Film Frustration

[LarryM]

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I live in rural California and the only options for film developing within two hours drive are the usual chain drug stores. I've made the rounds and have not been satisfied with any of the local places. Clearly the machine was dirty at the last place as there are lint marks on both the prints and on the image files on the cd (but not on the negative). It seems to me that my choices are: 1) mail order, or 2) local drug store developing (negative only) and then scanning them myself - but that seems to take me away from the original objective which is to work in film. If I'm doing the latter, why not go digital all the way? Comments? Suggestions? Recommendations for a good, mail order film lab?

 

BTW, right now I'm using a CM and mainly shooting color. If I can get the lab situation resolved to my satisfaction, I would really like to move up to an M6, or MP. If the frustration continues, I'm going to bag the whole idea and buy a digital.

 

Thanks,

 

Larry

[Riccis]

Larry:

 

I live in Florida and for my professional work use either of these two labs in L.A.

 

-Richard Photo Lab (http://www.richardphotolab.com/)

-The Icon (http://www.iconla.com)

 

Both are great and I highly recommend them.

 

Hope this helps,

 

Riccis

[earleygallery]

I think it depends what you want to do with your images. Your options are;

 

1) Get the negs developed and scan yourself. The 'drug store' places will be printing digitally I'm sure, I doubt they are providing you with traditional prints.

 

2) Post to a reputable lab (and one that provides traditional prints if that's what you're after)

 

3) Buy the gear and develop the films yourself. Colour neg isn't that difficult.

 

4) Go digital - but that opens up a whole new can of worms......

[Fassbender]

drug store developing (negative only) and then scanning them myself - but that seems to take me away from the original objective which is to work in film. If I'm doing the latter, why not go digital all the way? Comments? Suggestions? Recommendations for a good, mail order film lab?

 

A few reasons to scan film yourself could be;

 

- Size of the film frame vs digital sensor. In theory you should be able to make larger prints provided the film developing is of good quality, you use a high qualty lens to record the scene on film and the scanner is of good quality (Nikon make some of the best).

 

- You'll still be able to take advantage of the dynamic range of print film. In other words; less blown highlights compared to digital.

 

- You'll always have a 'hard copy' in the form of a negative or slide. No worries about crashed computers, unreadable cd's, corrupted files etc.

 

- Less investments in gear and no worries that your digital gear will be 'old technology' in a few years from new.

 

- Being able to shoot Kodachrome Nothing beats the Leica lens/Kodachrome combo.

[budrichard]

Dwayne's Photo in Kansas handles all my work, B&W and Slide. They develope and scan to disk for me. Quality has been superb and 100% reliable. Dwayne's is also the last lab in the world processing Kodachrome, which is all I use anyway.(until I run out)-Dick