Processing film in lab and scanning at home

southernjessie

southernjessie

Suspended / Banned
Messages
607
Name
SJ
Edit My Images
Yes
As an alternative to having my film processed and scanned on to a CD at a lab, I was thinking of just getting them to process the film and buying a scanner to scan the negs myself. It might also be a step towards developing my own film (I'd probably only do black and white) to make the whole process in-house.

I've read a few threads on scanners - if I wanted to scan the processed film that comes back from a lab as a high res TIFF or JPG would something like an Epson V500 be ok? It seems to be the most popular scanner that people talk about, and not too expensive. I would be scanning 35mm film.

Thanks guys
 
Scanning can be boring, but some people enjoy it.....if I've read your post correctly and you just have the negs developed and not scanned, they don't come back as Tiff or jpg.....you create them yourself when you scan.
The V500 is reasonable for a 35mm scan but much better for medium format.
 
If you were going to spend V500 money and only scan 35mm film, I would buy a better 35mm scanner like a Plustek - and there is a forum member who always recommends the Reflecta 7200, which is a similar scanner to the Plustek.

Flatbeds are generally much better for larger film.

Almost all of us on the forum own our own scanners for this very purpose; if you don't mind the time to scan and post-process, the scanner pays for itself in the amount you save getting film dev-only.
 
Well, I might go down the route of learning to develop my own B&W 35mm film but having it processed in a lab and then scanning would work out cheaper in the long run.
 
southernjessie said:
Well, I might go down the route of learning to develop my own B&W 35mm film but having it processed in a lab and then scanning would work out cheaper in the long run.
Click to expand...

Absolutely. And do think about developing your own film, it's quite easy, there are countless resources (here and across the internet) on how to develop your own - in the form of videos, tutorials, pictures - and it's considerably cheaper than lab developed B&W.
 
Thanks freecom - I might well do that. I saw that Peak Imaging are well thought of for processing film so might use them in the beginning and then move to doing it myself.

Thanks for the tip on the Plustek and Reflecta. I need something that scans at relatively high resolution so if I did want to make a big print, I could. I know it's time consuming - I have an old Canon Lide and even at lower resolutions it takes a while to scan.


freecom2 said:
Absolutely. And do think about developing your own film, it's quite easy, there are countless resources (here and across the internet) on how to develop your own - in the form of videos, tutorials, pictures - and it's considerably cheaper than lab developed B&W.
Click to expand...
 
Thanks for mentioning me @freecom2 ! To be honest though I don't think that the Reflecta Proscan 7200 can be realistically recommended for most these days as the price of them has shot up so much to over £350 in the UK (although they can be got from Germany for ~£300 still - I got mine for a fantastically low £220 on Amazon [I think the price was mis-listed!]). They still are a fantastic bit of kit and do give absolutely great results especially compared to a flatbed, but the price they sell at now is excessive and I don't think I would buy one now myself unless I was importing from Germany. Very few places seem to sell Reflecta products in the UK anyway so that might be one reason for the high prices.
 
I just had a look on Amazon and you're right - it's about £352. The Plustek 8200iAi is around the same price as well. I thought I would be able to pick up a good 35mm film scanner for around £200-£250 but it looks doubtful now...

s162216 said:
Thanks for mentioning me @freecom2 ! To be honest though I don't think that the Reflecta Proscan 7200 can be realistically recommended for most these days as the price of them has shot up so much to over £350 in the UK (although they can be got from Germany for ~£300 still - I got mine for a fantastically low £220 on Amazon [I think the price was mis-listed!]). They still are a fantastic bit of kit and do give absolutely great results especially compared to a flatbed, but the price they sell at now is excessive and I don't think I would buy one now myself unless I was importing from Germany. Very few places seem to sell Reflecta products in the UK anyway so that might be one reason for the high prices.
Click to expand...
 
s162216 said:
Thanks for mentioning me @freecom2 ! To be honest though I don't think that the Reflecta Proscan 7200 can be realistically recommended for most these days as the price of them has shot up so much to over £350 in the UK (although they can be got from Germany for ~£300 still - I got mine for a fantastically low £220 on Amazon [I think the price was mis-listed!]). They still are a fantastic bit of kit and do give absolutely great results especially compared to a flatbed, but the price they sell at now is excessive and I don't think I would buy one now myself unless I was importing from Germany. Very few places seem to sell Reflecta products in the UK anyway so that might be one reason for the high prices.
Click to expand...

