Kodak Kodachrome 64

Paul Simon wrote the song in 1973 because Kodachrome was already a cultural shorthand. The slide film was thirty-eight years old at that point and would run another thirty-six before Kodak shut it down on December 30, 2010. The last roll Kodak ever manufactured went to Steve McCurry, who shot it around the world and had Dwayne's process it in July 2010. Dwayne's accepted Kodachrome through December 30, 2010 and ran the final batches in early January 2011, with owner Dwayne Steinle's group portrait of his employees among the last frames developed. No other film stock has ever gotten that kind of sendoff.

What made Kodachrome unique was the dye-coupling chemistry. The color dyes were added during development, not built into the emulsion layers, which is why a properly stored Kodachrome slide from 1965 still looks nearly identical to a fresh one. Ektachrome shifts magenta with age and Fuji slides shift cyan; Kodachrome holds. National Geographic's archive of Steve McCurry, William Albert Allard, and David Alan Harvey work is mostly Kodachrome 64 and is still color-accurate fifty years on.

The signature look is warm reds, deep blacks, and a slightly muted midtone that holds shadow detail better than any other slide film of its generation. The famous McCurry "Afghan Girl" portrait was Kodachrome 64 in a Nikon FM2; her green eyes are the color they are because of the chemistry.

You cannot shoot it anymore. Process K-14 ended forever in 2010 with the closure of Dwayne's processing line. Frozen rolls turn up in estate sales for hundreds of dollars and can only be processed as B&W. We list Kodachrome 64 here because the app supports it for anyone shooting recovered stock as black and white, with reciprocity exponent 1.10 applied to long exposures.