Kodachrome article

Poisson Du Jour · Sep 22, 2008

A very interesting salute in that article. For me, Steve McCurry's striking 1985 National Geographic cover photo is probably one of the most defining memories of Kodachrome in professional documentary use: decades later, with the world still mesmerised by that image, McCurry to set out on a personal odyssey to track down the girl (which he did) and photograph her again on Kodachrome. Of the film, it's clarity and sharpness, bold without being brassy colours and beautiful nuances of contrast. Most of us in our youth would have flicked through NG and found Kodachrome images literally jumping out of the pages, a full 30 years or more before Velvia usurped the Big K. A realist, I can unfortunately see the writing on the wall for Kodachrome, as I can for 35mm tranny film: we traditionalists are players in a shrinking market that, it seems, has little appeal to the manufacturers. It's just awful.

AutumnJazz · Sep 22, 2008

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2002/04/afghan-girl/index-text

The world is a depressing place.

Michel Hardy-Vallée · Sep 22, 2008

Now that I think of it: the AP release is not news at all!

It's just this Alex Webb speculating about the future of Kodachrome. We are all over that phase, aren't we?

Photo Engineer · Sep 22, 2008

Michel Hardy-Vallée said:
Now that I think of it: the AP release is not news at all!

It's just this Alex Webb speculating about the future of Kodachrome. We are all over that phase, aren't we?

Alex Webb? The author was Ben Dobbin AFAIK.

I decided more was needed here. If AP things Kodachrome rates an article all by its lonesome and if it attracts attention like at Kodak, I'm not going to complain, nor should I worry about who wrote it. But I would like to give the credit where it is due. Looks like Ben did some good work diggin up information that is interesting to us all.

PE

Colin Corneau · Sep 22, 2008

Apart from wanting to get a whole lot MORE Kodachrome...this article made me think of the looming "digital dark age".

My friend's father was an avid photographer throughout his life. He travelled all over Canada during his career, and used photography both professionally as a crop scientist and personally as a strong hobby.

His Kodachrome slides from the 50's look the same now as they did the day they came back from processing. Stored well, they'll be the same a century from now, too.

I'd also remind all about the work of a photographer from Vancouver named Fred Herzog. He did the whole "Leica street photography" thing after he arrived as a refugee from WWII Germany, but unlike most people used Kodachrome instead of Tri-X. His images of a bygone city are powerful images, priceless artifacts, and amazingly accurately coloured, too.

http://www.nonstopdesign.com/lost-vancouver.php

and
http://www.equinoxgallery.com/artists_index.asp?artist_type=1&artist_id=121

PKM-25 · Sep 23, 2008

Nice stuff Colin...

Now lets do OUR version of that, SHOOT IT PEOPLE!!!

railwayman3 · Sep 23, 2008

^^^^PKM-25
Just received a supply of K64 by mail order this morning.

Emulsion No. 1558, dated 10/2009......so, with this and other expiry dates to 12/2009 which I believe have been seen, I should be able to use Kodachrome on a proposed trip to Venice in the new year.

But I would really now like to see some K64 with an expiry date in 2010.

Michel Hardy-Vallée · Sep 23, 2008

Photo Engineer said:
Alex Webb? The author was Ben Dobbin AFAIK.

I decided more was needed here. If AP things Kodachrome rates an article all by its lonesome and if it attracts attention like at Kodak, I'm not going to complain, nor should I worry about who wrote it. But I would like to give the credit where it is due. Looks like Ben did some good work diggin up information that is interesting to us all.

PE

No, I didn't mean the writer, I meant the photographer quoted at the beginning of the article. The pretext for the article is mostly a photographer's anxiety rather than anything official from Kodak. "Not news" as they say elsewhere.

tim_walls · Sep 23, 2008

Photo Engineer said:
Looks like Ben did some good work diggin up information that is interesting to us all.

What information is that, out of interest? I thought it was common knowledge that Kodachrome was only produced once per year, and "Kodak won't say when the next run will be" isn't exactly new information .

If you read what the article actually says, rather than what it wants you to think it says, it doesn't actually state that only 20,000 rolls are produced per year. It states that a sheet can produce over 20,000 rolls, and nothing more.

Photo Engineer · Sep 23, 2008

tim_walls said:
What information is that, out of interest? I thought it was common knowledge that Kodachrome was only produced once per year, and "Kodak won't say when the next run will be" isn't exactly new information .

If you read what the article actually says, rather than what it wants you to think it says, it doesn't actually state that only 20,000 rolls are produced per year. It states that a sheet can produce over 20,000 rolls, and nothing more.

Tim;

"Knowing" about it and seeing it in print are two different things. Also, the figure was confirmed roundabout by his figures regarding Dwaynes throughput, at least that is the way I took it.

In other words, about 20,000+ rolls are used each year all over the world. That is not much Kodachrome.

PE

Uncle Bill · Sep 23, 2008

Well, I am enjoying Kodachrome while it is around. I might pick up a couple of rolls this afternoon for use this fall.