I knew it was you, but I couldn't remember your username (let's be honest... can you remember your username?!).

I've had a quick look on Amazon and even the Plustek models have creeped up in price, especially now that they have stopped selling the 7xxx series and only sell the 8xxx models (which are apparently exactly the same, just with newer software).

That said, the Plustek 8100 will almost certainly blow a V500 out of the water for 35mm scan quality, and it's under £200 at Jessops, Park Cameras and SRS Microsystems.
 
I was looking at the 8200 but this is more of what I hoped I would be paying :) Reviews are good and the only thing I noticed is that some people cannot get on with the SilverFast software.
 
freecom2 said:
I knew it was you, but I couldn't remember your username (let's be honest... can you remember your username?!).

I've had a quick look on Amazon and even the Plustek models have creeped up in price, especially now that they have stopped selling the 7xxx series and only sell the 8xxx models (which are apparently exactly the same, just with newer software).

That said, the Plustek 8100 will almost certainly blow a V500 out of the water for 35mm scan quality, and it's under £200 at Jessops, Park Cameras and SRS Microsystems.
Click to expand...

One of the biggest reasons why I chose not to get a Plustek is the annoying design flaw they have of requiring you to use the maximum 7200 dpi setting to get the very best quality, despite that only actually resolving ~3200 dpi so you get massively bloated files with no more detail! The scan times quoted in test reports for 7200 dpi are excessive (~15 minutes a scan with Digital ICE [or whatever they call their equivalent]), and even more annoying is how if you choose to scan at 3200 dpi, it resolves even less so you lose out either way. The Proscan 7200 doesn't have this flaw and scans pretty quick so I went with one of them; as I said you can buy them from Germany, but unfortunately it seems that Reflecta have decided to replace the 7200 with the 'Proscan 10T', and the shop no longer sellw the 7200 without being packaged with Silverfast (which adds on ~100 EUR).

The 10T looks interesting on paper (supposedly a 10,000 dpi optical resolution [yeah right like it'll actually resolve it!]), but I just hope it doesn't fall into the trap I mentioned above of requiring the maximim dpi setting to achieve the best (like with the Plustek models and the Reflecta RPS Professional 7200). 7 minutes at 10,000 though with ICE is not a bad figure though if its actually that quick.

The Cyberview software that Reflecta provide is not very good to be honest though, and I would seriously consider buying Vuescan to use instead (as well as the fact that you can use it with nearly any scanner unlike Silverfast which is locked to the scanner it was purchased with).
 
Yes, it'll save you a lot of money - scanning is not cheap at all. AG Photolab are one of the cheapest (see the spreadsheet in the Film Processing sticky) but adding a medium-res scan to a process takes the price from £3 to £7. Roughly 25 rolls will pay for a v500 - and then you'll still own a scanner that you could sell for what you paid for it.

The guys are right about getting more for your money if you only want to scan 35mm, but I saw in another thread that you'd love to try medium format, so I'd consider getting the v500 anyhow and future-proof yourself. You may as well surrender to the F&C-induced addiction to film right from the start.
 
WHS.... Best £100 I've spent, its saved me hundreds of pounds so far. Also definitely try home development, I did my first films last weekend after 2 years of putting it off and its fantastic. 4 rolls so far and all have come out perfectly and at about 20p per roll another massive annual saving.:D
 
I have a V550 and scan my 35mm, I don't see any reason why you would need anything better. My desktop which spans 3 large monitors (6400 pixels) is a section of a 35mm Velvia slide and it looks fine. I'm not sure what use cases a V500/550 would be inadequate for. I had a plustek a few years back and it was excruciatingly slow with only one slide at a time and no auto-advance. The V550 does 12 frames at a time so it's really not a chore at all scanning a film in.
 
