Monday, March 5, 2012

Mama, Don't Take My Ektachrome Away

Kodak is exiting the color slide business completely. The decision was probably accelerated by Eastman Kodak's bankruptcy, which is causing it to shed unprofitable products as fast as they can write the notices.

No surprise there, color slide film has dropped in popularity. Hell, so have horse-drawn carriages, which are still being made and sold. Film is more and more a niche product, used by people who take so few photos that they've never made the switch to digital and artist/photographers who like the product better.

But for the overwhelming majority of photographers, from morons rank amateurs to the Pros from Dover, digital is the way to go. In time-sensitive operations, such as news-gathering, the pros abandoned film many years ago.
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3 comments:

  1. w3ski3/05/2012 12:43 PM

    Sigh. I tried a photography class in the mid 70's,in High School.Loved the taking pics but couldn't handle developing. Finally got a good film camera in the early 21rst century. I so love taking pics and except for film, and developers, I am set for life. Flowers to trees and clouds. My favorite is to take a drop of water in a waterfall and hold it clear with the symphony of the waterfall in the background. It brings me such joy. And now, I must re- adapt and "re-buy" , when I have no money. Everything new. So sad. I really am just a dinosaur at heart. Big bore pistols and rifles, film camera, wood heat,drive a 4x V-8 Chevy.I live at the end of an old road in old gold mine country. Load my own and grow my own.
    I picked this life, but lately I tend to feel a bit lost.
    w3ski

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  2. bearsense3/05/2012 8:00 PM

    There was a certain amount of care, thought, planning and anticipation in shooting film. Composition, exposure and, if you will, a bit of soul went into every squeeze of the shutter. There was a communion with light and shadow that digital can't reproduce. Sure waiting for the tape to tell you to pour off the developer or take the next step while in the darkroom, or waiting for the image to appear in the tray could sometimes be a hassle, but the pleasure of "flashing" in a portion of a B&W landscape just doesn't happen in the digital world.
    I miss "serious" photography (and the Hasselblads my Dad sold before i could inherit them).

    ReplyDelete
  3. Stewart Dean3/05/2012 9:36 PM

    oh my. I learned the Zone System from Paul Caponigro, did the fine B&W print. But eventually, it was real life or photography. I kept my oar in with color (after DuPont, which made glorious B&W papers, got out of the business in the late 70's or so). And I did large format in 8"x10" Ektachrome slides in the early 80's, landscapes, see them here:
    http://imagovitae.org/HudsonValleyLandscapes.html
    The tonality, the resolution is ravishing...since it is the digital equivalent of a 750 megapixel images. I sneer at digital, but I use it.
    And the finest print material for color slides, the Cibachrome, is also going away.
    Sic ttansit gloria mundi.

    ReplyDelete

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