[rollei_list] Re: The End of Kodachrome

While discontinuing Kodachrome based on lack of sales may make sense from a business standpoint I rather wonder if sales would have been better if Kodak hadn't been trying to kill off Kodachrome for a dozen years. The first step was eliminating processing for sizes other than 35mm and making even that hard to obtain. Why buy a film that is difficult to get processed when you can use another film which is processed by every corner store. I am not sure why Kodak decided to eliminate this product. One long standing suggestion is that the processing required substances which were difficult to control from an environmental protection standpoint. If this is true it may have made the operation of processing machines excessively expensive. Since all the film is made on one line in one factory control on the manufacturing side should have been easier. Kodak began eliminating Kodachrome formats and processing very early on. Up until the announcement of Ektachrome, c.1946, Kodak made Kodakchrome in sheet sizes up to 11x14. All those went as soon as Ektachrome came on the market. OTOH, Kodak did not offer Kodachrome in roll film sizes until fairly recent times. Otherwise it was made in 35mm for still cameras and in 8mm and 16mm for motion picture cameras. Well, its gone and nothing will bring it back. It was a bit of a tour-de-force when first made. While Agfa beat Kodak to the punch in having an incorporated coupler color film it was never anywhere as good as Kodachrome. 

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Richard Knoppow
Los Angeles, CA, USA
dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 
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