Kodachrome Film is No More

How many remember those little yellow boxes that would arrive in the mail, carrying our latest processed Kodachrome colour slides? Back in 1965, when I was 18 years old - keen as hell on photography - the arrival of a yellow box was a magic time, as I am sure it was for countless others.

Very soon the yellow boxes will be gone forever.

Kodachrome transparency film was introduced way back in 1935. With only minor changes to its unique fourteen stage process, the product survived until the day before yesterday when it was announced by Eastman Kodak that no more of it would be made. Existing stocks will probably last about 2-3 months and processing of currently circulating rolls will end next year.

The passing of the film era really comes home to me now, because once upon a time I must have shot more Kodachrome than anything else - God alone knows how many frames of it I exposed over the years, recording so much of my youth, young adulthood, early career, family, vacations AND images intended for print publication.

For me photography was all about Kodachrome II which boasted an ASA of 25. Kodachrome I, (which was before my time) had been limited to ASA 10. I am told that it had been just as good if just a bit slow. In any event, for my money, Kodachrome II provided the finest grain and most lifelike colours possible. What is more, the transparencies have lasted, without fading, all this time. For some reason (best known to the Almighty) a certain breed of trend obsessed photographer (sigh) would sneer at my use of KII, dismissing it for it's overbright, overblue colours. Such people (presumably in the know) would always suggest that I change to Ansco or Agfa and then (much later) a johnny come lately product called Fuji.

Well I hope those wise arse characters went ahead and shot EVERYTHING on muddy overwarm Agfa, red biassed Ansco and dull, grainy early version Fuji. I have to tell you that virtually all my Agfacolor slides from the 1960s have turned to purple, many of my Ansco slides have faded almost completely to blank while the early Fuji product I shot was so latitude intolerant that I gave away the whole idea (of shooting Fuji) for decades.

Virtually ALL of my Kodachrome slides look just like they always did - beautiful natural colour, with lovely fine grain.

Eventually along came Kodachrome X with a lightning fast ASA (i.e. ISO to you newbies) of 64. It was a perfect product for use with Instamatic cartridge cameras and while it lacked a little of KII's latitude, the overall results were pretty much the same. A little later they changed the name of these products to "Kodachrome 25" and "Kodachrome 64", which made perfect sense to me.

With the arrival of Kodak's Ektachrome range of transparency films, things began to change. The colours were never as true and the grain never as smooth but they could be processed in a range of local labs that couldn't handle Kodachrome. This made turn-around much faster and for commercial work this was often vital. What's more, keen types could set up their own labs to process Ektachrome themselves and process routines were devised to push the products to 400 ASA and finally even 1200. Colour transparencies could be shot in iffy light circumstances not previously thought possible. Shooters for outfits like National Geographic were delighted and took to Ektachrome like ducks to water.

At the end of the day however, if the light was good and the object of the exercise was unambiguous beauty - Kodachrome was one's film of choice.

Aaanyway .... it's gone now.

Despite the fact that I have now shot digital for years, you only get to be a young impressionable photographer once. I'll always remember Kodachrome.

FF - Much Ado About Not Very Much?

When Digital SLRs first came out, many of us were disappointed to note that the standard format was an APS-C sized sensor (later known as "DX" by the Nikon faithful) which was roughly half the size of a traditional 35mm film frame. We had all become so brain washed by the 35mm format that many of us began to agitate for "full frame" on the grounds that we were somehow being short changed by anything less.

Now the 35mm "standard" for small still cameras was an arbitrary one at best and had been originally chosen largely because film of that format was already in use by the motion picture industry and was therefore readily available for use by these subversive "miniature" camera manufacturers. There is nothing intrinsicaly magical about the format but photographers don't always take to change very easily. If we were brought up to believe that 35mm sized sensor surfaces were the REAL fair dinkum article, we were not going to accept "half" sized formats lying down.

