International photographer (Jan-Dec 1934)

enters the buildings — a process common enough — but at Kodak Park the air ducts themselves are kept spotless and rleckless. Their inside walls are frequently Hushed a n d polished by men in sou'westers, armed with hose and polishers. Not an atom of dust is permitted to linger in the ducts. Why all this cleanliness, this emphasis on "good housekeeping"? Surely, on such a large factory scale, this can be no idiosyncrasy of an over-careful management ? Imagine a roll of motion picture film in a camera "shooting" a scene that may have required a small fortune for preparation. Then imagine w h a t Kodak Park has made unimaginable — dirt or grease on the film, that would spoil the scene. Conjure up the photographic records of astronmical explorers. A speck on the film might put an extra star in a significant cluster. Any cartridge of amateur photographer's film leaving Kodak Park may have important work to do. It may get a rare opportunity to record a baby's fleeting smile. Of such things, large and small, the world's affairs are made. Kodak Park's job is to assure that photographic materials are ready without flaw to take the picture, whatever the job on hand. With a look at photographic paper, let us begin an inspection of Kodak Park. Prints made from nega Though this huge duct carries nothing but purified air, it is nevertheless flushed and polished. Huge ducts carry washed and conditioned air within the various production buildings of the plant. tives — by way of explanation — are on a paper base, coated with the sensitive silver "emulsion." Certain chemicals in the content of ordinary paper would ruin the photographic printing materials. Copper and iron, for example, could destroy the photographic effectiveness of the emulsion if a trace of them appeared in photographic paper. Not only, therefore, are extreme precautions exercised to keep impurities out of the photographic paper in the making — precautions evolved from years of experience — but also the system of tests to assure that the standards are met is very extensive. Not only chemical tests, but actual photographic printing tests as well are applied to every batch of paper and some parts of this testing program are carried out at every stage of manufacture — the raw material, the wet band of new paper as it first gains strength enough to hold together, the finished paper, the paper after sensitizing and the paper at points in between. Every department concerned with making photographic paper at Kodak Park — and the same thing applies to film — has its independent control laboratory, manned by alert chemists whose job is to detect and arrest any chemical stranger intruding into the sacred purity of the materials. They take nothing for granted at Kodak Park — not even the o.k. of their fellow chemists in other departments. One can't get away from that struggle for purity. Paper making in the House of Kodak begins on a small paper machine, where test sheets are made. These sheets must cope successfully with the tests before major production on any given paper-making job can commence. If the test paper stands up, production begins on the larger paper making machines. Yet, even when production jumps from the small laboratory basis to full-scale manufacture, the puritycontrol setting is present. The digesters are made of glazed white brick. Pipe lines are similarly protective. The water is rigidly purified after being piped from the undisturbed depths, far from shore, of Lake Ontario. The workmen's clothing is spotless. Their hands are (Turn to Page 18) Five