Kodachrome: [koh-duh-krohm] -noun, A color positive film, used for still and motion-picture photography, manufactured by Kodak.

Technology is a good thing. Photographic film was a revolutionary invention, and it changed the world. As of this writing, however, it is obsolete. Modern digital cameras are vastly superior to our beloved old 35mm antiques.

But...

In our rush to embrace new technologies, we risk losing sight of the beauty of our old tools. Look closely at an old manual typewriter. Listen to the methodical ticking of an antique pocket watch. Their obsolescence does not lessen their magnificence.

The computer you are looking at right now is the product of the labor of thousands of men and women. It's an incredible achievement, and yet it's sterile. Owing its existence to so many people, in the end, it bears the soul of none of them.

But the old inventions... the old machines, the old technologies... they talk to us. You hold a Leica M3 in your hand, and you feel that someone made it. You're dimly aware that a mere mortal, someone like you, someone like me... someone designed it. As this slowly dawns on you, you feel a sense of awe.

Kodachrome instilled that same sense of awe. To veteran photographers, the name itself invokes reverence. We all had our favorite films, but Kodachrome... Kodachrome was special. Kodachrome was magic. Kodachrome slides were not just photos. They were an experience. You'd be somewhere with your camera, and you'd think: this might be good. You'd look in your bag, and shuffle through the rolls of unexposed film: some Plus-X Pan, some Fujicolor 200, some Ektachrome... but no, this might be good, really good, so you'd tear open that special box of Kodachrome 64. You framed every shot carefully, checked your exposures twice, because you were using the best film you had.

When you were done shooting, you dropped off your film at the local photo shop, and then you waited. No on-site processing for this: this was Kodachrome, and only Kodak could process it. And when you got them back a week later, you hurried home and opened the distinctive yellow box the moment you walked in the door, too anxious to take the time to set them out on the light table. You handled each slide carefully, holding the edges of the mount, and you held them up to the light one by one.

Somewhere in that box, if you were lucky, or if you were just plain good, there would be the one... that one perfect shot that you were looking for. You held it up to the light, the colors vibrant and bright, and the place and time rushed back to you, distilled into perfection. Everything about that moment was there, inside the frame. You looked at the light streaming through the thin, delicate emulsion, and it was magic. It was the world: it was that experience, captured in a 35mm space.

If you never knew Kodachrome... if you never knew that feeling... I pity you.

Those of you who are young, you are lucky. You have better tools. Photography is easier now, and the results are superior. You don't need to feel the frustration of knowing that your camera simply can't capture the image you want without more light. You don't need to fret over the cost of wasted film. You need never know the disappointment of realizing that the photos you thought you took don't exist, because the film didn't catch on the takeup spool.