I won't re-post the entire thing here, but have a look at this.

Some labs are frankly incompetent. No it's not put me off of shooting film, it's just made my life harder to try and find a place that does a decent job.


http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read. ... e=31457283

I see your point, Barry. I encountered that here in our labs very long ago.

So far in all my years of film I've only had 2 incidents of negatives being ruined. I consider myself very lucky, but then again, for the last 15 years I've dealt almost exclusively with pro shops. One of my problems was with K-Mart in the '70s, the other with a 1 hour processor in the mid '80s.

Dusty

That is really tough. In 2001 my wife and I backpacked through Europe (Greece, Italy, Austria, Germany, Switzerland, France, England) for 4 months and, of course, I was shooting film. Along the way I got some of the film developed from time to time. Quite a few of my negatives were doggie-doo though -- watermarks, poor developing (maybe old, dirty chemicals), scratches, etc. Very disappointing. While I have nothing against film and I used it since I first got into photography in the early 1970s I don't miss it at all these days. Not saying digital is ideal or better than film in all ways, just that for *me* I am much happier with digital.

When living in Brazil (early 80's) I never had film developed there. I always sent it back to the States with someone to get developed. I didn't trust the one local lab in a medium sized city on the Amazon to get things right every time. It's always the question - do I send it home and risk losing it, or do it here and risk poor quality?

Dusty

I don't know why, Dusty, cause here in Brazil we have the same equipment like you. Some American, Chinese and Japanese equipment. The paper is the same, imported from that countries. You just lose money, I guess...

If I had been in Rio, Brasilia, Manaus or Curitiba, maybe. But Santarem in the early 80's was a one-horse town with one TV station, one film processor and electric that went out every day. What I saw from the shop were inconsistent results and over-used chemicals. I'm not sure the equipment they were using was modern, and paper was not too likely to be properly stored. The store wasn't climate controlled, and just the fact that humidity can go from 50% to 99% in an hour made local processing chancy.

I love Brasil, and may be headed back there with my family for a few years, but the Amazon region was and largely remains a frontier. People skrimp on the equipment they use and how they do things to be more economical. I did it too. If the local guy would have installed a good AC system, dumped used chemicals when needed and run his shop like a first rate lab, he would have gone broke, because there wasn't that large of a shutterbug community in town. A lot of the work was from guys taking pictures in the gold mining areas of those who struck it big, then high-tailing it back to get prints made before the guy ended up dead in a gun fight! I know one of the guys who did this.

Up-river in the mining towns it was like the Old West (US). Twice a day boats came down-river, and nearly every day one - sometimes both - would be carrying the body of a guy who got shot over a claim, knifed in a drunken fight by his "best friend" over a hooker, etc. Such things are typical of anyone poor who suddenly makes it rich, and not to be considered a slam on meus amigos brasileros.

Dusty

Dusty, nice to have you back with us.