Bill

railwayman3 · Sep 23, 2008

^^^PE

There was another post somewhere around in the last few days suggesting that this figure of 20,000 films per year seems not to make complete sense.

I can't find the post right now, but the gist was that the larger Boots chain stores (pharmacy/household stores) in the UK seem to have about a dozen K64 films on display as a stock item...I've purchased there myself and the stock is fresh and replenished. And Boots is not a store that would waste shelf-space to items which didnt sell.

They have about 2500 stores in the UK, so if a half of them each had a dozen films somewhere in the store (excluding any in the main warehouses, and at Kodak UK), that's three-quarters of the annual production sitting in one company here in our one tiny country.

And 20,000 per year would be less than 70 used throughout the whole world each day. I hope things are not that bad!

Anyway, I'm just playing with figures...200,000 per year would still not be a large usage.

Ian Grant · Sep 23, 2008

The 20,000 rolls isn't the same as the amount used, it's the amount of new film produced, that's quite different. There may well have been a lot of film out in the market place unsold, particulary as Kodachrome ceased to be exported/imported into many markets in 2007 months ahead of the processing lines closing.

Most film now on sale has an expiry datete of 2009, so that means it's probably 2 or 3 years old already.

Ian

Photo Engineer · Sep 23, 2008

Well, I said 20,000+. IDK the real number, nor does the author, I suspect as that is closely guarded by both Kodak and Dwaynes. I suspect Ian is right. It does not all come back at one time. Look how many here say that they are hoarding it. Dwaynes will probably be swamped when/if Kodak says they are discontinuing it.

You can run the same calculation that the author did by using the length and width of a master roll and the size of a 35mm x 36 exposure roll. It comes out to somewhere around 30,000+ rolls but that does not include waste.

PE

railwayman3 · Sep 23, 2008

^^^^Ian and PE

I take your respective points, guess I was clutching at straws a little bit!

I wasnt sure how many films might be made from one master roll, but the figures certainly add up with one-roll-per-year. I may be totally wrong (again ), but I vaguely recall someone writing that one master roll was coated each November in recent years. If so, maybe the 2009 dates could be from the Nov 2007 coating. IDK, just my speculation, I probably ought to go and do something more useful. :rolleyes:

My K64 which came today was from Mailshots (UK), I tried the website for "7-day shop" yesterday and it said that K64 were out of stock and was on back order.

Photo Engineer · Sep 23, 2008

Actually, I've been thinking about this a bit.

It seems to me that hoarding the film hurts the market. The reason is that then Dwaynes reports processing far fewer rolls than Kodak reports being sold. Then Kodak assumes that the difference is waste of some sort or another as they cannot determine the actual number being hoarded. Then they base the next production run on what Dwaynes actually processed rather than what was sold, and etc.

IDK. Just idle speculation.

I did post here in the past that usage of about 30,000 rolls of film / year would equal 1 master roll and also that production of Kodachrome, once nearly round the clock is now a once a year event.

PE

Paul Howell · Sep 23, 2008

Photo Engineer said:
Actually, I've been thinking about this a bit.

I did post here in the past that usage of about 30,000 rolls of film / year would equal 1 master roll and also that production of Kodachrome, once nearly round the clock is now a once a year event.

PE

If the experiation date is now 2009, when was this film run made?

railwayman3 · Sep 23, 2008

Photo Engineer said:
I did post here in the past that usage of about 30,000 rolls of film / year would equal 1 master roll and also that production of Kodachrome, once nearly round the clock is now a once a year event.

PE

In my University camera club days, Kodachrome was the colour film of choice unless a higher speed was needed. We'd often shoot pics at a weekend, post the film to Kodak UK at Hemel Hempstead on Sunday (Sunday postal collections are now long discontinued in the UK), and could rely on the processed slides being back by Thursday in time for the Camera Club meeting that evening. A friend who lived in Hemel said that the Kodachrome processing was round-the-clock in those days.

Aurum · Sep 23, 2008

railwayman3 said:
^^^^PKM-25
Just received a supply of K64 by mail order this morning.

Emulsion No. 1558, dated 10/2009......so, with this and other expiry dates to 12/2009 which I believe have been seen, I should be able to use Kodachrome on a proposed trip to Venice in the new year.

But I would really now like to see some K64 with an expiry date in 2010.

Interesting. I have a roll sitting here, marked as 1558, but expiry dated as 09/2009.

I wouldn't have thought a master roll of the stuff would take 3 months to cut and wind even on the slowest low volume Noddy line that EK had. More like a couple of days tops, unless they're putting it outside for final packing (Box and plastic container, and these are country/Language specific)

Confused in the UK

Photo Engineer · Sep 23, 2008

To answer the above, I have no clue whatsoever when it was coated last, but I would guess 2007. But, it might have been 2006 for all I know. As for Kodak processing, yes, it was round the clock 24/7/365 at many sites around the world, on every continent and major island. Now, one plant does all of it.

Actually, the coating of Kodachrome was nearly at that rate to keep up with the huge market as well. After all, there were the sheet films, 120, and 35mm as well as 8mm and 16mm. That was a lot of film.

