Kodak ‘Investigating What it Would Take’ to Bring Back Kodachrome

[480sparky]

Kodachrome 64 developed in caffenol:

Scanned, desaturated and reversed:

 

[Wayne]

Professional printers are the ones who noticed a lot! It was also photographers buying the "big bickie" prints that also created the most hue and cry with surface imperfections that appeared undetected after printing. Crimping, scuffing, stickiness, wrinkles, separation of base material, contrast irregularities... a very long list! Sometimes entire rolls had these and any manner else of problems and were summarily ripped out and sent back, with weeks and weeks passing before any replacement stock came, and then oftem the same problems were discovered.

That's interesting. In 20 years of reading Ilfochrome threads I don't recall ever hearing about such a list of persistent problems, although (in light of the below) I guess I must have read about them when you mentioned them 6 years ago. I googled Ilfochrome qualty control problems and the first thing that came up was an old post of yours on Apug complaining of the same problems. Not much else popped to the top.

 

[Theo Sulphate]

If anything is going to happen it'd be a "Kodachrome III" - a reversal film that has somewhat the look of 1960's Kodachrome, but can be E6 processed.

A new film today using the K-12 or K-14 process just doesn't make sense from an economic perspective.

 

[flavio81]

But, on a serious note - OMG People, what are you thinking. This ain't gonna happen.

PE

Come ride this clown car with us and have fun!! Why take this thread seriously?

By the way, PE, i have good news: we've managed to find this "Ron" guy who knows everything about Kodachrome, we have him on a detention cell and he has promised us to simplify K14 processing down to a simple monobath.

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

That's interesting. In 20 years of reading Ilfochrome threads I don't recall ever hearing about such a list of persistent problems, although (in light of the below) I guess I must have read about them when you mentioned them 6 years ago. I googled Ilfochrome qualty control problems and the first thing that came up was an old post of yours on Apug complaining of the same problems. Not much else popped to the top.

Ilfochrome Classic problems began appearing much earlier than 6 years ago. I would say around 2006 is when things started looking wonky. Four prints produced for me of my New Zealand tour at the time were held up and I was asked to fly over there for a discussion. There were four other photographers there being given a briefing too.

If the (Adelaide/South Australia) printer was still around, their lengthy dossier on IC would make disturbing reading. It's all gone. In place of that lab (demolished sometimes after 2010) now sits a new ultramodern home!

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

a reversal film that has somewhat the look of 1960's Kodachrome, but can be E6 processed.

Yesssss! That's it. E6 dunking, not this silly, tedious mail-in/mail-back.

 

[flavio81]

If the (Adelaide/South Australia) printer was still around, their lengthy dossier on IC would make disturbing reading.

A forumer above posted earlier a video where a late dictator gave his opinion on Cibachrome. It was unfavorable.

 

[skorpiius]

I would continue to shoot and develop it like I have been.... in my darkroom...... as the black & white film it truly is.

How does it rate as a b&w film?

 

[flavio81]

Yesssss! That's it. E6 dunking, not this silly, tedious mail-in/mail-back.

Tedious... as in "reloading film on a Pentax 67"?
On the other hand what you propose is perhaps the only thing that could happen.

 

[480sparky]

How does it rate as a b&w film?

So far, I've only used caffenol. I'm waiting until next month when I start my Winter Film and Print Developing Spree to try it with commercially-available developers.

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

Tedious... as in "reloading film on a Pentax 67"?
On the other hand what you propose is perhaps the only thing that could happen.

Believe me you really, really don't want to try reloading Pentaximoo!
I had to do it last weekend, and — !!!
Nothing gets my bowels and consonants moving quicker than such festering fiddling and fumbling while mozziequitos are biting, flies are buzzing and freshwater lobsters are snapping. Bloody Pentax cameras... .

