Whats the difference between Kodachrome and Ektachrome

[BMbikerider]

I have seen results from the the new Ektachrome and it is mouthwateringly superb. Clean colours, sharp and not over the top with colours from films such as Velvia. You cannot really compare Kodachrome with Ektachrome as has been said before as Kodachrome is no longer in production, I would wager that there is a less than .000001% chance it ever will be.

My personal experience with Kodachrome is less than favourable. I have slides dating back to at least 1976 (and a few from an earlier age) and of those non-Kodachome images have survived better. Almost all of them (the Kodachrome ones) exhibit signs of fungus deterioration whilst other types/makes do not appear to be affected, although they were both stored in the same place and under the same conditions, Colour fading is not a problem except in some very early Agfa CT18 slides which had a known problem.

My last use of Kodachrome was around 2004 when I used Kodachrome 200 on a trip to Europe. ALL the slides out of the 4x36exp cassettes came back with distorted colours and an overall pink hue even in the leaderstrip. This was during the era when the Kodak Lab in UK had closed, although the address to where they were posted remained the same. The actual processing took place in Switzerland and I feel that less than perfect storage may have been responsible. Protestations to Kodak just fell on deaf ears and all the blame was passed back to me. Two cassettes of Fuji Sensia bought in Germany whilst I was over there at the same time, were processed in UK and they were perfect. I am one who does not miss the demise of Kodachrome.

 

[railwayman3]

My last use of Kodachrome was around 2004 when I used Kodachrome 200 on a trip to Europe. ALL the slides out of the 4x36exp cassettes came back with distorted colours and an overall pink hue even in the leaderstrip. This was during the era when the Kodak Lab in UK had closed, although the address to where they were posted remained the same. The actual processing took place in Switzerland and I feel that less than perfect storage may have been responsible. Protestations to Kodak just fell on deaf ears and all the blame was passed back to me. Two cassettes of Fuji Sensia bought in Germany whilst I was over there at the same time, were processed in UK and they were perfect. I am one who does not miss the demise of Kodachrome.

In my own experience, Kodak UK processing went through a bad period in the 1990's, with scratches, blue spots and variable colors. The situation did not improve when the processing moved to Switzerland, with the same muddy colours which you mention (plus nasty plastic slide mounts). I (and other members of my Photo Club) almost entirely switched to Fuji, Agfa and other brands.
OTOH, in the last couple of years, when processing was by Dwaynes, I could not, personally fault their work. I shot about 100 rolls of 25, 64 and 200 with only a couple of negligible faults. If only Kodak had kept up this standard throughout.......

 

[trendland]

I had zero performance issues with K14-64! In fact, I preferred its performance over K25.

After discontinuation of K25 I first tried a K64 and the resolution wasn´t that extraordinary any more - I never tried K200 but I realy could imagine that there wasn´t any rest of finest grain.......so I 100% agree with you.

with regards

 

[Photo Engineer]

I made my post to boost the value of my stock portfolio. Anyone that believes this also believes that Kodachrome is coming back.

It had great sharpness and grain but poor color! Demonstrably so.

PE

 

[George Mann]

I personally love the color and rendition of K14-64.

 

[DREW WILEY]

As long as we're in the realm of imagination, I want 8x10 Kodachrome at 50 cents a sheet, including processing, of course.

 

[Sirius Glass]

So when do you estimate its return?

The twelfth of Never.

 

[Photo Engineer]

Either next Octember or Septober.

Hey, Grant Haist had several boxes of sheet Kodachrome and Ektachrome in 8x10 and 11x14 sizes.

PE

 

[abruzzi]

I was digitizing a bunch of slide my father took in Nigeria when we lived there in 1976, and embossed on the slide frame was either Kodachrome or Ektachrome. I found, generally, that I could tell which were which without looking at the frame because the Ektachrome was fading noticeably while the Kodachrome still had vivid colors. These were all fairly heavily used slides that my father had in a carousel that he used every year in his anthropology classes. I'm surprised that for others Kodachrome deteriorated more.

My father's Kodachrome from 1976, digitized with a digital camera with zero adjustments: