iPad Light Table

A quick followup to Saturday's post about using an iPhone as a light table. A friend suggested I use my iPad for more editing room. The iPad gives you enough room to view two 4x5 transparencies or about half of a page of slides. Very cool use of an iPad. 

Impromptu Light Table

Photograph ©2011 Alex Suarez. All rights reserved.

I was sorting through some old slides tonight and needed a light table. I grabbed an iPhone and launched a flashlight app--instant light table. For a loupe, I used a 50mm lens. I opened the aperture all the way and looked through the front of the lens. It worked quite well.  BTW, the image above was shot with another iPhone. 

Mama, They Took My Kodachrome Away!

Today is a sad day for me. Kodak announced that the have discontinued Kodachrome film after 74 years in production. Kodachrome 25 was the most beautiful color film ever. The fine grain, the way it rendered colors, especially the reds, was exactly what I wanted out of a color transparency film.

I'll admit that I hadn't bought any Kodachrome since the mid-90s, maybe 1993, so I can't (and won't) complain. Kodak reported that Kodachrome sales were "just a fraction of one percent of Kodak’s total sales of still-picture films," so you really can't blame them in this digital age. Check out Kodak's tribute to Kodachrome.

Anyway, I attribute the look of my color photography today to be heavily influenced by this film.  I would not have developed my style of sometimes highly saturated colors in my images, had I not spent the 80s and into the 90s shooting Kodachrome film in the way that I did. Goodbye my friend, we had some great times over the years.