Long Live Kodachrome!!

[Paul Mattei]

:) John Pytlak, if you're out there listening, has Kodak ever considered selling the rights to manufacture Kodachrome to someone else?? I think it could be a win win solution for everyone if we could find a small company to take this over since Kodak is giving it up. Lets have Kodak sell the rights to a reputable company for $1.00. This company could resurect this beautiful film and maybe even offer Kodachrome 25 again. Kodak could save face and alot of us would be happy again. Am I a dreamer or what?

[John Pytlak RIP]

:) John Pytlak, if you're out there listening, has Kodak ever considered selling the rights to manufacture Kodachrome to someone else?? I think it could be a win win solution for everyone if we could find a small company to take this over since Kodak is giving it up. Lets have Kodak sell the rights to a reputable company for $1.00. This company could resurect this beautiful film and maybe even offer Kodachrome 25 again. Kodak could save face and alot of us would be happy again. Am I a dreamer or what?

 

Sorry, but you are a dreamer. :( Since there are only two labs in the whole world that even process KODACHROME movie film anymore, why would it be any easier to convince a "reputable company" to make a complex multi-layer film? And if they had the capability of formulating and coating a complex color film, they would be a direct competitor of Kodak, and not a "niche" vendor.

[Filip Plesha]

John Pytlak, if you're out there listening, has Kodak ever considered selling the rights to manufacture Kodachrome to someone else?? I think it could be a win win solution for everyone if we could find a small company to take this over since Kodak is giving it up. Lets have Kodak sell the rights to a reputable company for $1.00. This company could resurect this beautiful film and maybe even offer Kodachrome 25 again. Kodak could save face and alot of us would be happy again. Am I a dreamer or what?

 

As much as some people at Kodak are still trying to battle the digital age and to keep the customers satisfied, the current idea seems to be, expose everything with a low con film, and make it look like Kodachrome or whatever you wish with simple curve tools.

Now that is also a big dream. Aviator seems to be the symbol of that age and way of thinking.

I am under the impression that the authors of that movie are convinced that they made it look like technicolor.

It looks like a brand new film with modified color palette, nothing more.

 

Some things just dissapear. Photography has the unfortunate fate of being between fine craft and art, and bussines, so it has to fight as any corporation fights.

[John Pytlak RIP]

Don't discount the power of what custom LUTs can do:

 

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/products...1.4.4.4.6&lc=en

 

7299 is a film who's "look" is mostly defined by the KODAK VISION2 HD Digital Processor. It doesn't even use traditional colored coupler masking.

[Filip Plesha]

Don't discount the power of what custom LUTs can do

 

I'm pretty sure with enough starting information, you can use LUTs to emulate any filmstock you want. What I doubt is, mans ability to create such LUTs that REALLY recreate the asethetics of such old films as Kodachrome.

 

The reasons:

-nobody has the real interest nor time to do detailed scientific research that would quantify such asesthetics and move them away from poethic words of "vintage" or "retro" into specific numbers which can be emulated by a computer

 

-those who care enough (people who want to photograph images wish such aesthetics) usually don't have the scientific background of a lab technician, nor access to detailed Kodak data on what makes older films like Kodachrome look like they look

 

-most real world DI or photoshop (in still photography) atempts at recreating the look of films of yesterday were superficial, concentrating on trivial matter such as matching contrast and saturation of specific colors, which really don't convince anyone with decent visual intelligence (ability to recognise such visual patterns).

 

-The sucessful atempts were made using materials that already look somewhat vintage because they are based on older technology (Kodachrome, Tri-x, EPR, Ektachrome VNF films) so we are back where we started.

 

-These things require extensive laboratory knowledge like the people at Kodak have, who design and upgrade the visual parameters of film stocks and know how the films of yesterday tick because they were battling that "cheesy" old look as a part of their daily job.

Some of that knowledge crosses the boarder of what the public should know, because its not good for bussines to reveal every little detail about the technology you are selling.

 

 

So I think there is nobody interested enough to even start making such LUTs because nobody really cares that much and you don't get Kodak lab technicians to sit on your DI sessions revealing 100 years of trade sicrets