xayraa33
rangefinder user and fancier
From the Pete Grafton photo collection:
https://petegraftonphotos.com/2017/04/24/america-at-home-1950s-kodachromes/
https://petegraftonphotos.com/2017/04/24/america-at-home-1950s-kodachromes/
Contarama
Well-known
Bravo!!! *clapping* TY for sharing!
What is this digital thing again???
What is this digital thing again???
ornate_wrasse
Moderator
Having grown up in the 1950's, I really enjoyed this collection.
Thanks for sharing.
Ellen
Thanks for sharing.
Ellen
skucera
Well-known
A couple of years ago I got out a few of my dad's slides from the late Fifties right through the mid Seventies. It's amazing how bright and clear the colors still are, unlike most of the photos I still have from those decades. I should get out my own Kodachrome slides from the Eighties to show my kids. Half of them are 110 slides.
Scott
Scott
charjohncarter
Veteran
KodaChrome April 1946 by John Carter, on Flickr
Found Fotos by John Carter, on FlickrI love old Kodachromes; these are two from our family. The first is 1946 ASA 10, the second about 1952 also ASA 10.
DownUnder
Nikon Nomad
Color film image longevity is an odd (and imprecise) 'science', if I may call it that.
I have Kodachromes (inherited from family) from the 1940s and 1950s showing virtually no color shift or fading. Also a small and prized lot of mid to late '30s Kodachromes taken with a Contax in Singapore, Malaya and Hong Kong by an uncle who was a banker and so could afford both the gear and film. These have faded to a degree but are still salvageable by scanning. I plan to do archival scans of these later this year, to preserve the images and also provide some family members with pictures.
I must say I get an eerie (but enjoyable) sense of I'm not sure what, looking at color images of my aunt taken in 1939, when she was a 22 year old nurse in Singapore. She had a colorful time in the Far East until she was sent home to Canada by her banker (then lover), who turned up unexpectedly in 1942 and they were married. She outlived him by many years and passed away in 2007, aged 90. I often stayed with her in her fine old home in Vancouver and she kindly gave me the slides (the Contax camera and a Rolleiflex TLR have both disappeared) a few years before she left us. I feel a great sense of time and place and being there with her, when I look at these old slides and then my own photos of her, taken when she was a very old lady.
Slide films were expensive in Canada in the '60s and like everyone else at that time I shot mostly 120 B&W and some Kodacolor negative films. Almost all my color negatives from that time have faded, as did my 1980s ones. Oddly, 1970s negatives somehow survived, also 120 and 35mm Agfachrome films (CT17, if my memories are accurate) I took in Bali in 1970,1972 and 1974. These have, I'm told, some cultural value and I will also be scanning the lot for my archives and to donate images to Bali university photo archives.
My Ektachromes have also fared oddly. Some (1970s) taken in Bangkok, survive and still look good, or at least salvageable. Others processed in Malaysia have faded but may come up in multi-pass scans. Almost all my color negative 35mms from Sydney (1975-1985) have faded to some extent, but most of my slides look in reasonable condition.
As for the rest of my collections, my Fujichromes up to 2000 show some fading, some Agfachromes have deteriorated but a lot has survived. The Kodak slide film mileages vary. Ektachromes are so-so, one lot can be good, another will have badly faded. Most Kodachromes have survived.
In the 1990s I acquired a Nikon slide copying outfit and spent many winter nights in Melbourne diligently copying slides to black-and-white negatives. All these were processed archivally and I like to think will outlast me.
It's wonderful to see such vibrant colors, in my own work and in what has been posted here. Of my childhood, I have a few hundred 616 B&W contact prints, beautifully finished and with deckled edges, and ONE color print of me taken in 1954 or 1955 by a traveling photographer who had set up a studio at the local hotel. The print is marked 'Ektacolor'. It's a wonder that it has lasted so well for so long, but I keep it safely stored and away from light, which may have helped.
My goal is to scan everything I have in color before I shuffle off to that big darkroom in the skies. Which should ensure I live well into my nineties.
I have Kodachromes (inherited from family) from the 1940s and 1950s showing virtually no color shift or fading. Also a small and prized lot of mid to late '30s Kodachromes taken with a Contax in Singapore, Malaya and Hong Kong by an uncle who was a banker and so could afford both the gear and film. These have faded to a degree but are still salvageable by scanning. I plan to do archival scans of these later this year, to preserve the images and also provide some family members with pictures.
I must say I get an eerie (but enjoyable) sense of I'm not sure what, looking at color images of my aunt taken in 1939, when she was a 22 year old nurse in Singapore. She had a colorful time in the Far East until she was sent home to Canada by her banker (then lover), who turned up unexpectedly in 1942 and they were married. She outlived him by many years and passed away in 2007, aged 90. I often stayed with her in her fine old home in Vancouver and she kindly gave me the slides (the Contax camera and a Rolleiflex TLR have both disappeared) a few years before she left us. I feel a great sense of time and place and being there with her, when I look at these old slides and then my own photos of her, taken when she was a very old lady.
Slide films were expensive in Canada in the '60s and like everyone else at that time I shot mostly 120 B&W and some Kodacolor negative films. Almost all my color negatives from that time have faded, as did my 1980s ones. Oddly, 1970s negatives somehow survived, also 120 and 35mm Agfachrome films (CT17, if my memories are accurate) I took in Bali in 1970,1972 and 1974. These have, I'm told, some cultural value and I will also be scanning the lot for my archives and to donate images to Bali university photo archives.
My Ektachromes have also fared oddly. Some (1970s) taken in Bangkok, survive and still look good, or at least salvageable. Others processed in Malaysia have faded but may come up in multi-pass scans. Almost all my color negative 35mms from Sydney (1975-1985) have faded to some extent, but most of my slides look in reasonable condition.
As for the rest of my collections, my Fujichromes up to 2000 show some fading, some Agfachromes have deteriorated but a lot has survived. The Kodak slide film mileages vary. Ektachromes are so-so, one lot can be good, another will have badly faded. Most Kodachromes have survived.
In the 1990s I acquired a Nikon slide copying outfit and spent many winter nights in Melbourne diligently copying slides to black-and-white negatives. All these were processed archivally and I like to think will outlast me.
It's wonderful to see such vibrant colors, in my own work and in what has been posted here. Of my childhood, I have a few hundred 616 B&W contact prints, beautifully finished and with deckled edges, and ONE color print of me taken in 1954 or 1955 by a traveling photographer who had set up a studio at the local hotel. The print is marked 'Ektacolor'. It's a wonder that it has lasted so well for so long, but I keep it safely stored and away from light, which may have helped.
My goal is to scan everything I have in color before I shuffle off to that big darkroom in the skies. Which should ensure I live well into my nineties.
p.giannakis
Pan Giannakis
It's strange to see those decades in colour...