RE: filmscanners: Digital Shortcomings

["laurie" <laurie@advancenet.net>]

I forget which is the case; but Kodachromes only had either longevity with
respect to dark storage or longevity with respect to lightfastness as
compared to E-6 but not both.  While the Kodachrome process is entirely
different from E-6 which may stabilize the dyes as you say, it is always
possible that there is an inherent limitation in dyes which restricts
stability of one type versus another; whereupon the manufacturer has to make
compromises.

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-filmscanners@halftone.co.uk
[mailto:owner-filmscanners@halftone.co.uk]On Behalf Of Derek Clarke
Sent: Tuesday, June 26, 2001 4:24 AM
To: filmscanners@halftone.co.uk
Cc: derek_c@cix.co.uk
Subject: Re: filmscanners: Digital Shortcomings


Unfortunately I think you'll find that nothing will last as long as
Kodachromes.

The completely different process used means that the dyes can be made more
stable.

And it looks to me that Kodachrome is slowly on the way out.

Soon the only game in town for longevity will be digital re-copied to more
modern media and possibly converted to a more modern file format every
five years or so...


artistic@ampsc.com (Arthur Entlich) wrote:

> Silly me, I used almost exclusively Kodachrome back in the 60's 70's
> and 80's.  I only really moved to E-6 films after they convinced me I
> could trust them (in the 1990's), (other than Afga slides which used
> some weird process (CF??) which has failed completely on me, and will
> need to be dealt with via digital repair (for what is left of the
> image).  Even the Agfa stuff made me nervous enough to go back and
> reshoot on Kodachrome before I left the area (good intuition that
> time...)
>
> I do have some 40+ year old slides from childhood that are looking
> pretty ratty and some negs from the 70's and early 80's that need a bit
> of help, but these are in the minority.
>
> I think today's slides and negs (properly processed!!! and stored) will
> remain very effective images for a long time to come.  If they last as
> well as my 1970's Kodachromes, I'll be overjoyed.
>
> Art
>
> Isaac Crawford wrote:
>
> > Hersch Nitikman wrote:
> >
> >> For all the concern about the lifetime of CDs, I have been scanning
> > my
> >> personal archives of slides and color negatives ranging mostly from
> >> the past 30 years, with a few older. I have to say that most of my
> >> 30-year old slides and negatives need Digital ROC (Restoration of
> >> Color) very badly. Ed Hamrick's independent version in Vuescan has
> >> done some remarkable things for me, turning slides that were very
> > much
> >> faded to a predominantly magenta image into very much more believable
> >> ones. I would not count on slides and negatives to be truly
> > 'archival'
> >> unless stored under 'archival' conditions, and maybe not even then.
> >> Storing and renewing a digital image on quality media every few years
> >> still seems like the best means now available.
> >> Hersch
> >
> >
> >     This is an interesting idea that doesn't get talked about as much.
> > B&W
> > film has far better archival qualities than the color stuff. Many
> > people
> > lump "film" all into one group when obviously there are differences
> > between films. Maybe digital is the best way to preserve accurate
> > colors...
> >
> > Isaac
>
>
>