Monochrome Kodachrome

How To Process Kodachrome As B&W

Dan Murano

15 October 2012

(Update of an article originally published on 10/15/2012.)

I still had a roll of exposed Kodachrome long after the last processing lab closed. This roll sat around for 23 years - first in a drawer, then wrapped in foil and chucked into a freezer - before I finally decided to try and retrieve any of the latent image and still might be left on it. it.

Back in the mid-1980s when these images were made, I couldn't afford the expense of Kodachrome film or processing. I was shopping in Woolworth's on day and saw a pile of of outdated ASA 25 Kodachrome II for about fifty cents a roll and bought the whole batch. Most of it I used and had processed, but for some reason, I held back this one roll thinking that nothing special was on it.

Diafine Developer

I finally pulled the roll out of storage and mixed up a batch of Diafine black & white film developer. I chose Diafine, because I had no idea how long to process this film or if there was even anything of the latent image left on it. With Diafine, beyond a certain point the development time doesn't matter, so there would be no chance of underdevelopment.

Kodachrome also has a black rem-jet carbon backing that I had to rub off during processing. I did that by carefully sponging the film base. Most of it came off, leaving to my surprise a full roll of rich black & white negatives.

The Slideshow

9 photos. Click below to open the slideshow:

Evaluating the results

Diafine heightened Kodachrome's inherent sharpness, adding rich texture and crisp tones that work perfectly with these images of stone, and even with the portrait. Some of the rem-jet backing didn't come off, but the spots are easily dealt with in the digitization process. These were all done on a Nikon Coolscan which accentuates film grain.

I was fortunate to photograph these sculptures before they were cleaned. I don't believe the stonework is now so gritty and dark anymore.

The biggest treat was finding 3 or 4 frames of my niece with her new baby. The one here was simply scanned through the storage sheet on a flatbed scanner. I now use a digital camera to digitize my negatives and slides.

Photography Content - - Washington, D.C. - - Film photography - - Film Processing - - How To

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Comments

Karla McDuffie (not verified)

Wed, 12/20/2023 - 1:03pm

Really excited to see these (some of them to re-visit) and loved hearing the developing process. Curious; do you ever go out to shoot film these days? I'm sure time is an issue, since you've been building this site and the previous one for quite some time and also working on publishing several books!

Dan Murano

Wed, 12/20/2023 - 2:59pm

Thanks, Karla! Yes, I actually was using a film camera today. Who knows when I'll see them - I still have unprocessed film from 8 or 9 years ago!

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