Today I received my first developed Kodachrome pictures in some years. See, back in the day, before the instant gratification of digital, we had the excitement of “getting your pictures back,” as well as the days of looking forward to it. Thus, I see for the first time the pictures I took a week and a half ago, them having made the return trip from Dwayne's in Kansas, the only place in the world where you can still get Kodachrome developed. Shooting these was a pleasure in itself. There is nothing terribly exciting here, just some shots from a few...
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NOTE: Pepsi Throwback was set to reappear on December 28, 2009. This post was written back in April, the first time it came out, and thus is not current. As of Dec. 29, the Throwback website is showing a blank page, and I have managed to find very little of it so far. New information going into my new post as I find it. When Pepsi Throwback first appeared in stores, I posted a quick blog entry professing my love for it. Then, much to my surprise, I began getting Google traffic from people looking for actual information about the...
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While grocery shopping this evening, I discovered that Pepsi Throwback has finally gone on sale! This is the stuff made with real sugar, rather than that awful high-fructose corn syrup. They only had it in cans, so I picked up a couple of 12-packs. I don't know if they're selling it any other way. It's like a little can of pure love. Unless you order the special Dr Pepper from Texas, we haven't had soda made with sugar in this country since the mid-1980s, and man, did I miss it. Nevermind the ongoing debate about how bad high-fructose corn syrup...
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When I started shooting film again, that meant I had to develop it, and that meant I needed a timer. Surely, I thought, there must be something suitable for my trusty iPod. But when I looked, nothing was right. There were a bunch of timers available, sure, but they were designed like computer programs, with convoluted ways of entering the time (tap “minutes” 5 times for 5 minutes, etc) and unattractive interfaces. Some of them have instructions. Instructions, for a timer? Why, I wondered, can't I have a timer that just works like the one on my microwave oven? So...
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Courtesy of my new scanner, this is a picture I took in the summer of 1986. This was the year when I first discovered that a sunrise is a fine way to end the day. My friend and I would ride our bikes down to the beach, or wherever, and head home once the sun was up. I would say hello to mom, who would be getting ready for work, then go to bed. I'd wake up about when she was back at home making dinner, so the timing was good. This is a pattern I've stuck with over the...
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B&H today sent me this little box of love, a nice supply of Kodachrome. I haven't shot Kodachrome in years. How silly of me, though, to think digital could ever replace it. I haven't even shot any yet, and I'm excited. Kodachrome is special. It's also rather precariously on the Endangered Species List – Kodak has already killed off 25 and 200, leaving us with only the ISO 64 varient, and there is now only one place in the world that can develop it. (You can't develop Kodachrome yourself.) I know film is no longer mainstream, but this is crazy....
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I've been shooting film lately. Yeah, I know, and I'm not interested in reviving the old “film vs. digital” debate. That one's already old. The thing that got me thinking about film again was how often I don't do black and white conversions. It's not because I don't like working in black and white – I do – but the fact that I have to create it on the computer. Sure, you get all kinds of options for the conversion, simulating color filters and so on, but it's never the same. The highlights suffer; trying to simulate the shoulder of...
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Well, it's happened – I have a cheap ripoff! As you may know, I have an iPhone application called ThisDay, which shows “today in history,” holidays, famous birthdays, etc. The database for this took a while to put together, what with editing for interestingness, verifying things, writing the actual entries, etc. Now, someone has released a cheap, half-assed copy with almost exactly the same name (“This Day,” with the space). It has “today in history” lists copied verbatim from Wikipedia! No effort whatsoever. Also, having gone through Wikipedia's lists, I can tell you that their accuracy is often questionable. This...
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