Ilford Labs/Prints

[SimonUK]

Hello all!

I'm off to Paris for a few days, and it being the a city of art, i will be taking my ETRS as well as a T90 or my Zenit...

Along with the colour i have to shoot, i'm going to pick up a few rolls of FP4 in both formats, and have been looking on where to get them dev'ed and printed/scanned.

I've read in the past that Ilford Labs, do some amazing prints, because they obviously make the film and everything, as well as using black&white paper. I can see they are a little pricey but is it worth getting it done by them? I'd be looking at getting low-res scans, as well as there small prints. Hoping to get one or two pictures to have printed large as well but that shall wait

Just looking for some opinions on what they are like!

Thanks

SImon

 

[freecom2]

I had a roll of B&W 120 printed by them - only 4"x4" size, of a 6x6 medium format negative, so it was a very small enlargement. The prints were okay but hardly blew me away, and I'm sure I could've printed to a similar result.

Which isn't to say they aren't worth going for, just that I don't think they offered anything special that a decent darkroom company couldn't give you. Yes, they make the film chemicals and paper, but all of those are available to the general public as well - and most commercial labs tend to pick from only a select few chemicals, the ones designed for high volume commercial throughput.