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Good UK Developing and scanning Labs


Stealth3kpl

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I use 120 Velvia 50 and Ektar regularly and have used Palm in Birmingham for a number of years for my processing. They provide me with a professional service and my films are always returned cut, sleeved and clean within 3 working days of Fridays, which is E6 processing day at Palm.

 

Can’t comment on their scanning, I do it myself via my Imacon, I would expect good quality from my history of dealing with them. Palm also use Imacon scanners.

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 4 weeks later...

After not the best results from another lab, I posted a roll of Portra 160 to AG photolab in Birmingham on Monday.

 

Today the negs and prints came back and are superb quality, with the bonus of lightning quick turn-around time. The 6x4 prints are:

  1. in sharp focus, in stark contrast to the other lab
  2. lovely colours and expose, again in stark contrast to the washed out efforts of the other lab
  3. negs are pristine and unscratched

I scan my own negs on Coolscan V, so cannot comment on their scanning, but will use AG from now on for dev and print.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi guys,

 

I'm watching this forum for a while and it has been source of good knowledge. This my first post in here. Excuse misspelling, English is not my native language.

So my story goes like this. For developing my films I start use Jessops. Back in the days they give you free film with the process, which was average. Anyway I wasn't happy with results most of the time, prints look really doted(not sure if its right word, very digital look). Even when using top film like Kodak Portra, results looks sometimes worst. The last drop was when I picked print and film and there were last 6 frame missing. 

I start looking around and find lab in London named Primary Colours. At that time I start doing more slides, disappointment from prints I guess. Quite soon  Genesis Imaging bought them. I was happy with the service, shoot boss wedding with Portra and prints was excellent, But they stopped developing films completely.

I tried Metro imaging and to be honest normal prints didn't look any different than one from Jessops.

Than I find Bayeux Lab and was very happy with the service, prints looks rich ad somehow different,  but recently they send me prints with line across all of them. However film don't have any lines. I had a trip to London and they make new prints, but it left bad feeling abut it. Service cost quite a bit and I'm surprised about quality control didn't picked that up. More and more I have feeling that once they got you service get bit of guard. Nobody care about small guys. I just amateur and don't spend massive money with labs, but it seems to me that if your film don't contain pictures from wedding or something serious that its not reflected in prints. Don't get me wrong, I know my pictures are not special but point is print should show what films are capable of. Do I expect to much? Don't thing so. I use to have my own darkroom and I know what I'm capable to achieve.

I do apologize for long email and for any misspellings.

 

Vladimir (Vlad)

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I have just had my first film returned from Meinfilmlab. It took a fortnight and cost about £20 for develop and provide CD.

I have to say that I am delighted with the results. The lab even commented that some images look a tiny bit under exposed - which is correct, but I have found the reason for that in the R series threads of the forum where the exposure compensation had been set erroneously.

This is just the second film I have put through the camera (Portra 400) so I am pretty chuffed with the results.

Richard

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Like many others on this forum, I use Peak Imaging. 100% reliable and reasonably quick although not cheap. You get what you pay for and Peak are still a little cheaper than the people I use in France Labo-Photon (due I expect to poor £ to € exchange rate), who are also very reliable. I still however, miss the days of: Box 14 Hemel Hempstead, Herts  :) for those of us old enough to remember. The address in the UK that Kodachrome was sent to for the pre-paid processing. 

 

Wilson

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  • 6 months later...

Give my vote to Ag Labs.

Posted Thursday returned Tuesday.

Who does not 'digitally manipulate' an image? (a little).

Colour processing excellent.

Mono - my fault. Their processing is consistent.

For some reason I am over exposing.

Their auto set-up prints for average grey - so I get 'wishy-washy'

D.Lox

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2 hours ago, Stealth3kpl said:

I've just found this place. It seems to get good reviews. Has anyone used it?

https://www.photographique.co.uk/

Pete

Pete, 

I like and use Peak Processing but they seem to be getting slower and slower, especially for E6 (10 days +). I would be happy to give these folks a try. Their website also says they can process weird formats, so I have asked if they can process the 70mm B&W film from my Combat Graflex giant rangefinder (15 feet/50 images) and 35mm B&W from my Leica Reporter 250FF (10 metres - 250 images). 

