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Money & Company

Kodak discontinues Kodachrome film

By Tiffany Hsu
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This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

Tough luck, Paul Simon -- your Kodachrome is being taken away.

Eastman Kodak Co. announced today that it is retiring the 74-year-old Kodachrome color film as photographers gravitate to digital cameras and newer films. About 70% of the company’s revenue now comes from its digital sales.

Kodachrome sales had plunged in recent years to less than 1% of Kodak’s total film sales. Dwayne’s Photo in Parsons, Kan., the only lab worldwide that still processes Kodachrome, will offer the service through 2010.

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But the film had an illustrious history, favored by professional photographers like Steve McCurry, who used Kodachrome in 1985 for his famous National Geographic photo of a young Afghan girl with piercing green eyes.

In 1973, Simon immortalized the film’s “nice bright colors” in his song “Kodachrome.”

Kodak said it will donate the last rolls of Kodachrome film to the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film in Rochester, N.Y., after McCurry shoots one of the rolls.

-- Tiffany Hsu

Money & Company
Tiffany Hsu

Tiffany Hsu is a former staff writer for the Los Angeles Times. Previously, she wrote about the California economy, fast food, restaurants, retail and alternative energy for the Business section. A Bay Area native, UC Berkeley graduate and eternal Nor-Cal fan, she once worked for the San Francisco Bay Guardian. She also did a stint at the Richmond Times-Dispatch, where she developed a passion for sweet tea. She still has faith that someday she’ll find two economists who agree.

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