Film processing/ scanning

[Todd.Hanz]

I know there was some discussion about this a while back but I could not find it.
I took some color film to be processed today and the clerk asked if I wanted a disc with the images on it for 7.99. I never thought of having my film scanned by anyone else, so I gave it a try. They did a pretty good job, blew the highlights in some images but I can discuss that with them next time, there will be a next time.
I don't have a dedicated film scanner (I use a flat bed) and my color images don't come out very well so I think I'll use them ofr color. If you are interested the camera shop is Ritz/ Wolf depending on where you live. Here are some samples using Kodak Hi-Definition consumer film taken with my M6 and 35/2 Summicron:

[Todd.Hanz]

..........and one more.

[GeneW]

Very sharp and excellent colour range. They did a good job with these two. That hi-def film looks good. I'm going to try some.

Gene

[back alley]

todd, that's what i've been doing with my c41 b&w film.
i just ask for develop and scan, no prints. it's cheaper, i can view the prints on my monitor and post them here or email to others.
and best of all it only takes a couple of hours at most.

i have bags of undeveloped film all around my place, from years ago and even recently and i have no desire to dev or print them myself.

i'm hoping for a change of attitude soon.

joe

[Todd.Hanz]

No prints? That is a good idea, I throw away lots of prints anyway. Man you've got to develop those rolls, we had a drawer we would throw used film in, we never got it developed. Finally one day I hauled it all in, it cost me a couple hundred for developing, the moral...........don't hoard film!

Todd

[back alley]

this is all standard b&w film, lots of delta 3200. i need to do it myself. couldn't bear to have a lab do it.

(hey wait a minute, didn't you just say that a lab does your c41 b&w films?
well, yes, ah, well, yes i did just say that.)

i know, it doesn't make any sense!
but then just ask me about bokeh...

joe

[Wayne R. Scott]

OK, tell me about bokeh!! And how it relates to rare earth glass, C-41 processed B&W film, magic bullet cameras, and little known bird calls.

Hey, I'll process your Ilford 3200 for you if you want.

Wayne

[back alley]

oh wayne!
did you miss the thread last night where i brought up bokeh? i can't recall which one it was now. bill m. and some others made some good points and got me thinking...always a scary thing.

process my film?! tempting but...well, i'll give it some thought.
i guess i'd have to buy ya a beer (at least) for something like that!

joe

[GeneW]

Joe, the nice thing about developing your own film is that the entry cost is fairly low and the ongoing costs even lower. I use concentrated developers (HC-110 and Rodinal) and they last forever. I figure my developing cost per roll of B&W film is something like $0.50 cdn. If I did more volume the cost would be even lower.

And, it's fun to do ... You can shoot in the morning, develop the film in the aft, and scan the negs in the evening. Not quite 1-hr, but pretty fast turnaround.

Gene

[Marc Jutras]

I get all my films scanned by my lab. They use a Noritsu 2901.

They recently told me that I can ask them not to apply any corrections or ask for custom corrections like color corrections but no sharpening. If you don't ask for anything special, you get what they did for the prints.

Depending on the content, I get prints or not. Prices are pretty good and service is excellent (about 1 hour). A 36 exp C-41 film printed on Royal paper and scanned (base 16 = 3088x2048) costs about 20$CAN. Process and scan only is about 12$. A base 64 scan is available for 5$CAN per frame.

Today, I got an 8x10 from the "Raku" picture in my gallery. It's really beautiful.

Here's a sample (crop at 100%) from another picture ("Blue butterfly" from my gallery) to show you the quality of the scan.

[RML]

I've been tempted to get my (36 exposure, colour) films developed and scanned by my regular 1-hr lab bu with about 5 rolls per week things will be too expensive.

Development is already 2.95 euro (price increased from 1.95 euro only 6 months ago), and if I want a cd they demand to have prints as well. And than still the cd will cost me 2.95 euro.
If I just want a photo cd I can ask them to keep sequence but that will cost me 1.10 euro per photo (random order will cost .69 euro), and the cd is 7.95 euro. About 100 photos go on the disc but they charge a minimum of 20 photos, regardless if you want less photos on the disc.