Wilson

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I do not use a lot of colour film but over the last ten years I've sent film (35mm & 120, C41 & E6) to Peak, AG Photo, Canadian Film Lab (was UK Film Lab), MeinFilmLab (Germany) and Palm Lab (Birmingham).  As I scan myself, I order 'dev only'. The only ones that have returned my negs/transparencies completely free of embedded dust/fluff have been Canadian/UK and MeinFilmLab (and yes, I know the difference between embedded dust and that from the scanning process).  At present I'm using Palm as they are reasonably fast (albeit they only process E6 on Fridays) and easy to deal with. 

 

PS - am I the only one who finds Peak's online payment methodology strange?

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On 1/25/2019 at 11:17 PM, wlaidlaw said:

Pete, 

I like and use Peak Processing but they seem to be getting slower and slower, especially for E6 (10 days +). I would be happy to give these folks a try. Their website also says they can process weird formats, so I have asked if they can process the 70mm B&W film from my Combat Graflex giant rangefinder (15 feet/50 images) and 35mm B&W from my Leica Reporter 250FF (10 metres - 250 images). 

Wilson

Wilson

Not sure if you have seen these people on Ebay https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Film-processing-70mm-C41-Colour-Negative-long-and-short-lengths/113606155981?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649 but they offer both C41 and B&W processing for 70mm film.  I'm not sure how good thay are as I've only brought a few rolls of Cine film from them in the past and noticed this offer when browsing their store the other day.  I'm sure they also occasionally have 70mm Cine film for sale, but I may be mistaken.

Regards

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Bob, 

Many thanks for posting that. No I had not come across those folk. I will contact them to see if they can process B&W. Offering to process C41 70mm is pointless. As far as I am aware C41 70mm film was last available in the early 1990's and was obsolete even before 70mm Ektachrome E6 film was. 

Wilson

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Bob, 

Excellent news for me, Northern Film Lab can do all processes, Silver B&W, C41 and E6 for lengths of 70mm up to 17 feet without cutting. I can now use my Combat Graflex a bit more. 

Wilson

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  • 6 months later...

I have used AG Labs for some years now and can confirm the scan quality is superb. "Even" off the Noritsu, the large scan will produce superb 30 x 20 inch prints from my 6x9 roll film cameras.

I was also delighted with the large scan quality from 35mm, specifically c41 xp2.

Do I use Leica. I have to confess, not presently! But I have/do use Nikon (sorry!), Linhof (the big Leica!), Hasselblad V, Rolleiflex, Cambo and more recently a return to mf with Mamiya 6x6 and Universal Press 6x9"s

The top of the range Universal Press optics are superb, mostly being Zeiss or Schneider copies!

I have been pro 35+ years and covered most subject types. Taught it as well, including film processing and darkroom procedures.

It was realising that I could get superb scans at very competitive prices that tempted me back to film, a real eye opener after the terrible "large" 18mb high street scans from the likes of Jessops and Snappy Snaps (appropriately named!)

Clean and sharp requiring only minimal correction in PS, I cannot praise AG Labs highly enough. And a superb customer service to match....

Don't take my word for it, send them a roll and request the large scans. They even offer a flextight service...so if you have a really cherished image...

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  • 4 weeks later...
On ‎8‎/‎23‎/‎2019 at 4:30 PM, David Purton said:

I have used AG Labs for some years now and can confirm the scan quality is superb. 

I will second that. I have used them for years and, until a couple of months ago, could not fault them. I then had a problem as I did not receive the usual acknowledgement and my films did not arrive. I contacted them and they assured me that the films had been received and sent off. I waited a couple of weeks and then requested a refund. This arrived the same day and two days later so did my films. It would seem that the fault was with the Royal Mail not AG so I offered to return the refund but they would not hear of it. It is very rare these days to have that sort of service. 

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  • 8 months later...

May I just bump this thread?

Last post was Sept.2019 are there any updates on UK Lab. quality output and choice since then from the regular film addicts?

I have been having an hiatus from photography recently but have a requirement for some 35mm C41 processing and scan work.

Edited by chris_livsey
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AG or Palm in Birmingham, both very good and professional. Palm is slightly cheaper and have 10% for films above 5.

Palm was planning to offer service for pushing C41 as well and they offer free push for BW and E6 films. At AG you need to pay extra.

Or you can send to Ilford and they can develop as well.

Edited by fatihayoglu
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