So, my friend Stone is making a trip to the four corners of America — Pacific Northwest, New England, American Southwest, and the Florida Keys — for what he calls his passion project: Farewell to Kodachrome. He’s taking 800 photographs on Kodachrome film before the December 31, 2010 deadline. The New England leg of the trip is done, and some image samples are here.
On that day, the last Kodachrome film processing lab in the world is closing up shop in Kansas; they’ll process film until the last roll is finished, but after that, it’s done — the chemicals will be gone, and no one in the world will get Kodachrome film printed ever again.
Stone is planning to be there the day before, with the last rolls of film, with what he hopes will be his first book of professional photographs. And since Kodachrome is this amazing film that’s been used to shoot high-color, archival-quality prints for everyone from Hugh Hefner to National Geographic to the White House to Hollywood, he expects the pictures to be fantastic.
He’s raised about $3800 for the trip expenses; he’ll be sleeping in his car some of the time, and couch-surfing at others, and he’s still short about $2000 or so. This means he’s going to go, no matter what… it’s just an issue of whether or not he’ll have the cash to pay for the developing when he gets to Kansas. And that sucks.
It’s not a tax-deductible contribution. There’s not any glory in it, except maybe for him. I think it’s a cool project and I’ve chipped in some cash myself because of that, and because I think that helping a guy achieve his dreams is a pretty great thing. So consider donating.
Help because the window is closing on this learning experience of a lifetime. He’s got a month and a half to churn out something amazing, and it would be a shame if a little thing like greenbacks held him back.