You're right I would love to try MF as my family had a Rolleiflex in the 50's I believe. Although I cannot justify getting one of these now I would at least like to get a cheaper MF camera to experiment with.



abdoujaparov said:
Yes, it'll save you a lot of money - scanning is not cheap at all. AG Photolab are one of the cheapest (see the spreadsheet in the Film Processing sticky) but adding a medium-res scan to a process takes the price from £3 to £7. Roughly 25 rolls will pay for a v500 - and then you'll still own a scanner that you could sell for what you paid for it.

The guys are right about getting more for your money if you only want to scan 35mm, but I saw in another thread that you'd love to try medium format, so I'd consider getting the v500 anyhow and future-proof yourself. You may as well surrender to the F&C-induced addiction to film right from the start.
Click to expand...
 
I thought the Plustek gave a better quality 35mm scan than the Epson? That's what put me off the V500...

mid_gen said:
I have a V550 and scan my 35mm, I don't see any reason why you would need anything better. My desktop which spans 3 large monitors (6400 pixels) is a section of a 35mm Velvia slide and it looks fine. I'm not sure what use cases a V500/550 would be inadequate for. I had a plustek a few years back and it was excruciatingly slow with only one slide at a time and no auto-advance. The V550 does 12 frames at a time so it's really not a chore at all scanning a film in.
Click to expand...
 
To be honest, there are a lot of variables in getting a good image out of film, the scanner is just one of them.

The V500 will do the job admirably, I'd guess 2/3rds of the members of F&C have or have had a V500 at some point. While the Plustek may be better, it doesn't mean that the V500 is bad, not by any stretch of the imagination.
 
robhooley167 said:
The V500 will do the job admirably, I'd guess 2/3rds of the members of F&C have or have had a V500 at some point. While the Plustek may be better, it doesn't mean that the V500 is bad, not by any stretch of the imagination.
Click to expand...

^^^WHS^^^

I have a Plustek and a V500, only because I needed to scan some medium format recently. I used the Plustek for thousands of slides and negs from my archive, and more recently new black and white. I thought about selling it when I got the V500, but decided there were advantages in keeping it. A slightly better film holder was probably part of it... but there are film holders you can buy for the Epson that will do a better job.

A 2400 dpi scan, which the Epson will do happily, gives you at least 8*12" prints, and probably more without motcieable loss of quality.

Oh... I've used both Silverfast and Vuescan. SF has more widgets than you could throw a stick at; Vuescan is as good in most cases and just easier. Pay for the Pro version... it will support pretty much any future scanner you buy, and probably any all-in-one printer scanners that you have, too, while SF is tied to exactly one scanner.
 
Thanks guys - Park Cameras also sell the V550 for £189 - would that be just as good?
 
For me anyway, the versatility of the flatbeds easily wins the day. You can spend ages trying to find the best scanner for 135 format, but its scans still won't look as good as most medium format shots scanned on just a V500.

If it were me, I'd be looking for a used Epson 4990 or V700 as these can handle film formats ranging from 135 and 120 all the way up to the big boy sizes.
 
southernjessie said:
Well, I might go down the route of learning to develop my own B&W 35mm film but having it processed in a lab and then scanning would work out cheaper in the long run.
Click to expand...

I develop my own b/w at home and scan on a Nikon Coolscan IV - keep your eyes peeled for them on Gumtree etc as a lot of people don't know what they are! I got mine for £50 from a lady who thought it was a printer. I also found the flatbed scanner I had (a new Canon Canoscan model) to be out of focus, compared to the dedicated 35mm scanner.

After the initial cost outlay of the scanner, chemicals and equipment, it's a lot of fun to experiment with different films and developers and perfect your skills! Scans done at home can be considerably better than those from a shop as well, especially if you go down the cheaper shop route (Asda etc).
 
Last edited:
Thanks skysh4rk & Charlotte. I'll probably look for a flatbed scanner for the flexibility if I pick up a MF camera one day.

@ Charlotte - it's just a question of finding the room to do the home processing and where to store all the bottles of chemicals (plus the fact I'll probably mess it up at the beginning :D).
 
southernjessie said:
Thanks skysh4rk & Charlotte. I'll probably look for a flatbed scanner for the flexibility if I pick up a MF camera one day.