As time went on, resolutions increased and general technical improvements arrived, it did indeed become apparent that APS-C/DX sensors were perfectly capable of producing images comparable to the prints and transparencies that 35mm film could produce. For all practical intents and purposes they could do the job, that most of us required, very satisfactorily. What's more, lenses designed for use with 35mm film would still work superbly with DX - especially once it was realised that DX only really utilised the "sweet spot" of such lenses, enabling them to give still better performance than they might have done with film or indeed with the long anticipated "full frame" sensors.

But there WERE thoughtful arguments in favour of full frame/FX sensors. If the performance of "cropped" sensors could compare with 35mm film, full frame sensors might be expected to go one better and perhaps give results that compared to "medium format" film:

a) Full frame sensors would provide more space for a given number of "photo sites". Pixel density would effectively be reduced, thus improving high ISO performance.

b) Full frame sensors could be beefed up to provide much higher resolutions than cropped sensors - for equivalent sensitivities.

c) Larger sensors would mean larger mirrors. Full frame DSLR viewfinders could be expected to be much brighter than their cropped equivalents.

d) Full frame sensors would enable expectations of lens coverage to return to those we enjoyed when using film. Using cropped sensors meant that 28mm focal length lenses (for instance) were nearly "normal" in their coverage. With film and full frame sensors, 28mm lenses would return to genuinely "wide angle" .... the way that God had always intended.

Now all of this sounds very good ... I suppose. In practice however, how much water do these arguments hold?

(a) The first argument is the best one of course. The ability to shoot relatively clean images at 3200, 6400 or even 12800 ISO would be terrific. Imagine being able to shoot low available light images at practical shutter speeds, without tripods. It could be especially wonderful for action photography. In practice however, most people will use flash or not bother at all - few punters can see the point of gloomy images. Noise reduction software routines are also pretty good these days and (if used correctly) will usually go a long way toward effectively increasing high ISO performance for most cameras.

(b) Ultra high resolution sounds good but how important is it really? Good DX bodies can deliver fine, clean 10-12 megapixel images without difficulty. How much resolution do you really need? How big will your prints really be? If you are like me, the lion's share of your output is for internet use anyway. More than about 6 megapixels is effectively pointless.

(c) I have looked through the viewfinder of my brother's very nice Canon 5D mkII. The view is genuinely beautiful. But then again, when I am using one of my cropped sensor DSLRs, the viewfinder has always seemed perfectly satisfactory to me, however less bright it may ACTUALLY be in A/B comparisons with the FF version. Of course the REAL problem comes when you press the shutter. That heavy, oversized FF mirror (with so much further to travel) comes crashing back and forth with such violence that I thought the camera would shake itself out of my hand. However much advantage one gains from the extra resolution and cleaner high ISO performance, I cannot believe that you don't lose pretty much MOST of it with all that thrashing about during the instant of exposure. It's called camera shake.

(d) It is becoming very clear that as resolution increases, the limitations of a given lens become more and more apparent. If their potential advantages are to be fully realised, 21-24 megapixel FF/FX cameras require the use of the best lenses you can find. Given the already horrendous cost of FX bodies, we now must seek out equally expensive lenses. I (for one) simply can't afford it especially when, in a few years time I shall probably have to afford it AGAIN! And even if I COULD afford it, I am saddled with excessively heavy equipment which, I know from experience, will become a literal pain in the neck by session's end.

Don't get me wrong. Cameras like the Canon 5D and its matching L lenses are truly wonderful kit but at the end of the day the files from hires full frame cameras can be almost unworkable. If we care so much about ultimate performance, it makes little sense to shoot anything other than RAW images. The aggravation associated with downloading, editing and storing the resultant 30-40 meg files I just don't want to think about.

Full frame sensors, heavy camera bodies, tank like lenses and massive image files sound like a great idea. All the fashionable people seem to think so. For those photographers in possession of the necessary patience, perseverance, hard drives, gym subscriptions and funding, I am confident they can produce most satisfying product. In practice - for many of us - the concept may be overrated and impractical.