Kodachrome 64 might have a chance now...

[tibz]

I've given it a try, I like it a lot. I still want to try the Super 8 40t version, but it only comes up from time to time on ebay.

[keith_lubow]

In my opinion what kills Kodachrome is the fact that it's 35mm, and about $25 and a week's time by the time you have purchased, shot, shipped, and processed a roll. If it was available in all formats and could be dropped off at a local lab for overnight processing, I might love it. As it is, I find Ektachrome and Fujichrome more than good enough for my needs. Too bad, as I do like the results from the film.

 

Keith

[robert_johnson15]

Keith, not sure where you are, but I can get a roll of K64 for $6.59 from B&H, processing is $4.88 at Wal-Mart (takes 7, maybe 8 days at the most), TN tax is 45 cents and the shipping from B&H depends on how many rolls you buy. That's between $12.25 and $12.50 a roll total. The Fuji Provia 400X mentioned above is $10.99 a roll from B&H unless you buy gray and then add processing, taxes and shipping, now that's more like the figure you mentioned!

 

Robert Johnson me@robertejohnson.com

[silverscape]

I know this is off the topic, but I just wanted to say that I've also had some experience with Dwayne's Photo and so far it's been great. I don't shoot slide film or any 35mm Kodachrome, but if I did, I wouldn't hesitate to send it to them. I have a collection of old 8mm movie cameras, and I've bought several rolls of double-8 film from Dwayne's Photo, and also sent it to them to have it processed. Their service was FAST...in fact, sometimes I couldn't believe how fast they got the movies back to me. I've sent Kodachrome and 100D movie film to them. I'd mail it at the post office, and not even a week later I'd have the movie back. If you put your email address on the order form, they will also send you an email when they ship it. The quality of the movies was great too. I haven't had them process pictures yet, but if it's anything like they how they do with movie films I'd be very happy.

[keith_lubow]

Robert,

 

Where I am, K-64 is $9.99 a roll over the shelf at Samy's Camera. It is $13.50 for one roll's processing and return shipping at Dwayne's, plus shipping the roll there. Ends up being less if you send off multiple rolls.

 

Interesting that Wal Mart does it at all, let alone for under $5! Good to know. Maybe you are catching a lucky break at your particular location due to the fact that the lab manager doesn't know how much it will cost them to send it out to Dwayne's to be processed. Even at your price, I am still much happier processing my own E-6 and getting the results same day for about 50 cents a roll...in all formats up to 8x10.

 

Keith

[robert_johnson15]

No lucky break on the price as the nationwide price appears to be $4.88 by contract. The local people behind the counter have no clue as to what is going on. They just ring it up as the price on it when returned. WARNING - check you price as it could be wrong. If it's wrong, it's always TOO MUCH! Latest comment clerk made as he was feeling the thickness of the 3 envelopes I picked up "Gee, you mean these are slides?" The "manager" was probably assigned to the "garden center" as they have that kind of stuff piled everywhere, including the parking places for the auto center! Oh and the store manager was dressed as a baby with his blankets in a playpen begging for money for some charity! "Tip jar" was getting full. Lots of employees standing around just watching! Typical Wally-World! Oh, and I bet any shoplifters were hard at work with the distraction!

 

Robert Johnson me@robertejohnson.com

[reuben_c]

Here's a challenge to everyone -- particularly the naysayers who have never tried Kodachrome:

 

Buy ONE roll (fresh, not expired of uncertain provenance).

 

Shoot "colorful stuff" -- including some landscapes, with "bright sunny blue sky and puffy white clouds" -- and, some architecturals (ideally with some brick buildings).

 

For the landscapes and architecturals, focus your lens to INFINITY -- do NOT pretend that "hyperfocal distance" is real (because it isn't, unless you're only going to be viewing wallet or 3X prints; if you want to see the lens at its REAL resolution, set the focus to infinity!)

 

If at all possible, use an incident meter or gray card, and bracket, bracket, bracket (when you get the slides back, you can look at the bracketed series and determine what is YOUR "working EI" for the film).

