Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2011/01/14
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]On Jan 14, 2011, at 2:14 PM, Jim Shulman wrote: > With a > process as demanding as Kodachrome, the chances of a small company > replicating the process are diminished further. > > Several years ago I saw a German video of the last Kodachrome movie film > processing done in Europe (Swiss plant). I was really surprised of how > much > operator judgment this required--it was a LOT more involved than > dump-in-chemicals-and-press-button (which is a good reason why E-6 took the > vast majority of the color transparency market.) > > I fear that the operator knowledge will be lost forever, which will make > replication of the process in the future difficult if not impossible. For > instance, I love vintage recordings (made before WWI). The acoustic > recording techniques are known today, but modern attempts to replicate them > have not matched the quality of the originals. The original operators > obviously knew certain tricks or tweaks, which have been lost to history. Back in the mid '60's I worked a Kodachrome line at L.L. Cook Company, the largest midwest processor at the time. The "crew" included: 1) a Kodak trained manager to oversee both the mechanical and chemical operations 2) a full time lab technician in a fully equipped laboratory, with vented hoods, et al, 3) two machine operators (of which I was one) Regards, George Lottermoser george at imagist.com http://www.imagist.com http://www.imagist.com/blog http://www.linkedin.com/in/imagist