Kodachrome CD ROM's?

<p>I hear Dwaynes offer a CD ROM for Kodachrome that they do at the time of processing. This sounds a good service and I would like to use it, however I have a few questions.</p>

<p>Is it available to those outside the USA - amd if so, how do I make use of the service?</p>

<p>What is the cost and method of payment?</p>

<p>How is the quality of the scans - and what sort of file size are they?</p>

<p>Are they full frame scans or are they made after mounting in the slide holder?</p>

<p>Thank you for any info, Ian</p>

<p>Why dont you ask Dwayne?</p>

<p><a href="http://www.dwaynesphoto.com/">Dwaynes</a></p>

<p>The scans are 3004x1936 pixels. If I recall correctly, they are full frame. Quality is so-so, ok for the web. I don't shoot much Kodachrome, so my opinion is based on a very small sample.</p>

 

<p>You can request Higher rez for a few bucks more but the colors were not true in the one I got.</p>

<p>I was hoping to make an A3 sized print. 3004x1936 sounds reasonable - better than nothing.</p>

<p>Thank you, Ian</p>

<p>You must have to ask them for high res, since the CDs I received (after filling out their standard form) had 2MP jpegs. In my case, there was a significant blue cast to the scans.</p>

<p>My understanding is that the blue cast is due to the cyan dye. A profiled scanner is supposed to give very good scans, and I am waiting for my IT8 Kodachrome target from LaserSoft so that I can generate an icc profile using SilverFast. If you only want a few prints, may I suggest that you contact a good lab that has an icc profile for Kodachrome.</p>

<p>The cyan dye in Kodachrome gets blamed for all sorts of problems: some real and some imagined. The K-14 cyan dye is different from the cyan dyes in most other films. It peaks at a longer wavelength and extends into the infrared region. Here are a few of the effects I know about:</p>

 

<ul>

<li>It affected the design of EDupe film which has a very long red spectral sensitivity peak. The peak sensitivity is positioned at one of the two points where Ektachrome and Kodachrome cyan dyes will produce about the same contrast. It is necessary to use a different filterpack with Kodachrome to get the color balance right. For those labs who were too lazy to switch filtration depending on the original, there was an IR304 dichroic filter that allowed both Ektachrome and Kodachrome to be printed with the same filter pack. It also resulted in high cyan contrast in the dupes of Kodachrome. This was the earliest instance of comments that Kodachrome is hard to reproduce. </li>

<li>The K-14 cyan dye affects the IR channel in ICE equipped scanners. (The relief image does too.) While there is a real effect, it is barely noticable in my Minolta scanner. I routinely use ICE for my Kodachrome scans.</li>

<li>The K-14 cyan dye tends to crystalize producing increased graininess. The slope of grain vs. speed is far steeper for the red record of K-14 than anything else. This is why K-200 is so grainy compared to E-200. This is also one of the reasons K-400 was never introduced. (Ron Mowrey and colleagues had a partial solution, but I'll let him describe it.)</li>

<li>The K-14 cyan dye requires different scanner settings from E-6 films. This is another reason why many claim that "Kodachrome doesn't scan well."</li>

</ul>

<p>If you want to see the results of many different scans of many different Kodachrome images, go to <a href="http://ronald.andrews.googlepages.com/kodachrome">http://ronald.andrews.googlepages.com/kodachrome</a></p>

 

<p>I think that Dwayne's scan are pretty good for $4.95. If you edit them just a little bit you can do some good things with them. I find them nice if I need to make a print of something in a hurry.</p>

<p>Ron,<br>

What do you mean by "The K-14 cyan dye requires different scanner settings from E-6 films"? Assuming one as an icc profile for K-14, what settings other than contrast, brightness, etc., does one change?</p>

<p>I've done the Kodachrome IT8 calibration thing with SilverFast Ai for my Epson V750, and it really does work. No more nasty blues. Now I just need to pony up the money to also buy the Nikon CoolScan IV version of SilverFast Ai, since that's where I prefer to scan 35mm slides.</p>

<p>Hey John...I didn't know the targets were already out. Mine is on order, and they claim early 2009. Did you get yours recently?</p>

<p>This may be a stupid question (I do not scan one thing myself) but.... are these target that you are talking about actually put on Kodachrome film?</p>

<p>Benny,<br>

If you have a profile for K-14 you are all set. Some scanners don't hve a provision for profiles and some people don't make use of profiles.</p>

<p>Thanks, Ron.<br>

Patrick....the only stupid question is the one that is never asked. Yes, the target is the film itself. So a Kodachrome target will look like a Kodachrome slide (unmounted), with different colors arranged in a standard pattern. Each color is defined by three numbers that define the color...L, a, and b. It's a long story what those three numbers represent. The targets (except for the expensive ones) are not individually measured, so the Lab coordinates are only approximate, but good enough for me and most non-professionals. A professional might want an individually measured target. During a scan of the target, the scanner spits out RGB values for each color patch. The icc profile is a map of these RGB values vs Lab values. When scanning a slide, software uses this mapping (icc profile) to estimate what color is being seen by the scanner. The result is an image that really matches the slide.</p>

<p>Answering a question from long ago, I've done my SilverFast IT8 calibration for Kodachrome with the genuine Kodak IT8 targets. Even if they theoretically have limited shelf life (color fading), all my Kodachrome slides have faded at least that much as well! SilverFast had their own Kodachrome IT8 targets made, but they have since sold out.<br>

I've also found that IT8 calibration for Kodachrome is beneficial for old K-11 and K-12 Kodachrome slides.<br>

I did finally pony up the money for SilverFast for my Nikon Coolscan V. Sometimes SilverFast with IT8 works best on a vintage Kodachrome, sometimes the Digital ICE3 "Restoration of Color" in Nikon Scan works best. Sometimes I just apply color curves.</p>