KR PKR and am I crazy?

[MMfoto]

Hi, I shoot Kodachrome 64 and buy the select version with the common assumption that the price difference reflects only slight differences, and that the Select version has a longer shelf life.

I've been having a lot of K-14 films processed lately. Now, maybe I'm crazy, but I swear the films that I worried most about, the ones shot six months or a year ago, often without refrigeration, or those having spent months in a hot backpack look better than the fresh shot stuff.

Wether it's all in my head or not, this does bring me to consider a side by side test of KR and PKR. Maybe the PKR really is better straight out of the fridge and the Select needs to ripen a bit.

I think I'll head out and pick up my first ever roll of PKR and find out.

 

[railwayman3]

Not sure which versions you are referring to?

There seems to be only the "basic" Kodachrome 64 now available (at least here in the UK?), KR135. The KPR was, I believe, the professional version...I have some in the freezer, but, so far as I know, it was discontinued quite some time ago.

(FWIW, my most recently purchased K64, bought last week in the UK, is Batch 1555, expiry 08/2009, so hopefully we still have Kodachrome and processing for a little while longer. )

 

[MMfoto]

PKR, the "professional" version of K 64 is still actually still available. No idea if it's still being produced, but it is currently "on the shelf."

 

[railwayman3]

Just checked on the Kodak websites...PKR (sorry, not KPR, my typo in last post above) looks to be available in the US, but is definitely not on the UK website )

The PKR which I have in the freezer was bought fresh at the time (it's UK manufacture, expiry Sept 2005), and it still produces absolutely superb results.

I think that there may be a most subtle difference between the Pro and the ordinary versions....maybe give the Pro an A+++ rating and the ordinary an A++ , but it would really need a side-by-side test comparison to distinguish accurately. For my own humble photographic efforts, there is no real practical difference between the two versions.

 

[Claire Senft]

Given my medical training I am at this time unable at this time to answer question number two. To be certain please call my receptionist to schedule a brain scan and I will see if the films comeback on zone zero. My TVologist is quite skillful and I would match him up against the very best of yesterday's radiologists.

 

[MMfoto]

Thanks Doc. Sliding scale for the uninsured? Hmm... haven't had a good brainscram in a while.

 

[kodachrome64]

Now, maybe I'm crazy, but I swear the films that I worried most about, the ones shot six months or a year ago, often without refrigeration, or those having spent months in a hot backpack look better than the fresh shot stuff.

Wether it's all in my head or not, this does bring me to consider a side by side test of KR and PKR. Maybe the PKR really is better straight out of the fridge and the Select needs to ripen a bit.

This very thing is often stated. It is said that PKR is designed to be used fairly quickly as the "pro" version, and KR is produced with the thought that it very likely will sit on the shelf for a while and then be purchased by an amateur, who may or may not shoot it for a year and almost certainly won't refrigerate it. I have never tested the difference between the two.

That being said, I think it's funny that there is even an "amateur" version of Kodachrome on the market. The only ones who will go through the trouble to use it are very serious about their photographs. Maybe not pros in general, but certainly not the amateur that comes to my mind who is used to buying nothing but Kodak Gold or Fuji Superia and sees some KR64 on the shelf and decides to give it a whirl. It isn't exactly happening like that.

 

[accozzaglia]

That there is a marketing difference established (if not merely inferred) between KR and PKR -- given who shoots with either now is probably the same photographers -- exemplifies one of the disconnects between EK's branding and marketing of their existing film lines and how those efforts aren't exactly reaching their desired audiences. I wonder how many photography schools actually introduce, for instance, Kodachrome as a practice medium? How many students even know it exists, to say nothing of new photographers wanting to explore using film on their own? In a decently-sized city like Toronto, with at least a dozen serious professionally-tailored film shops, only two I'm aware of (Henry's and Vistek) are known to stock any form of Kodachrome, and it's usually just the KR, not PKR.

I think I'd have an easier time here buying Rollei Retro or Efke IR than KR. And this is rather telling, all things considered.