These services are still very prohibitive here in Holland.

[Doug]

Hi Remy, that doesn't sound so very convenient... :-(

My local lab is one among several branches, with the main lab 40 miles away. The local lab's machinery is all out in the open behind the counter, vulnerable to the dust and other debris that blows in when the door on the windward side of the store is opened. They scan, but I've often found my negs dirty and scratched.

So I now opt for "pro" development at the main lab, with a 2-day turnaround. It costs a bit more but the machinery is in a clean room, as this is also where they make their own prints for the portrait and wedding business elsewhere in the building. The scans are clean and also higher resolution.

Just picked up some processing today. $14.75 for develop and scan only (no prints) for 38 exosures on 35mm. Resolution 3000x2000.

When I want prints, I copy the twiddled scans to a Compact Flash chip, take it to the local lab branch, and insert the CF in their little print kiosk machine. It copies the scans to its memory, I tell it what size, what border, how many, etc, and it uploads the order to the main lab computer. Prints are then shipped to the local lab the next day. No need to submit valuable negs for them to scratch or lose. Pretty slick!

[RML]

Doug, I too like the conveniency of those digital kiosk print thingies. Like you said, no more hassle with my making mistakes selecting the correct negative, or the lab people scratching the lot. I'm fortunate they never lost any of my negs.

As for the scans on cd, yes, it's major leaugue inconvenient. I'm wondering why these things always take so long to get a hold here in Holland, and why they always have to be so expensive. It's not like this company (it's called Hema, which is chain like Boots and Walmart) won't recoup their investments as they are ALWAYS very very busy. I go there often (at least on a weekly basis) and I always have to wait.

[r-brian]

I too have started to have my color film scanned at time of development. My wife has gotten into scrapbooking and likes the freedom of adjusting the photos herself. I take the film to my local WalMart for the 2-day processing. They send the film to a Fuji processing center and I get back negatives, one set of prints and a CD for around $8. The CD is only about $3.70 extra. We tried the scan from the 1-hour service and returned it because it was lousy (very grainy). The scans from Fuji are good enough that my wife has printed 8x10 from them. The new Canon i860 printer definitely helps.

Brian

[bmattock]

WHY DOES NO ONE LISTEN TO ME? (grin)

I posted on this stuff months ago, dudes. And then again and again and again, until I got sick of shouting into the wind.

Get the film processed (C-41) with no prints and save big bucks. You can have them scan (but I don't really care for the quality, I often find scratches), or you can scan yourself. If you do a lot of film like I do, the cost of a dedicated film scanner (or two, I'm on my second) will amortize in nothing flat - in other words, cheaper than having it done, and a better job too.

I don't like scanning AFTER prints have been made by the 1 hour places - they are always scratched up. That's been my experience everywhere I've gone, in many cities and many 1-hour shops. Others say they haven't experienced it - I say I have ALWAYS experienced it. I suspect they just don't know what dust/scratches look like, trust me, they're there. They must just have a different threshold than I do for garbaged-up negs. Or they have Digital ICE that removes the junk automatically - I don't have that feature, it costs too much.

NOW...

Once you have your scans made, you can easily touch them up in Photoshop or whatever your favorite program is, crop them, do whatever to them. Then, take the ones you want to print and copy them onto a CD or a memory stick of just about any kind. Take it to your 1-hour place and print any size print of just the images you like! No need to print out the whole roll when usually only one or two shots are what you want!

Most 1-hour labs have this ability now - Walmarts and Walgreens and etc. I expect it is catching on overseas as well, yes?

ANYWAY - you may compliment me now. I must be some kind of genius, I thought of all this a long time ago, but nobody listened.

HAHAHAHA...

OK, just having fun with y'all. But I *did* tell you about it. Am I just talking to hear my head ring?