 

When you get the slides, either put them on a light table and view with a good loupe (best loupe you can find is a good 50mm 2.0 or 1.4 lens, held over the slide, with rear of lens facing slide, front of lens facing your eye) -- or, project them (ideally with a good projector/lens, onto "plain" screen or white card (back of mattboard) rather than a "glass bead" or "aluminized" reflector type screen.

 

Set a stopwatch to start timing when you take your first look at a properly exposed slide of decent subject matter. When you look up, hit the stopwatch again, and report how long it took for you to pick your jaw up off the floor. :)

[keith_lubow]

Reuben,

 

Interesting, but how is that specific to K-64? I would do all that, and much much more, with any film I was testing.

 

If all my work was 35mm and I had grown up and built my technique and my career on Kodachrome, then I would completely understand the need to use it today. Some guy at my local big camera store just ordered 100 cases of Polaroid Type 55, at about $1,000 per case. My friend went in to order a case for himself and was told he had to wait for the next Polaroid shipment, because the other guy bought all that Polaroid could ship at one time.

 

Makes sense if that is your bread and butter and your preferred way of working. However, I personally see Type 55 as a waste of money, and no modern, professional-quality E-6 film I have ever tried has left me wanting for more. I honestly don't think that K-64 is practical any more. Not bad film, just not great enough to warrant the required process and expense of using it. The gap between how great Kodachrome used to be compared to how crummy Ektachrome used to be has been significantly narrowed for a long time.

 

I think Kodachrome today is a great option if you are primarily a 35mm shooter with plenty of time and no interest in doing any of your own darkroom work.

 

For me, the fact that it is 35mm only reduces its possible uses for me. When I use 35mm, I am using fast films 90% of the time. I use 400 Provia, often pushed two stops, occasionally three. If I want resolution, I use larger formats. This would be when I would want Kodachrome; not for 35mm.

 

Keith

[reuben_c]

Well, Keith, believe it or not, there are more people shooting 35mm than 4x5 -- or even 120. And for those folks, most of them have never shot Kodachrome.

 

And, if they do shoot a roll as I suggested -- using a good lens, ideally on a tripod -- they will discover that 35mm gear can equal the work of larger formats (sans things like lens movements of course).

 

That these days are quite probably drawing to a close is not a mark of progress. Progress used to mean that things get better, not worse. But, as McCluhan put it, the future ain't what it used to be.

 

Enjoy using what you use. Please don't piss in the punch for the rest of us though.

 

Deal?

[jeff_z.]

"And, if they do shoot a roll as I suggested -- using a good lens, ideally on a tripod --

they will discover that 35mm gear can equal the work of larger formats (sans things like

lens movements of course)."

 

Absolutely, and especially when one considers the practical benefits of a 35mm system,

such as hiking any sort of distance for nature photography, and the huge selection of

lenses for various purposes, and the speed with which it can be used to capture fleeting

moments in nature.

 

While I think that I lean towards Kodak's E100G and GX films, I'm intrigued with some of

the seemingly unique Kodachrome characteristics, like how it behaves with a polarizer,

and its high acutance.

 

"Enjoy using what you use." Very well said.

[keith_lubow]

I don't recall pissing in anyone's punch. I explained why Kodachrome has limited appeal to me. I am not trying to talk anyone into or out of anything.

 

Keith

[heinz_anderle]

Kodachrome 64 of the 1970s/1980s had intense colors and an unsurpassed sharpness. Therefore Ektachrome 100VS/Elitechrome 100 Extra Color with its remarkable acutance and good skin color rendition appears to be a more suitable and equivalent successor than Fuji Provia 400X or even Ektachrome 100G(X)/Elitechrome 100. For Kodachrome 25, Astia 100F/Sensia 100 may be the better choice.

 

With the introduction of the Agfacolor Neu process in 1936, the ancestor of all modern chromogenic color films, Kodachrome was outdated from the beginning with its cumbersome multi-step processing. At least when the Fujichrome E-6 slide films entered the market around 1980, Kodachrome soon had found its serious rivals, finally with the introduction of Velvia (50). Today it appears to me as a dinosaur just before extinction, since E-6 slide films have not only caught up, but left this technology behind.