M3 film advance problem?

[Victorinoxy]

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Hey folks,

 

recently i have noticed that every 2 or 3 rolls that i get developed after shooting it through my M3, some of the pictures are correctly "cut". I dont know if this is a film advance or shutter problem. Or may it even be a fault by the lab? Some of the negatives (and small prints) look like this... any idea where this problem might come from?

 

I find this very unsatisfying

 

Here are two examples:

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[xalo]

Hi there,

This looks like the negatives were cut in the wrong place — in the middle of the image rather than in between them. So it happened in the lab, not in the camera. Sorry for you.

Film advance can sometimes be a little uneven with manual winding, leading to uneven spacing of the frames and occasionally even to overlaps (usually something went wrong then), but these neg's frames seem properly spaced when exposed.

I'd signal it to the lab, ask for refund plus replacement roll(s) and change the lab, preferably choosing one were a human, not a machine is cutting the film strip. Whenever a lab encounters an issue with a film, like overlap, underexposed parts that make it impossible to visually distinguish the transition from one image to the next, the film should not be cut by the lab but delivered uncut. Destroying negatives should be the privilege of the photographer. A reason for home development...

 

Alexander

[250swb]

Wouldn't it be easiest to just look at the negatives to see where the problem is? They've either been cut badly or printed badly, either situation would be clearly apparent by looking at the negs. And faulty film spacing caused by the camera would show up as different sized and/or overlapping exposures.

 

Steve

[payasam]

The entire image area is 1:1.5 and the portion I have cut out is 1:1.35. Please look at the corresponding negative. To me it looks like an error in printing.

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[xalo]

... Some of the negatives (and small prints) look like this...

 

Hi, my comment was based on the reference to the negatives; if the negs are fine, ignore, and indeed, it's a problem with the prints (though the automatic lab remains the culprit).

Alexander

[pico]

It is a printing error. You can see the black space between the frames which means the negatives were not framed properly when printed.

 

It does help to examine the whole roll as negatives to check the spacing throughout the roll.

[Victorinoxy]

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Thanks a ton guys for all the answers. Glad to hear that this is most likely a mistake by the lab and not by my trusty M3. You are absolutely right, thats just one more argument for developing at home, i think i'll get this started soon. And i will get in contact with the lab to get some of my money back.

 

My thought was that it might have something to do with me advancing the film in two steps (like a double stroke model) and that in that way things could get a bit messed up inside.

 

Thanks again!