Why 'chrome' ??

Ian Grant · Oct 6, 2009

Just remember one important thing we've overlooked.

The man behind Verichrome at Wratten C.E.K. Mees was Head of Reasearch at Kodak, he would have played a part in naming Kodachrome. The Kodachrome Research team worked directly for Mees who was also a Vice President of Eastman Kodak. (George Eastman had died 3 years before the release of Kodachrome).

Mees went to an English Public school and would have learnt Classics, both Latin & Greek, so the earlier comment about the use of Chrome coming from the Greek word Chroma would be logical to him.

Ian

AgX · Oct 6, 2009

I just want to add that it took some time in Germany to change frome `-chrom´ to -chrome´ in the designations.

(Which means changing from the german to the english spelling.)

Q.G. · Oct 6, 2009

Ian Grant said:
Just remember one important thing we've overlooked.

The man behind Verichrome at Wratten C.E.K. Mees was Head of Reasearch at Kodak, he would have played a part in naming Kodachrome. The Kodachrome Research team worked directly for Mees who was also a Vice President of Eastman Kodak. (George Eastman had died 3 years before the release of Kodachrome).

Mees went to an English Public school and would have learnt Classics, both Latin & Greek, so the earlier comment about the use of Chrome coming from the Greek word Chroma would be logical to him.

Yet again, not something that can be shown to be relevant.
We just do not know why the word "chrome" came to be in use, except that, it meaning colour, is an appropriate word for colour related thingies.

Mees, by the way, came to Wratten when they already were working on their panchromatic plates. 'Post hoc'.

George Eastman did not die before Kodachrome started life in 1914...

Ian Grant · Oct 6, 2009

By 1914 Mees had already head of Kodak Research for 2 years and had his sidekick from school, University and Wratten Shepperd was working alongside him.

Mees was the high-flying chemist, and throw what ever dates - he's the link there with Verichrome, Kodak & Chrome

Going back to the term Chrome for modern slide films, Agfa marketed their films like Agfacolor CT18 in some markets right up to the switch to E6 films, but in the UK had changed the packaging to Agfachrome by the 70's.

Ian

removed account4 · Oct 6, 2009

Chris Nielsen said:
I couldn't find this on a quick google search and it's been bugging me..

Why is slide film referred to as 'chrome' ????

Thanks!

chris, to get back to your original question ...
chrome = slide film mainly because it was easier to say chrome,
instead of whatever brand it was. it was lingo mainly to
professional, since most of what was shot ( color at least )
and all the diapositive or slide films end in chrome ...

as for the derivation of the word chrome and why it is
used at all in photography, who knows ...
photography has had a history of trying to be as prove itself as
the "fine arts" so probably the person who came up with "chrome"
with whatever prefix he decided to use - auto ( was he first ? )
was trying to be fancy, by referring to the greeks ...
seeing that the summer olympics were held in paris in 1900 ..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1900_Summer_Olympics

and probably paris was still "greek-crazy" ..

as for the rest of them, probably autochromes were seen as
"the best!" so the name-makers were just referring back to IT, when
putting the name chrome in whatever name was used.

Ian Grant · Oct 6, 2009

Well put

We said trannies in the UK but then those US trannies might object

What dress are you wearing today John . . . . .

Ian

Q.G. · Oct 6, 2009

Ian Grant said:
By 1914 Mees had already head of Kodak Research for 2 years and had his sidekick from school, University and Wratten Shepperd was working alongside him.

Mees was the high-flying chemist, and throw what ever dates - he's the link there with Verichrome, Kodak & Chrome

I know. (I also know that "Shepperd" was called Sheppard, and wasn't working at Wratten's ).
But that was not the point i brought up. Which was that Eastman wasn't dead when Kodachrome was first launched.

The contention that Mees was the man who put the word "chrome" in the photo world's vocabulary is absolutely unsustainable.

Did he bring it to E.K.?
Why, for instance, not Ducos du Hauron and his photochromoskop or polychromes, either because George Eastman (or his detective Clarke) knew about him, or through Powrie and Warner who suggested to George Eastman that they had perfected Ducos du Hauron's method (claiming to have improved upon James McDonough, who said he improved upon John Joly, who in turn said he made Ducos du Hauron's idea 'producable')? Why not EK employee Fifield, who really perfected the method? (Many names: just one, single (!) line along which the term could have been suggested to GE)

Why not the Lumière brothers you have mentioned already?

And (and this is the nail in the coffin) how can we ignore that "chrome" already was alive and kicking in the photo world when all that happened?

So unless you present proof (good luck! ), not even plausible.

Ian Grant · Oct 6, 2009

yawn

David Brown · Oct 6, 2009

Well, I want to know why we call them "cameras"! I mean, yes, there was the camera-obscura. But really, the word camera means "room" and not plastic/metal/wooden box.