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

PS - Where I live, a roll of film 1-hour developed is about $6. To just have the negatives processed is $2. That's $4 per roll saved. Now, if you have scans made at the 1-hour place, that's about $4 extra. $4 times 100 rolls is $400 gone forever. Buy that dedicated film scanner for less than $300 and it pays itself back in about 75 rolls of film AND you get better scans!!! Do the math, my friends!

[dwpayne]

Only if you value your own time as zero. Scanning 36 exposures takes time. I do both, scan my own, and have the lab scan them. More often the latter these days.

Redo the math with the cost of your time factored in.

[Todd.Hanz]

Bmattocks,
Oh.............so you're the guy ;)

Todd

[bmattock]

I find that scanning takes very little time, because it can be done while doing other activities on my computer. I just have to keep the negative holder filled, and that takes very little time. If I was dedicating my time to this, then yes, I'd take it into account.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

[bmattock]

Originally posted by Todd.Hanz
Bmattocks,
Oh.............so you're the guy ;)

Todd

YES! OK, just kidding. But it was frustrating. Now suddenly everyone discovers this stuff. When I posted it, no one was interested, or they kept insisting that the lab never scratches THEIR negs, or it doesn't cost THAT much more to have prints made, etc. Buncha foot-dragging and obfuscation. Now they all see the light and it's like they thought of it. I finally just stopped talking about it.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

[back alley]

actually bill, the place i go to has not (yet) done any damage to my negs and the scans seem ok too.

but, i did follow your prior advice to not get prints.:)

joe

[bmattock]

Originally posted by backalley photo
actually bill, the place i go to has not (yet) done any damage to my negs and the scans seem ok too.

but, i did follow your prior advice to not get prints.:)

joe

Bwahahaha! I'm just in a mood today. Frustrating day at work, and so there you go. My apologies.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

[back alley]

no offense was taken my friend!

joe

[RML]

Bill is right, of course, and I've been doing this for years now as well. But I find that scanning does take loads of time, and it is boring.
I don't often have much to do on my pc, and I much rather like to go out to shoot, I really have to force myself to sit down and scan. I'm lousy at that, and now I have about 50 developed but unscanned films lying about: it just builds up ever so slowly.
What's worse is that the older the shots get lesser (isthataword?) interested I'm in those rolls and don't feel much urge to scan them. I much rather see my most recent results.

All this is one of the reasons I'm looking forward to the RD-1. It's going to save me time on the scanning front so I'll have more time for shooting.

[chenick]

I just got a 2 rolls back from the camera shop.
I thought their max resolution was maybe arouns 1.5-2 megapixels. (nearest Kodak lab scans at 1544x1024 pixels, which is OK, the Fuji ones scan about 1800x1200.

However, this time I got some 5x7 prints as well and the scans were 3360x2240pixels - or 7.5 megapixels. :D :D
I'll have to investigate this further & speak to a lab guy, as whenever I asked before, nobody in the shop seemed to know.

Scan + CD cost 3.50 euro more (about 4$ I imagine)
It's a Fuji machine in the shop.

-Nick

[taffer]

Another guilty one here ! :-)

My last roll was XP2 C41 B&W film, I had it developed in a 1-hour lab and ordered also a scan + CD. Total cost around 7 € and the scans were good enough to post or email.

And if I need something extra, I can always scan them myself with the 3170 or simply order an old fashioned print.

Hey Bill, you know it's always better late than never :D

[bmattock]

Originally posted by taffer
Hey Bill, you know it's always better late than never :D

Hey, whatever works, bud. But I would say that once you've had the scans done commercially, the negs may well be scratched up, so you'll have more work to do when/if you decide to scan them yourself. Again, whatever works best for you!

For me, having all negs processed but not printed, and scanning all negs myself (c-6 and c-41, I *do* process my own B&W) has helped to keep costs down - the cost of the scanner itself is easily justified and paid back in nothing flat. Plus, I get better scans. There is no 'good enough' for me. I have to have 'as good as I can get' - nothing else will serve. Not that I can afford the very best - but I want the very best at the price point I can play at.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks