, although more of a grab shot than artistic, shows the kind of treatment Kodachrome gives very specific light in terms of what I see possible.

I am out of town until later this week, so I am going to take at least the rest of this week away from the forum and possibly more...as much as I get out of coming here and like to make actual contributions, I think forums are often just too much of a distraction for me...

I have about half a dozen other projects that are anywhere from 6 months to 12 more years long, so it's not like I will be purposeless if I leave my stash of KR64 in the freezer and just get what I have as a book out. In fact, I really just need to do that as there are so many rich images that people have yet to see but I am not putting them on the web. I am not at all lacking for imagery to get this book out when it comes right down to it...

It would really be something to know how to process Kodachrome, even if it resulted in only a few rolls being brilliant at the end of testing and souping and a trip out to Rochester to see Ron, Audrey and the Kodak gang would be really cool about right now. I still know the top two gals who worked in the lab and could pick their brains too. But I am a photographer first and foremost so I would much rather pay someone to do it...and I would be willing to pay them what they are worth as I was in this case...

Maybe some day, until then, the film sits under hundreds of other rolls at the very bottom of one of the freezer drawers, the idea a fond one in the back of my mind's eye....

Take care everyone and have a good holiday season!

 

[StoneNYC]

Thanks for the call Stone, I appreciate the heads up and don't want to let thanks go un-given. So thanks to PE, Stone, etc for the offer, but I think I want to just stick to what I have the time to do and what I know best and that is shooting..



Greg, great links, thanks for showing them, I had no idea that work was out there. My idea was posted on my blog in early 2010 then I sat on it a bit, a couple of the paintings I had in mind shown:

http://kodachromeproject.com/blog/archives/229

As far as originality, I was looking at challenging my self to recreate exact works of specific paintings which will require bulletproof casting, set building, costume design and utterly masterful lighting. If I were hell bent on this no matter what and had all the aforementioned lined up, I have a couple of packs of 220 Astia that *might* come close...but not as close as Kodachrome. I have seen that kind of light in the natural world, not on a set, it seems to only be revealed by Kodachrome unless painted. The attached image, although more of a grab shot than artistic, shows the kind of treatment Kodachrome gives very specific light in terms of what I see possible.

I am out of town until later this week, so I am going to take at least the rest of this week away from the forum and possibly more...as much as I get out of coming here and like to make actual contributions, I think forums are often just too much of a distraction for me...

I have about half a dozen other projects that are anywhere from 6 months to 12 more years long, so it's not like I will be purposeless if I leave my stash of KR64 in the freezer and just get what I have as a book out. In fact, I really just need to do that as there are so many rich images that people have yet to see but I am not putting them on the web. I am not at all lacking for imagery to get this book out when it comes right down to it...

It would really be something to know how to process Kodachrome, even if it resulted in only a few rolls being brilliant at the end of testing and souping and a trip out to Rochester to see Ron, Audrey and the Kodak gang would be really cool about right now. I still know the top two gals who worked in the lab and could pick their brains too. But I am a photographer first and foremost so I would much rather pay someone to do it...and I would be willing to pay them what they are worth as I was in this case...

Maybe some day, until then, the film sits under hundreds of other rolls at the very bottom of one of the freezer drawers, the idea a fond one in the back of my mind's eye....

Take care everyone and have a good holiday season!

Welcome Dan, thanks for the thanks

Side note, being "original" doesn't mean much since "it's all been done before". I too have a 'recreating old paintings' project (I may have even talked about it with you briefly Dan, can't be sure) but its never been done like the way you would do it, nor I, so I would rather see different styles if the same idea than scoff at an idea previously done.

Best of luck to us all in our endeavors, I'm still trying to figure out my scanner... Who would have thought it would be this much of a pain, maybe I should have just doesn't the money at $10/scan...

I feel like Dan, what I'm good at, SHOOTING, the rest is just stuff I have to do to show people the shot, I'm no artist of the darkroom...I like the light too much


~Stone

The Noteworthy Ones - Mamiya: 7 II, RZ67 Pro II / Canon: 1V, AE-1 / Kodak: No 1 Pocket Autographic, No 1A Pocket Autographic

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Matt5791]

Just getting back to the original question - if it was very important then I wouldnt have thought some people would pay this.

Stephen, as we now run a lab, I will keep this in mind for the day someone comes in with some Kodachrome they must have processed as colour slide, even at a cost.

As a lab we could always build up to 5 rolls from different customers and send them at one time.

Matt