Anybody else disgusted at the slaughter of emulsions by Kodak?

Me | 3/11/02 | Me

[Don Joe]

It's sickening! No more Ektar (25 & 100 missed the most), no more Royal Gold (25 & 100 as per Ektar), no more Pro100, no more Kodachrome 25, no more 120 Kodachrome, no more Verichrome Pan, no more Plus-X or Tri-X (although they will be delivering replacements -- different films -- with the same names for those two classics), and there was going to be no more Kodachrome 200, but they backed down -- they'll sell it at something like $23 a roll -- while there's still demand for it. (Gee, how long will that be at that price?)

[Don Joe]

Argh, argh, argh!

[Texaggie79]

uh.....yeah.....sure

[Crowcreek]

No sweat, partner. . .

Good Bye Kodak -- Hello Fuji, Konica, ect.

[mlo]

Is there an actual piece of news you are ranting about?

[freedomlover]

Pictures, please.

[Lazamataz]

Kodak is a buggywhip industry. So is Xerox.

Thusly, I left Rochester.

[Timesink]

Well, if anyone was still questioning whether or not to short Kodak stock, they have their answer now. This company is barreling towards Chapter 11 faster than Bill Clinton towards a pair of 36Ds.

[counterrevolutionary]

Sob...those poor little emulsions...silver halide running in the gutters...the horror...the horror....

[Timesink]

(Note to those reading this chart from THE FUTURE!: This chart is dynamically generated every time this page loads, using data up to and including the current day. What we're seeing on March 11 isn't what you're seeing in 2025. Of course, knowing Yahoo, they'll change the URL for their stock charts a week after I post this anyway, and all you'll see is a big empty rectangle. FR really needs to start letting people load graphics onto the FR servers ... not just that stupid "Caption This Image" section, but for anything.)

[Bella_Bru]

This is General Interest. Home of all things amusing, bewildering, cheese-infested, and vanity-esque. It's a nod to the whiners on the regular side who couldn't figure out how to NOT click on a thread they thought they may have no interest in.

[freedomlover]

Does this mean we can have a General Interest moderator who will slap around whiners and delete newsworthy posts??

[Bella_Bru]

I hope so!

[Don Joe]

"Good Bye Kodak -- Hello Fuji, Konica, ect."

The thing is, there's nothing remotely comparable to the emulsions they killed. They were really head and shoulders above the crowd.

K25 and RG25 were grainless razor-sharp emulsions. You could make huge prints and have the quality rival 4x5 quality. Literally!

What happened as best as I can tell is that the beancounters took over and said gee, we're not making our target revenues from those lines, so dump 'em. That would be like Chevrolet dropping the Corvette, or Dodge dropping the Viper.

They killed their flagship products, they cut their pro lines off at the knees, and they're trying to go toe-to-toe with the "cost-cutter" off-brand stuff for the point-and-shoot crowd. Instead of playing up the quality of those legendary emulsions, they pared down their consumer lines, rebadged 'em with stupid teenybopper names like "Max Zoom!" and put bright shiny colors (doubtless tested on lab monkeys) on the boxes.

My freezer is full, I'm still trying to round up some 120 RG25 (and some more 35mm if I can) at reasonable prices. They're all way outdated, but I found a roll that had been bouncing around in two attics over ten years and ran it through my old Retina 2a for giggles, and it came back looking like it was fresh off the shelf. The slow films have staggering keeping qualities. (Films age due to heat and cosmic rays, and the faster the emulsion, the more susceptible it is to the latter.)

I could keep on ranting (and probably will later on :)) but I need to sit back and de-aggravate my blood pressure now... Ugh!

[Don Joe]

"Kodak is a buggywhip industry."

They can have my Kodachrome when they pry it from my...

[CharacterCounts]

Now I have to keep two windows open. One for the serious stuff and one for the fun stuff.

[freedomlover]

Be careful, that comments was a little too ... serious. :)

[falfa]

And leave my sliderule alone too!

[Timesink]

Don Joe, where did you read/hear about this, anyway? I'd like to read more myself, but I'm having trouble finding any news stories about it.

[headsonpikes]

"...I'm having trouble finding news stories about it."

If you insist on talking about 'news', I'll press the 'Abuse' button.

This forum is for 'un-news', get it??

[Timesink]

What about news about Britney Spears's breasts? Bet you wouldn't hit the abuse button on THAT!

Hiiii, headsonpikes. *blowing kiss!*

[headsonpikes]

Ooooohhh!!!

SUH-WEET!!!

Nice pic!!!

No abuse here.

[Mr. K]

Laz! Where did you go if you left Roch. I worked there for almost 10 years until 1998- maybe we worked at the same places - I was a software engineer contractor, and each time a job finished I would call my pimp and get placed somewhere new..

[Stefan Stackhouse]

Digital photography is still much inferior to film photography, no question. Just like film photography was much inferior to oil paint portraits and landscapes in its infancy. Once film photography became as good or better, painting didn't go away, but veered off into a creative realm of the imagination that couldn't be replicated by film photography, while realistic oil paint portraits became a very specialized nich market. Expect this same pattern to repeat itself.

