Amateur photos of CBS color from 1951

[benman94]

Originally Posted by dtvmcdonald

Kodachrome doesn't do that sort of fading. Its Ektachrome that does.

The chemistry changed a lot over the years for Kodachrome. I would be hesitant to say that Kodachrome doesn't fade the way Wayne described; some slides can and do seem to fade terribly, though not nearly as bad as Ektachrome of the same period.

FWIW, my Great-Grandmother died back in September, and we found that her Kotavachrome prints from immediately after WWII through 1953 are quite faded. My Grandmother's wedding photos (also on Kotavachrome, this time circa 1957) are fine.

Does anyone know what Kodachrome chemistry was in use circa 1951?, when the Life magazine slides were shot? It's much too early for K-14. Maybe K-12?

[old_tv_nut]

Originally Posted by benman94

...
Does anyone know what Kodachrome chemistry was in use circa 1951?, when the Life magazine slides were shot? It's much too early for K-14. Maybe K-12?

From what I can find, the process was K10 at that time, with K11 arriving in 1955, K12 in 1961, and K14 in 1974.

All the Kodachrome that I have personally handled did not fade this way, even stuff shot by my father in the early 50's. So, I'm thinking that while some earlier Kodachrome may have faded, any used in 1951 probably did not. I would love to see some dated examples from 1951 that prove or disprove this.

The later versions of Kodachrome for sure had excellent dark stability, but actually poorer light stability than Ektachrome. We had to make duplicate test slides for the Zenith lab because using them daily in a slide projector / vidicon telecine for TV test material would produce noticeable fading (and mostly neutral, not towards pink) within a week. Fresh duplicates would be used for critical one-time/final video tests. Slides could be used in a flying spot scanner for long periods without fading, but the only use of a FSS was in the video disk lab, not for TV development. Plus, I don't believe the FSS had an automatic slide changer.

[benman94]

Originally Posted by old_tv_nut

From what I can find, the process was K10 at that time, with K11 arriving in 1955, K12 in 1961, and K14 in 1974.

All the Kodachrome that I have personally handled did not fade this way, even stuff shot by my father in the early 50's. So, I'm thinking that while some earlier Kodachrome may have faded, any used in 1951 probably did not. I would love to see some dated examples from 1951 that prove or disprove this.

I'll find an example from 1951 and upload it. That said, perhaps the Kotavachrome chemistry (Kodachrome "prints" on a funny little opaque sheet of white plastic) is slightly different than the "normal" slide chmenistry. Who knows...

Our 16mm home movies are in fine shape, having been projected only a handful of times. They do have truly excellent dark stability. My Great-Grandfather even coughed up the dough for a little RCA sound-on-film camera. The audio quality is terrible, but it is neat seeing amateur motion pictures with sound from a man who died in 1971.