Film SLR

trican

Hi all,

I'm a relative newbie to digital SLR photography (and indeed I suppose photography in general as distinct from taking snapshots), but I happened to borrow a friend's film SLR, nice camera and certainly demands a different mindset. However the other thing that really struck me was the high cost of film and getting it processed. I paid €7.50 in Boots for B&W film (36 exposures, 400 ISO) and getting it processed in Boots ranges from €8 to €11.

Are these normal prices? I would like to experiment more using film, but am put off buying & developing a roll of film at those prices, especially when at this stage my photography skills mean that for a given set of exposures I generally only have a small number of photos that are anyway half decent.

Learning photography techniques and shooting with film seems like learning by the whip, i.e. heavy penalty for mistakes!

Any comments welcome!

njburke

I'm about two weeks ahead of you with a 35mm SLR. My first two rolls (in 16 years) are due for collection today, as scanned data on a CD. I paid £7.50 for a roll of fujicolor Pro 400H in Jessops Newry, the other roll is kodak 200, one of 10 that came in the camera bag which may be expired. I'm not sure yet what the developing and the CD will cost, but I think there may be 3 frames on the 36 roll that will be worth it,at £7.50 + developing ,I rationed it carefully.

I do have a DSLR, which I've been learning on and the lens' and flash from it work on the film body, the film body was for near nothing, the idea is to shoot like there was no film in the DSLR and when the scene comes up that warrants the extra resolution/range of film, I whip out the film body.

Theres a thread yesterday on where to get cheap film for a large format camera, the ebay vendors listed supply a range of film for anywhere from 35$ to 12$ for 5 or 10 rolls. Cheaper than a chemist, I tried my local unicare pharmacy and they were 5 euros for 36 exp fujicolour 200 (I believe they do deals occasionaly at 5 rolls for 5 euros ).

duffarama

I don't think you can expect EVERY shot on a roll to be excellent. I was told before that if you find 2-3 shots per roll that you're happy with then you're doing well. Then I like to think that a more considered approach from using a film SLR makes my digital photos better too.

However, regards processing costs, that sounds about right by my experience. Be cheaper to do your own B&W after the initial expense of buying the equipment though. Search you tube for videos with a dark bag, it's not difficult at all!

sineadw

Its not cheap Are you getting prints done or just developed and onto CD?

CabanSail

You can probably save on the film by ordering it in from 7dayshop.

+1 to the developing & printing yourself.

[GRANDAD] When I was a young whippersnapper there wasn't any of this digital malarky & buying & processing film was all part of the learning curve. Being a student it was always in your mind that everytime you pushed that shutter it cost money. It actually made you consider each image more than just taking a few shots to see if it was OK. I remember that by buying Kodachrome 64 in bulk I could get the price down to less that €5 for a 36 roll (this was over 20 years ago though) so things are much cheaper now. [/GRANDAD]

DaireQuinlan

If you just dabble then yes, it'll be expensive. I buy in bulk from 7dayshop, taking full advantage of whatever short-dated and remaindered film offers they have, so I'd say I pay on average about €4 for a roll of film ( B&W is about 3/4 euros a roll, Portra is about 4/5 or so, slide ranges from about 3 to 5 euros).

Then I develop B&W and C-41 myself. Costs on B&W are wildly variable depending on what I'm developing them with. I have my C-41 down to about €1.50 a roll for development. Slide I still send off. Thats pretty expensive, the mailers are €8.50 each for dev and sleeve. Sometimes though, only slide will do

njburke

CD for these two anyway, any good frames will go into my 'for print' folder and then over to my brothers big Sony dye sub printer (200 off 8 by 6s for 50 euros or so in paper and dye), if the color negs are good from the kodak roll then I'll shoot the other nine rolls of age unkown that were in the camera bag. The brother also has a nice high res coolscan 9000 film scanner, so next time out its C41 developing only.
I did develop and print on my own way back when I was a teenager, back then I only thought my life was busy. In an ideal world, I'ld pop the film in the postbox and download the frames, when I made that suggestion at the local photo shop they'ld look at me as if I was from the 21st centuary.

trican

thanks guys for all the very helpful information! Is it really that easy and cheap (and fun?!?) to develop your own b&w's from C41 film?

cnocbui

lenses are expensive, film is cheap.

colblimp

Blimey, these 'young 'uns' don't know what it was like, back in the day!