[Revelation 911]

Thusly, I left Rochester.

Cmon Laz - it aint that bad - we still have Zwiegles

My neighbor mixes emusion - wonder how soon he'll be moving

[Revelation 911]

Thusly, I left Rochester.

Cmon Laz - it aint that bad - we still have Zwiegles

My neighbor mixes emusion - wonder how soon he'll be moving

[Revelation 911]

double post - damned c.t. - sorry

[PistolPaknMama]

Thusly, I left Rochester.

That's not the reason you left Rochester...and WE know her name!! bwaaahaaaahaaaaa

[Richard Kimball]

Canon EOS D30. Haven't shot film in over a year.

Photo-sho-o-o-p, you give us those nice bright colors...

[SpookBrat]

Never thought I would be debating film at FR. I have a Pentax K1000. Fuji is ALL I will ever use! Fuji 100 especially for pics of my kids in Texas wildflowers. :)

[Richard Kimball]

Texas, huh? I love the sunsets here...

Whyntcha post some of your pics?

[Keeper of the Turf]

I'm saving up for the Nikon D100. 6.1 megapixels of digital pleasure. Then I can say goodby to my N8008 and film forever.

[monkeyshine]

I'm more concerned about being able to buy Polaroid film for the medium and large format cameras. How are you supposed to do a test shot? I sure as heck am not going to spend $30,000 for a digital Hasselblad back.

[monkeyshine]

I boycott Fuji. First, you always have to correct for the green. Too much green come out on their film, I think it's a cultural thing. Second, they gave away free maps with purchase, and deliberately omitted Israel from the map to appease their Arab clients. Hence, no fuji in this house, not even free fuji.

[SpookBrat]

For real? Are you serious? I'm very gullible so always tell me the truth. LOL I never noticed that.

[SpookBrat]

Your picture is gorgeous. I'm going to be leaving soon and I am truly going to miss Texas sunsets. Our house faces east, (we live in the country) so the sunrises are beautiful too. Sigh.....

I have a ton of the most beautiful pictures you ever saw. I don't know how to get them in here though. When I figure it out, I'll ping you.

[oprahstheantichrist]

Betrayed by The Great Yellow Father.

Thanks for posting this. I'm horrified. Sickened. My grandfather is rolling in his grave even as I type. I have K25 slides of his taken before I was born (I'm 44) and the color is still perfect.

K25 was the original color film, correct? Dating back to 1939? I remember that it has (had) four actual emulsions, one black & white, plus one for each of the primary colors of light. Back in my college days I worked for a short time in a K14 lab running the processor, 8mm on one side, 35mm on the other. It was something. Forgot exactly how many tanks the machine had, but with four separate developers plus rinses, fix, and bleach baths for each, it was easily in the twenties. Huge machine. Must have taken a while to pay for itself.

Good luck finding any. And what of National Geographic? They were strictly K25. Have they gone digital (sold out) as well?

There will never be another Tri-X, but does Ilford still make a good B & W?

So it begs the question: Why? Why the big changes? Were all these films environmentally incorrect, or were they just not profitable?

[oprahstheantichrist]

Dittos on the Fuji, except I'd argue one thing: You can't correct the green. If you try, it comes out sickly magenta. Can't be balanced, I've always hated that stuff.

[Truth Addict]

I remember that it has (had) four actual emulsions,

Not quite! The film has three layers, like all color film. What you are remembering is that there are four developers, the first developer (MQ in K-12 or PQ in K-14), cyan, yellow, and magenta. What sets apart Kodachrome from all other color films is that the dyes and couplers are contained in the three color developers rather than being incorporated into the film itself. This makes for a rather complicated and costly process but a very simple film. As for the number of tanks, the K-14 process is as follows:

1)Pre-bath or rem jet.
2)Rem-jet wash
3)First Developer
4)First Developer wash
5)Cyan developer
6)Cyan wash
7)Yellow Developer
8)Yellow wash
9)Magenta Developer
10)Magenta wash
11)Bleach
12)Bleach wash (spray)
13)Fixer
14)Final wash

For K-12, substitute Prehardner for the pre-bath, and add a magenta reversal bath and wash before the magenta developer.

I also worked at a Kodachrome lab many years ago (early '70's).

[GingisK]

Don Joe,

I am grieved by this as well, and share your pain. I also lament the loss of glass lenses and metal camara bodies. Plastic lenses do not appear to accept gold flashings. New cameras surely don't look as sharp through the viewfinder as the older ones. My fairly well equiped darkroom may become inoperable due to losses like this. Actually, this marks the beginning of the end of a pure art form.

Its extremely sad, really.

[Don Joe]

Aren't there two separate reexposures too, one from each side? (IIRC the third reversal is done via a fogging second developer rather than reexposure?)

[Don Joe]

"Don Joe, where did you read/hear about this, anyway? I'd like to read more myself, but I'm having trouble finding any news stories about it."