@ Charlotte - it's just a question of finding the room to do the home processing and where to store all the bottles of chemicals (plus the fact I'll probably mess it up at the beginning :D).
Click to expand...

Mine live under my bathroom sink :D And yep, you may mess it up... but that's part of the process! Just don't develop anything too vital, the first time you do it.
 
mothdust said:
Mine live under my bathroom sink :D And yep, you may mess it up... but that's part of the process! Just don't develop anything too vital, the first time you do it.
Click to expand...

Mine too. The only space you need is a sink and a table to lay out the changing bag. My only real concern is getting the chemicals to the right temperature but I've got that sussed now so its a doddle. I have the Massive Dev Chart on my tablet and set that up next to the sink and it tells me everything I need to know... simples, even for someone from Crewe... :D
 
The point about second hand coolscans is well made, scanning can be tedious and some give up (and sell the kit) faster than others, even old scanners can be brought back to life (on a modern OS) with VueScan s/w.
 
If all you are going to do is post scanned shots on the web at about 1000px or less even the old Epson 2480 gives decent results, and scanned all of my B\W negs with it (although with varying results, some seem to be unscannable h'mm I suppose I should do them all again with the V750).....the 2480 was my first scanner (for £8) and scanned some old Kodachrome slides (taken about 40 years ago) and posted them on Apug about 5 years ago e.g. http://www.apug.org/forums/forum40/61417-first-roll-kodachrome-4.html http://www.apug.org/forums/forum40/59961-first-kodachrome-ive-shot-25-years-3.html #23
Very boring to use compared to the Epson V750 as you could only scan a few negs at a time. I also have an Epson 4180 and that gives reasonable results for the few negs I tested it on.
 
Last edited:
I've watched one of the YouTube videos and this is the part that seems a bit tricky - getting the chemicals to exactly the right temperature plus all the specific agitating. I guess with black and white film it's a bit more forgiving if you don't do things exactly right.

Andysnap said:
Mine too. The only space you need is a sink and a table to lay out the changing bag. My only real concern is getting the chemicals to the right temperature but I've got that sussed now so its a doddle. I have the Massive Dev Chart on my tablet and set that up next to the sink and it tells me everything I need to know... simples, even for someone from Crewe... :D
Click to expand...
 
Hi Loretta - I'll be hoping to print up to A3 size if possible if I get some pics I really like, otherwise A4. That's why I asked about a scanner that gave really good image quality. I'm still not completely sure but thinking of the V500 or V550 since it's fairly inexpensive and most people recommend it. The only thing in my mind is what freecom said about the Plustek blowing it away for 35mm film, which is what I'll mainly do.


excalibur2 said:
If all you are going to do is post scanned shots on the web at about 1000px or less even the old Epson 2480 gives decent results, and scanned all of my B\W negs with it (although with varying results, some seem to be unscannable h'mm I suppose I should do them all again with the V750).....the 2480 was my first scanner (for £8) and scanned some old Kodachrome slides (taken about 40 years ago) and posted them on Apug about 5 years ago e.g. http://www.apug.org/forums/forum40/61417-first-roll-kodachrome-4.html http://www.apug.org/forums/forum40/59961-first-kodachrome-ive-shot-25-years-3.html #23
Very boring to use compared to the Epson V750 as you could only scan a few negs at a time. I also have an Epson 4180 and that gives reasonable results for the few negs I tested it on.
Click to expand...
 
southernjessie said:
Hi Loretta - I'll be hoping to print up to A3 size if possible if I get some pics I really like, otherwise A4. That's why I asked about a scanner that gave really good image quality. I'm still not completely sure but thinking of the V500 or V550 since it's fairly inexpensive and most people recommend it. The only thing in my mind is what freecom said about the Plustek blowing it away for 35mm film, which is what I'll mainly do.
Click to expand...

I bet Mark stuck Loretta in for a joke :D
For 35mm the supermarket scans which I've printed which would be about 1800 X 1200 px are quite good at A4 and the V500 should at least equal that.... if it's any help. But they might be better if I had the latest printer.
I'm not sure many members print A3 and it might be best to go to a dedicated scanning forum to see what is the minimum scanner that can give a good quality print for that size.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top