Now, as to making 1 master roll, that was my estimate and using some research, the author of the article came up with the same figures after talking to people at Dwaynes, so I have some confidence in that. Even though 1 master roll can be made in an afternoon, prep time is weeks and weeks of work making the 9 emulsions and making the rem-jet support. Along with that are the preparation of any special chemicals that the film needs. All of this has to come together in one furious day of work that actually still represents a lot of time and labor. That has to return a profit for the entire roll!

Also, since the emulsion sizes at EK are fixed at 3 different levels, and coating width and length are fixed due to machine size, then any excess or underrun are "waste". The excess emulsion probably won't work in any other product and therefore would be waste. It certainly cannot be kept for another run a year later. The problems compound as the input to film manufacture consists of spoilable chemicals and materials that have a limited lifetime.

With other products that coat daily, this is not a problem. You coat until you are near the end of a batch of emulsion and then make a new one and keep going.

This is a simple view of the making. As for processing, the manual tells you how many feet of film you have to do each day and week to keep the Kodachrome process happy. The pH of the 3 color developers is very high and they go out of control very easily. It is not a "friendly" product to make or process.

PE

kodachrome64 · Sep 23, 2008

As PE has mentioned before (I think on this thread too maybe) there are several different reasons a batch may get another emulsion number--and it doesn't necessarily mean it's another master roll, if that's what is confusing you.

If the film tests reveal the color shift is occuring ahead of schedule, they may move the expiry date up a bit I think he said (just one reason of many for the fluctuation in dates and batch numbers).

railwayman3 · Sep 23, 2008

Aurum said:
Interesting. I have a roll sitting here, marked as 1558, but expiry dated as 09/2009.

I wouldn't have thought a master roll of the stuff would take 3 months to cut and wind even on the slowest low volume Noddy line that EK had. More like a couple of days tops, unless they're putting it outside for final packing (Box and plastic container, and these are country/Language specific)

Confused in the UK

Sorry, I wasn't explaining clearly....1558 (10/2009) is the batch I have received today. When I said that I'd seen mention of expiries as late as 12/2009, I don't know whether they are the same emulsion number.

There is a another recent post somewhere above by PE which explained reasons why numbers might have changed even with films cut from the same master roll.

Photo Engineer · Sep 23, 2008

kodachrome64 said:
As PE has mentioned before (I think on this thread too maybe) there are several different reasons a batch may get another emulsion number--and it doesn't necessarily mean it's another master roll, if that's what is confusing you.

If the film tests reveal the color shift is occuring ahead of schedule, they may move the expiry date up a bit I think he said (just one reason of many for the fluctuation in dates and batch numbers).

Well, the first part is correct, but I'm not sure about the second paragraph. I've never heard of that. If it starts shifting, it might only be good for scrap! As a coater, I become suspicious of any coating that begins to change for no apparent reason.

Usually, numbers are based on market, packaging and date of packaging. Size is also a consideration for products made in various sizes.

So, an order of Kodachrome sent to England made the same day as an order sent to Australia might have been packed at one time, but might have different numbers, IDK. I have heard of them giving different numbers to different master rolls, or different slitting and chopping and packing dates from the same master roll.

I was not much into that part of it. When I made a coating, either experimental or plant, they were still considered experimental, thus the number started with "J", "FW" or "FE". The J was narrow, the FW was pre-production and FE was full production but placed in plain yellow boxes. If the FE was OK, it went out in trade dress. In that case, the same master roll would be given a "real" number. I suspect that with the new Ektar film, the testers got rolls in plain boxes with black casettes and an FE number, and if it passed, they gave the rest of the run the full treatment for sale. IDK.

PE

Paul Howell · Sep 24, 2008

Photo Engineer said:
To answer the above, I have no clue whatsoever when it was coated last, but I would guess 2007. But, it might have been 2006 for all I know.

Although I am guessing, it seems to me that the latest experation date is 2009 and if it was coated in 2007 or 2006 then Kodak has not coated this year or we would see film with a experation date 2010. Would it make sense to coat every other year? I have one loan roll of KC 64 left, which I plan to shoot it this weekend and send it in for processing. I would not hord film, who knows when the prcessing line will be shut down.

PKM-25 · Sep 24, 2008

Paul Howell said:
Paul Howell said:

I would not hord film, who knows when the prcessing line will be shut down.

Click to expand...

1.5-3 years after the announcment is what you will have.

Kodak will supply ongoing re-orders of K-14 up until the last expiration date. Once that date is reached, there will be a query from Kodak to Dwayne's as to much chemistry the lab wants for the final order.

Kodak and Dwayne's know that once an announcement has been made, there will be a rush to shoot and process all the film that is out there which is a good bit more than what they are doing now. It could keep Dwayne's busy up to two more years after the final chemistry order.

Kodachrome article

Poisson Du Jour

AutumnJazz

Michel Hardy-Vallée

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Colin Corneau

PKM-25

railwayman3

Michel Hardy-Vallée

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Ian Grant

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Paul Howell

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Aurum

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kodachrome64

railwayman3

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PKM-25

Kodachrome article

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