On the topic of Kodachrome

kodachrome64 said:

I don't get why they send back the leaders with the slides either.

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Probably because the leader has the identification number tag on it, that they use to match the processed film to the envelope or other information that they use to identify whose film it is.

If they ever accidentally send film to the wrong person, those little number tags make it much easier to correct the problem.

Matt

We need to get together a march through the streets of Rochester - then a sit-in on the steps of EK. [grin]

Very interesting commentary on K64 especially in regard to reciprocity. As I mentioned in my post in this thread, I never used it: I was very happy in my early days 'stocking' volumes on Kodachrome 200. It's colours look positively pale viewed alongside 'Vaudeville Velvia'. I can vouch for the archival stability of Kodachrome: aside from a little dust on top of the boxes, all the trannies are crisp and clear, as if moments of time frozen in perpetuity. For some, I can barely recall where they were shot, what I was doing there or what could possibly have come across my mind to get "such a cracker" of a shot.

Today, my Velvia trannies are selectively snipped from unmounted, sleeved rolls and masked for the Ciba process; those not so treated are then put in archival sleeves and stored in archival boxes. I would only use K200 today as a fond, playful 'throwback' to an era long gone. One day I just might print a few of the K200 images from 20 years ago. I'm sure other photographers out there view their early collection of trannies as a virtual, precious time capsule. Certainly, it is a wonderful trip down Nostalgia Lane.

MattKing said:

Probably because the leader has the identification number tag on it, that they use to match the processed film to the envelope or other information that they use to identify whose film it is.

If they ever accidentally send film to the wrong person, those little number tags make it much easier to correct the problem.

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Also, I can't believe I'm the only person whose camera exposes a roll identification number at the beginning of the roll of film. I use these numbers as the basis of my indexing for all 35mm, so I have to say I was pleasantly surprised when I discovered Dwayne's returned the offcut with the ID on to me - I'd assumed they'd throw it.

tim_walls said:

Also, I can't believe I'm the only person whose camera exposes a roll identification number at the beginning of the roll of film. I use these numbers as the basis of my indexing for all 35mm, so I have to say I was pleasantly surprised when I discovered Dwayne's returned the offcut with the ID on to me - I'd assumed they'd throw it.

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Most educational. And what is the camera that does mark an ID at the start of the film? For decades I've marked my 35mm canister with a 4-digit number, matched that number to notes relating to exposures and sent it off for processing, again coming back as my own number. I was not aware there are cameras out there that can print numbers. Didn't the Canon A1 have this feature with its data back. Hang on...maybe even the EOS 1N's (defunct) Command Back. Dunno.

my f6 does...

Gee, what am I doing with a junky F-801s? Gotta throw that one in the bin and buy an F6 with my next order of Scala.

Poisson Du Jour said:

Most educational. And what is the camera that does mark an ID at the start of the film? For decades I've marked my 35mm canister with a 4-digit number, matched that number to notes relating to exposures and sent it off for processing, again coming back as my own number. I was not aware there are cameras out there that can print numbers. Didn't the Canon A1 have this feature with its data back. Hang on...maybe even the EOS 1N's (defunct) Command Back. Dunno.

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EOS-1V does.

(And if you can lay your hands on the mythical data cable - discussed in threads passim - you can use this ID to match with shooting data downloaded from the camera.)

The mf23 data back on my f4 also does write in-between frame info, although can't remember if it'll write a serial film number. There is a facility for a "fixed number", but never used it. I do the exposure data in-between frames and that works really well.
The F100 can write data on frame 0 as well with the mf-29 data back, CF18 does the trick. I'm told it does record data about exposure as well, which can be downloaded with an MV-1: planning to try that soon.
I do believe the F5 also has all sorts of recording facilities, but I don't have one so cannot comment.

So there are indeed a number of options there!
(but mostly they mean: get a data back...)

I don't think it is worth investing in any camera just for the sake of it printing a reference number on the film.
It can be handy, but is most unlikely to sway me off my faithful workhorse! Apart from that, some of the cameras mentioned in this thread are huge beasts: the F5, F6 and 1V among...

The F6?

yeah! The f6 standard is actually smaller than a f100, although not as lite.

Off topic but my Nikon F5 with the MF28 back will do leader imprinting too, IIRC. Not that I'm sending much of anything out for processing these days, but if I did I'd have to figure this one out. What the MF-28 back also does relatively inexpensively and well (and the F6 body does stock, w/o the back but rather spendily) is it can imprint your (c) first and last name in the margin between frames. Yet another reason to sleeve slides rather than have them mounted. To potential thieves, that's pretty fair notice that you take your work seriously (perhaps enough that you'll actively pursue copyright violations). Also, with this imprinting you stood a better chance of getting your originals returned to you from the wet-mount drumscan color separator guy after they were razored out out of the paper mounts, some weeks after the issue of the magazine was pasted up. (say what-what?)


Back on the original topic, Kodachrome in one of my camera bodies never scratched whereas E6 often did, something to do with the automated film transport gate. I finally figured out it was due to the Kodachrome RemJet backing being thick and sacrificial, it adds bulk to the film base but gets mechanically scrubbed off in processing. Another little factoid, did you also know that the reason PKR was more robust about holding it's color and grain structure than other color films in desert heat, is that the it's essentially B&W film until dyes are introduced during the processing stage?

If the processing weren't so hit or miss, I might still be shooting it... Also, for me, Kodachrome is dead. Long live Kodachrome!

All Kodachrome films are B&W films until dyes are added during processing!

This is not related to keeping stability before processing, but does aid in post process dye stability to an extent.

PE

sorry for the O/T, just to clarify my earlier statement

Yup, just confirmed: it's possible to setup a f100 to download shooting data to an mv-1's flash card. This can then be loaded to a pc to be used with exifs after scanning.
Data back is not needed: it works off the camera's memory.

Handy little feature, it's gonna save me a lot of pain. Who knows, I might even learn to love the f100!...