Speaking of camera equipment, I came across the coolest paper yesterday. The first one I’ll mention I knew about last semester but I couldn’t get my hands on any. The others are brand spanking new.

First up is Kodak Professional Color Metallic and man is it awesome. Basically it’s normal photo paper with an extra layer within the fibers themselves that contains a metallic finish. It makes prints look like those metallic baseball cards. Here’s what Kodak has to say:

“Color Metallic Paper gives color prints an eye-catching metallic sheen, and features an almost 3-D effect that makes images seem to pop off the page. Based on KODAK’S Modular Imaging Support Technology, KODAK PROFESSIONAL Color Metallic Paper uses a patented combination of five film laminates to produce the metallic/pearlescent effect.”

Next up are two papers that are along the same lines but are genious in their inovation. I’ll explain what I mean in a minute.

First is KODAK PROFESSIONAL PORTRA B&W. You’re probably saying to yourself “so what, it’s just another B&W photo paper, they have tons of those.” While you’re right in saying that B&W paper isn’t an innovation, being able to process that paper in COLOR chemistry is certainly a breakthrough. Think about that for a minute. Before now, if you wanted to print both black and white AND color you had to have 2 enlargers, 2 different types of materials and two sets of chemistry. Now, you can print both black and white negative and color negatives with the same enlarger and run them through the same chemistry. That’s fantastic.

Even more fantastic is the next paper which is an extension of the B&W. It’s KODAK PROFESSIONAL PORTRA Sepia Black & White Paper. Same idea, different results. Now instead of just black and white in color chemestry, you can print B&W with Sepia tone in color chemistry. Holy heck!