They don't make a lot of noise about it, for (IMO) obvious reasons. So, I hear rumors here and rumblings there, then go nosing around the www.kodak.com site looking for press releases and/or updated comments on individual emulsions' tech pages, and lo and behold, it's all there. You just have to dig.

[Don Joe]

"K25 was the original color film, correct? Dating back to 1939? I remember that it has (had) four actual emulsions, one black & white, plus one for each of the primary colors of light."

Mannes and Godowsky (two musicians!) invented it back in the 30s, originally as a two-color film (there were quite a few two-color films in the early days, the color rendition was not real good, but it was evidently good enough for some folks) and then when refined to a three-layer film, it went into production. IIRC it started out at ASA 8 (or the equiv in the pre-ASA days). When I started using it in the 1950s, it was ASA 10 (daylight), and Tungsten was ASA 16. There was a "Type F" for a while (for flashbulbs) which I think was ASA 12.

Then in the '60s they came out with "Kodachrome II", which was ASA 25, and sharper than the old ASA 10, with better color rendition. The K25 & K64 replacements came out in the '70s (with the new K14 process), and a lot of folks still lament KII, insisting that the "real reason" for the change was to use less silver.

K200 came out a little later, and there was a "secret" batch (kind of a beta test) of K100 a few years back that a select few got to play with. It never went into production.

The official story on why they killed K25 varies, they can't seem to get their story straight. :) One time they'll say it was because they can't get one of the key ingredients anymore, another time they say it's because the demand has dropped.

I've since heard that it's still in production for 16mm movie film, and if true, that would tend to clobber the first explanation. As to the second reason, when was the last time anyone saw any advertising for any Kodachrome?

My own conjecture is that they're letting it die because 1) E6 films have a better return, 2) they perceive "the market" as favoring speed over quality, and 3) they want to consolidate their lines in order to try to cut their production costs.

I think the "letting it die" theory is supported by the lack of advertising or other promotion.

BTW, E6 -- as well as all other chromogenic films (including C41 and the relatively new black and white C41 films) -- were originally off-limits to Kodak, because Agfa held the patents. After the war ended, the allies divvied up the spoils, negating German patents right and left. That's why there was a proliferation of Japanese cameras based on German designs.

[Don Joe]

PS:

"a lot of folks still lament KII, insisting that the "real reason" for the change was to use less silver."

IMO "the real reason" (in reality, there were likely several) was the changeover to tempered gelatin emulsions, which allowed for higher temp processing, shorter times (faster throughput), and rougher handling. (The tempered color films I've handled wet -- E6 & C41 -- were tougher than "normal" B&W films, whereas the older (i.e., E4) stuff was so delicate that if you looked at it cockeyed the yellow layer would slip off into the wash (literally!). It was almost impossible to hand-process the stuff without at the very least some nontrivial reticulation.)

[Publius6961]

Digital photography is still much inferior to film photography, no question.

Question.
For everyday photos in any light environment with a little thought the modern digitals are plenty adequate, infinitely more convenient, and tons cheaper over the long run.

Except for the most exacting professional or the anal.
Got 3 Nikon F(x)s that I haven't used in 2 years.

Oh yeah.
Kodak makes great digital cameras. :)

[Richard Kimball]

That is supposed to be a really good camera Nikon is coming out with. Almost makes me feel guilty about owning a Canon, but I kept waiting for Nikon to come out with a digital SLR for less than 4 grand, and finally went Canon. Although, I have to admit, I don't have any complaints about the D30. You know, though, photography is like getting married. You've just started spending money when you get the body. ;0>

[Keeper of the Turf]

You've just started spending money when you get the body.

How right you are...$4,000 for the body and $6,000 for a Nikkor Telephoto 400mm f/2.8 IF AIS Manual Focus lense (for nature photography)...you're talking big $$$.

[hobbes1]

Wow...Pre-Implantation and everything!

[Truth Addict]

Aren't there two separate reexposures too, one from each side?

Yes, a red light re-exposes the cyan layer on the base side, and a blue light re-exposes the yellow layer on the emulsion side. The magenta layer can then be chemically re-exposed since the other two layers have already been developed. K-12 used a separate magenta reversal bath and wash, while in K-14 they incorporated the reversal agent into the developer itself, eliminating two steps.

Those re-exposure lights use very sharp cutoff filters to expose only the relevant layer, and adjusting the intensity of the lamps is an important factor in process control.

I'm afraid that Kodachrome may not be with us much longer. There are only a handful of labs left that run K-14 (mostly Qualex labs), and there is just not enough demand to keep justifying production on a long term basis. I think what has really been the biggest factor is the demise of super 8 movie film. When everyone stopped shooting movies and went to video tape, labs saw the super 8 volume decrease to a trickle. When I worked at the lab, movie film far surpassed slide production, and without the movies, there was not enough volume to keep the line going.

[antaresequity]

Isnt some of this EPA related? The processing has been abandon for certain films becasue it cost to much to meet the EPA regs on it...I think K-12 (?) Kodachrome is very toxic.

That is why its much easier to have E-6 developed. Just a guess