'tis Autumn

'tis Autumn

- wellll, at least here in the northern hemisphere - thank you, Viola ;-) -

Happy Autumn, F-C!

Steve

The arrival of autumn, with its inviting palette, inspired me to share one of the last Kodachromes I had the pleasure to shoot.

Some lovely autumn weeks in October and November 2010 made for my "Last Hurrah with the Kodachrome." This iconic film by Eastman Kodak reached the end of its production in 2009. Shortly after that, Dwayne's Photo, the lab in Parsons, Kansas to which ALL Kodachrome slide and movie films had to be shipped for processing, announced it would be shutting down its Kodachrome line, forever.

Kodachrome and I go way back, as it was the film I started shooting as a rookie when I first became serious about photography in my teen years.

My favorite of the final generation of Kodachrome slide film was the wonderful fine-grained KM, ISO-25. When Kodak closed the Kodachrome-Era, I made a point of stashing away several rolls of K-25 in my freezer and earmarking it for only the best motifs for that personal "Last Hurrah."

And I was determined to shoot every last frame of that stash of this wonderful film, in plenty of time to get it to Dwayne's before that end of year deadline. Not just shoot it, but give it the very best motifs I could imagine. This occasioned an autumn trip to my beloved Canton Graubünden in Switzerland, as well as a visit to Hamburg. I could not have been more fortunate with the weather and autumn colors.

Still, I had two rolls left on my return, as I had shot my K-25 very selectively in Europe.

So, the "Last Hurrah" extended into late October and early November, as I took the remaining two rolls into the autumn colors of the Virginia Piedmont, where Mother Nature smiled down on me and the cameras, just as she had in Switzerland and Germany.

Guess the old gal must have loved Kodachrome too!

Photo + Design ©2010/2013 Steve Ember