Discuss ... :rolleyes:

Sirius Glass · Oct 6, 2009

Ian Grant said:
yawn

:munch::munch:

Ian Grant · Oct 6, 2009

David Brown said:
Well, I want to know why we call them "cameras"! I mean, yes, there was the camera-obscura. But really, the word camera means "room" and not plastic/metal/wooden box.

Discuss ... :rolleyes:

It's the way a camera obscura puts an image on a a wall, or screen - bit of ground glass,

Ever so simple

Ian

AgX · Oct 6, 2009

There are two different things being discussed here:

-) why is slide film typically designated with the suffix `-chrome´?
I assume consensus is that Kodak with their mass production slide films paved the way and that as Ian depicted other manufacturers of such films over the decennias joined.

-) how did `-chrome´ aside from slide film designation enter the photographic world?
This, as Q.G. pointed out, is a wide field...

Q.G. · Oct 6, 2009

Ian Grant said:
It's the way a camera obscura puts an image on a a wall, or screen - bit of ground glass,

Ever so simple

Yet again not the answer.

My cameras aren't rooms either. Can't put a sofa in them. Not even a comfy chair.

Ian Grant · Oct 6, 2009

Another yawn QC.

ian

Q.G. · Oct 6, 2009

AgX said:
There are two different things being discussed here:

[...]-) how did `-chrome´ aside from slide film designation enter the photographic world?
This, as Q.G. pointed out, is a wide field...

I think it has been answered a long time ago already, by pointing out that it is Greek for colour. Many terms used in photography (as is that word itself) are derived from Greek.

So only one thing to be discussed: the Original Question.
(That too has been answered pretty early on in this thread).

removed account4 · Oct 6, 2009

*YAWN*

JBrunner · Oct 6, 2009

Couldn't say to the exact origins of the word in regards to photographic history, but I would bet Kodak's unrelenting use of the word for the last seventy five years in the US is largely responsible for the popularity of the term in US parlance. Odds are they picked it up because it sounded cool, and had something to do with photography.

StorminMatt · Oct 6, 2009

Ian Grant said:
You should look at the quality of Autochromes they are the first "real" colour film/plate, if you've never seen original prints made from them then you should make an effort, the colours are extraordinarily good considering the technology and why Kodachrome has that name.

There were a number of colour slide films prior to Kodachrome all additive processes like Lumiere Filmcolor, Dufaycolor, and Agfacolor, but Kodak needed to differentiate their new film which was the first subtractive process from its competitors so used Chrome instead of Color, to indicate the better colour fidelity, for the same reasons Lumiere had used the term in Autochrome aboutb 30 years earlier.

In fact it was some time before a major competitor used Chrome to denote slides, Agfacolor-Neu launched in 1936 a year after Kodachrome and was their subtractive Transparency film. The next chrome transparency films were Ektachrome, again from Kodak.

In 1954 Gevachrome is a B&W film, Gevacolor R (reversal) N (neg), Agafacolor Neg or Reversal, Ilford Colour D (reversal),, same in the early 60's. Probably the first company to copy Kodak is Fuji with the release of Fujichrome in the late 1950's.

The term "Chrome" for other colour transparency films began being added slowly with Agfa and Perutz using it with new films (1964 Agfa had merged with Gevaert and rationalised it's film products) but it only became common to all with the release of the E6 in 1977 when all company's outside the Eastern block moved to E6 as a fully compatible processing system.

Ian

I am, of course, aware that there were other color processes before Kodachrome. But none of them REALLY seemed to catch on. So, when I say that Kodachrome was the first REAL color film, I mean that it was the first color film that actually 'made it' in the long term. None of those other color processes really amounted to anything in the long term. Kodachrome endured for almost 75 years.

Ian Grant said:
Well put

We said trannies in the UK but then those US trannies might object

What dress are you wearing today John . . . . .

Ian

I think that 'tranny' is a less popular word for transparencies here in the US because the word 'tranny' generally means an automotive transmission here.

AgX · Oct 6, 2009

StorminMatt said:
None of those other color processes really amounted to anything in the long term. Kodachrome endured for almost 75 years.

As this thread is seemingly about splitting hairs:

Agfacolor as a process containing ballasted couplers made it up to only a few years short of Kodachrome.

removed account4 · Oct 6, 2009

David Brown said:
Well, I want to know why we call them "cameras"! I mean, yes, there was the camera-obscura. But really, the word camera means "room" and not plastic/metal/wooden box.

Discuss ... :rolleyes:

there won't be much of a discussion david, just one person going on and on and on ....

DLawson · Oct 7, 2009

David Brown said:
Well, I want to know why we call them "cameras"! I mean, yes, there was the camera-obscura. But really, the word camera means "room" and not plastic/metal/wooden box.

Discuss ... :rolleyes:

As I understand it, "camera" doesn't mean "room" (as we use it) so much as "chamber" -- an enclosed space. The essential part of a camera is an enclosed space. Add a lens and a film holder, and you're ready to go.

Why 'chrome' ??

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