Kodachrome nostalgia

[Matthew Currie]

It's been some time since I scanned slides, but I agree that Provia was one of the nicest films to do, Velvia 50 one of the hardest.  Sensia, the less carefully made amateur equivalent to Provia, scanned nicely too. 

I always had a perverse fondness for Velvia 100F, which many people hate for its poor rendition of bright colors.  I liked the way it did earth tones.  Good stuff if you spend a lot of time looking down!

I loved slides, but don't much miss the tediousness of scanning.

I'm obviously not a color conoisseur anyway, but I was not hugely impressed by the Kodachrome presets in the link below, but with the change in EV and white balance added, it's hard to tell what part the Kodachrome preset is playing, as the thing one notices first is the change in exposure.

[pluton]

I loaded the presets from Gavin Gough (GG) http://blog.gavingough.com/blog/2016/7/18/kodachromepresets .  Here a comparison between a normal post-processed picture and the same with GG's preset and D5 calibration for Kodachrome 64; Kodachrome 64 is on the right.

Give me your thoughts (before I share mine):

I see the rendering of blue has been shifted away from cyan, and toward a 'colder' hue, which is a Kodachrome-like tendency.  It appears that the saturation has been increased, which is not a Kodachrome property.  I always found that Kodachrome 25 rendered saturated colors saturated, but pale colors pale.

[MFloyd]

Keith, this is Kodachrome 64.

Hereunder:
- first row: left: Kodachrome 25; right 64 (same picture as before on the right)
- second row: original (same picture as before on the left)

Again with the Gavin Gough presets.

[Akira]

A friend of mine attended one of the lectures offered by Fuji for the X series camera users told me that the lecturer had disclosed that "Classic Chrome" of the film simulation mode in the current Fuji X series cameras to be actually the simulation of Kodachrome whose implementation was officially allowed by Kodak.  I'm not sure whether it is of KM or KR, though.

The older models like X-T1 and even X-E2 are now added with the Classic Chrome item to the film simulation menu via firmware 3.0.

[MILLIREHM]

A friend of mine attended one of the lectures offered by Fuji for the X series camera users told me that the lecturer had disclosed that "Classic Chrome" of the film simulation mode in the current Fuji X series cameras to be actually the simulation of Kodachrome whose implementation was officially allowed by Kodak.  I'm not sure whether it is of KM or KR, though.

The older models like X-T1 and even X-E2 are now added with the Classic Chrome item to the film simulation menu via firmware 3.0.

Interesting. If a nostalgia wave is up to increase we might se more of these features

[MFloyd]

Does somebody has some Kodachrome scans ? It would be interesting to see and compare.

[Les Olson]

Scepticism about slide film emulation is appropriate, IMO, because simulating a transparency is not the same as simulating a print.  There are a number of quirks of the human visual system that make the effect of transmitted light quite different to reflected light. 

The Bezold-Brucke effect is the observation that the perceived hue of light changes with its luminance, so that at higher luminance blues and reds shift away from yellow and green.  The Hunt and Stevens effects are the observation that perceived colourfulness and contrast increase with luminance.  The Bartelson-Breneman effect is the observation that perceived contrast is affected by the luminance of the surround, which is why images intended for viewing in dark environments, such as slides (and movies) need higher contrast than print images. 

All of these effects were familiar to the people who put stained glass windows in medieval cathedrals (it is an urban myth that we have lost the ability to reproduce the colours of medieval stained glass: we just can't reproduce in a print the visual effect of transmitted light in a near dark cathedral).  The upshot is that an image on slide film viewed on a light table looks quite different to a print on paper taken from the same slide.   

[Matthew Currie]

Does somebody has some Kodachrome scans ? It would be interesting to see and compare.

I have a few which I'll see if I can hunt down later, but remember that the process of digitizing can change things too, especially as Kodachrome was not the easiest stuff to scan.  And of course it can depend on the scanner too. 

I have an old Nikon Coolscan IVED, which did a nice job for the most part, but at some point in the process of getting from a slide to the screen,  some changes occurred that I could never seem to get back. Most of the time it was unimportant - exactly what shade of brown is in a leaf or a tree trunk may have little effect if the point of the image is not the color anyway.  But in particular, certain deep reds in a slide, even when tweaked every which way, never quite came out the same - either a little orange or a little purple, or a little this or that, often very nice in the end, but never exactly what the slide said - and that's from someone who generally has little concern over the finest gradations of color.  I recall a lusciously custom painted motorcycle that I struggled over for a long time, and never got right, and an antique fire engine the same.  I just resigned myself to seeing some things in the world as being in out-of-gamut red.

[charlie]

Does somebody has some Kodachrome scans ? It would be interesting to see and compare.

I have a bunch of Kodachrome from the 60's & 70's, haven't scanned much of it but I did do a couple test scans comparing software on another thread: http://nikongear.net/revival/index.php/topic,2346.msg28773.html#msg28773

Scanned with an Epson V700 which is not calibrated. If I remember correctly the colors looked pretty similar on screen compared to viewing the slides. These may not be the best photos for color comparisons, but its something. If I find the time I'll try and scan some more.

Thanks for sharing the link, I love Kodachrome colors.

[MFloyd]

thank you Charlie !

[pluton]

Les makes an excellent point.  I shot Kodachrome as a hobbyist, rarely having prints made.  Once Kodachrome shots were printed by high quality labs, or scanned and printed in magazines and books, the look was highly variable. 
All the digital film simulations I've seen bear little resemblance to my experience with the films, but they might perfectly embody another operator's impressions of using the same film product.

[MILLIREHM]

Les makes an excellent point.  I shot Kodachrome as a hobbyist, rarely having prints made.  Once Kodachrome shots were printed by high quality labs, or scanned and printed in magazines and books, the look was highly variable. 

Rarely had prints made. The best quality, but also with a unique and very special look were the Cibachrome prints. They had become unavailable long time before Kodachrome was phased out. In both procedures the chemistry had not been to environmentally benign

[pluton]

The best prints I'd seen were type-c prints made using a 4x5" internegative.  Very expensive.

[David H. Hartman]

My favourite all-round film, all formats up to the largest sheet film for my biggest view cameras, was Fuji Provia 100. Acceptable speed, very subtle and rounded colours, and very fine grain and sharpness. It also scans beautifully.

I liked Kodachrome but switched to Provia 100. I did not like Velvia. I was far too contrasty and saturation was over the top.

I understand that at some point Kodachrome's chemistry was changed to make it more environmentally friendly and this changed the color rendition.

I'd like old Tri-X back when the H&D curve had a hump at Zone VI. I'd also like Super-XX 4142 in 4x5, 5x7 and 8x10. I haven't shot film since I bought my first dSLR.

Dave Hartman

[MILLIREHM]

I liked Kodachrome but switched to Provia 100. I did not like Velvia. I was far too contrasty and saturation was over the top.

I understand that at some point Kodachrome's chemistry was changed to make it more environmentally friendly and this changed the color rendition.


Dave Hartman

AFAIK Kodachrome II had more silver in it, thus some photographers saw the switch to K64, K25 as downgrade. Dont know whether the K14 chemistry then was facing other changes