But I digress. In the 1980s we had about 6-7 kiosks in Melbourne/Victoria where Kodachrome could be dropped off in mailers (then mailed back), right in the CBD, so one could load up the F3HP or later T90 and shoot the developing skyline (my God, how that skyline has changed in 30-odd years...). 1.00pm drop the exposed roll at the kiosk move on to the next. By the mid-1990s only one interstate lab was available. It does have a nostalgic ring to it, but that would only be true to those who have used and loved Kodachrome in the long-distant past. Present-day photographers have missed a lot (including digi fanbois).

 

[Theo Sulphate]

Come ride this clown car with us and have fun!! Why take this thread seriously?

By the way ... we've managed to find this "Ron" guy ... he has promised us to simplify K14 processing down to a simple monobath.

Let's pull out all the stops (*) and go all the way to what we really want: Polachrome!



Or Polavision!




(*) an idiom based on the music organ

 

[Sal Santamaura]

...OMG People, what are you thinking. This ain't gonna happen...

Kodachrome is NEVER coming back. Film is more likely to disappear than Kodak bringing back Kodachrome.

I don't know, Ron. I agreed with you until reading RattyMouse's post. Now that he's proclaimed "NEVER," Kodak might just be motivated to do it.

 

[Prof_Pixel]

How does it rate as a b&w film?

You always are stuck with the yellow Carey Lea silver filter layer.

 

[Photo Engineer]

That Polaroid product was something. See all the defects? Oh well, Kodachrome ain't coming back.

And here we are repeating the Kodachrome process for the nth time! Just read the patent.

PE

 

[Prof_Pixel]

Let's pull out all the stops (*) and go all the way to what we really want: Polachrome!

Or Polavision!

A major problem with Polachrome and Polavision was that they weren't really 'instant' like their still prints were. You had to shoot the entire roll of film in your camera and then run the film through a separate, special processing machine.

 

[Sirius Glass]

That Polaroid product was something. See all the defects? Oh well, Kodachrome ain't coming back.

And here we are repeating the Kodachrome process for the nth time! Just read the patent.

PE

That would be patently silly.

 

[Nzoomed]

If anything is going to happen it'd be a "Kodachrome III" - a reversal film that has somewhat the look of 1960's Kodachrome, but can be E6 processed.

A new film today using the K-12 or K-14 process just doesn't make sense from an economic perspective.

This is what I suggested earlier, would be great if t could happen, but would take a bit of R&D as PE has said its technically possible, but how easy it would be is anyones guess, its probably ironically easier to just make Kodachrome.

 

[Nzoomed]

Oh well, Kodachrome ain't coming back.

PE

What about those who said Ektachrome wont come back either?

 

[Roger Cole]

As I said then, ain't gonna happen.

Welll...tell Kodak Alaris, who seems to be at least entertaining the idea.

 

[MattKing]

Welll...tell Kodak Alaris, who seems to be at least entertaining the idea.

More importantly, is Eastman Kodak entertaining the idea of manufacturing Kodachrome for movie use?

 

[Roger Cole]

I found a reference somewhere that one person was able to soup Kodachrome.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K-14_process

He posted about it here. Fascinating, and showed that a) yes, it is possible, and b) no, it isn't even remotely practical.

 

[twelvetone12]

I did it too. It's messy, it's fun, it takes an afternoon of preparation and one hour to perform, after all the work you figure out that you screwed one of the re-exposures or one of the four developers, and start over. Did it once, I'm satisfied for life

 

[Theo Sulphate]

I did it too. It's messy, it's fun, it takes an afternoon of preparation and one hour to perform, after all the work you figure out that you screwed one of the re-exposures or one of the four developers, and start over. Did it once, I'm satisfied for life

Anyone offering workshop courses?

 

[Europan]

The Kodachrome process differs from all others by selective secondary exposure with blue, green, and red light according to in-machine measurements. It is/was a typical amateur user enhancement process as is reversal processing itself. Since Rochester moved away from reversal stocks towards the negative-positive system down to the 8-mm. film width (Super-8) without offering any contact printing service I am inclined to believe that they cannot get out of the electronic industry complex anymore. It’s an enterprise stuck in the wrong shoes. They are praising a history of shaping photography and at the same time behave like photographic innocents.