Before digital came along, photography was an extremely expensive hobby, depending on how many rolls of film one shot. At my peak, I was shooting up to 20 films a week. And people wonder why I'm poor now...:(:D

humberklog

For film go to Unicare Pharmacy. They're nationwide and are selling 5 rolls of Fuji is200 for 5 quid. One euro per roll. The film is grand. Nearly every colour snap that I post on the Random Thread is snapped on the stuff so make you own mind up. Complain in shops thast overcharge and tell'm about Unicare's deal. This worked for me recently.

njburke

Just looking at some of the numbers here.
OP, budget 30 -50 cents per film frame to take it as far as digitized images on a CD. I don't yet know what the quality is like of the two rolls I shot on Paddys day as the traffic was heavy this evening and I didn't get back to Naas to collect the CD, theres the other cost ,Time.

My D70 holds hundreds of raw frames on a 10 euro CF card.
If you think that your going to expend more than 500 frames on the learning curve then whatever 4 year old digital body that mates with the Film SLRs lens is worth considering and can probably be bought for 200 euros .
I've shot about 8000 frames in the last year just trying to get back up the learning curve, theres no way I could afford that on film. The Chris Rock sketch on bullet control comes to mind, he reckons if bullets cost 5000$ they're be no innocent bystanders ever shot and when someone pulls the trigger they damn well mean it.

Humberklog, I called into the Unicare pharmacy and it cost me 5 euros for a single roll of fujicolour 200,its labeled on the box as Unicare Pharmacy film. Is the 5 rolls for a fiver a special somewhere, or which Unicare do you get it at that price?

humberklog

njburke wrote: »

Just looking at some of the numbers here.
OP, budget 30 -50 cents per film frame to take it as far as digitized images on a CD. I don't yet know what the quality is like of the two rolls I shot on Paddys day as the traffic was heavy this evening and I didn't get back to Naas to collect the CD, theres the other cost ,Time.

My D70 holds hundreds of raw frames on a 10 euro CF card.
If you think that your going to expend more than 500 frames on the learning curve then whatever 4 year old digital body that mates with the Film SLRs lens is worth considering and can probably be bought for 200 euros .
I've shot about 8000 frames in the last year just trying to get back up the learning curve, theres no way I could afford that on film. The Chris Rock sketch on bullet control comes to mind, he reckons if bullets cost 5000$ they're be no innocent bystanders ever shot and when someone pulls the trigger they damn well mean it.

Humberklog, I called into the Unicare pharmacy and it cost me 5 euros for a single roll of fujicolour 200,its labeled on the box as Unicare Pharmacy film. Is the 5 rolls for a fiver a special somewhere, or which Unicare do you get it at that price?

No same deal in all. The box marked Unicare is the one alright. 1 roll costs a fiver or five rolls for a fiver. It's a strange one but there you go. I've now bought in Artaine Castle, Drumcondra and Rathgar. Only one (Artane Castle) advertises it.

Mr. Grieves

Does anyone know where's cheapest for developing C-41 35mm? Would any of the chemists do negs only or would you have to pay for prints/CD too?

Simplicius

Mr. Grieves wrote: »

Does anyone know where's cheapest for developing C-41 35mm? Would any of the chemists do negs only or would you have to pay for prints/CD too?

The Late night Pharmacy on Dame Street does Dev and CD only. I got a few rolls done there last week and with DCC discount (10-20%) depending who is on, it's relatively cheap.

I walked out last week with 37 shots on CD for €4.99! even i did a double take :eek:, thats cheapest in town by far.

120 : Photocare Abbey Street for colour, Gunnes for B&W

TelePaul

So if you get a roll scanned to a disc, I'm assuming it'd be pretty high-res? Could you tocuh-up in photoshop and print away at home?

sineadw

TelePaul wrote: »

So if you get a roll scanned to a disc, I'm assuming it'd be pretty high-res? Could you tocuh-up in photoshop and print away at home?

Not necessarily. IME if its B&W you'll get a decent scan, but if you want a good colour scan you have to ask for high res, which I think I was quoted 16 euro from Gunns for..

Next time out with colour I'll be getting negs only and using DCCs lightroom. For B&W I'll do me own

njburke

Collected the CDs and negs today. 13 euros for the two rolls, 63 frames were on a CD and a contact/index print on a couple of 6 x 4.
Looks like the older roll is expired.

The Scan quality is poor, the image quality is woeful compared to my 6MP D70s. They're all noisy and posterised,ugh.
Each film frame was scanned into two sizes, the HIRES folder has them at 1840 by 1232 pixels , which is about the same as a canon A60 (2MPixel) point and shoot from 9 years ago.
I'll scan them on the coolscan 9000 to see what can be squeezed out of them with a better scanner, .

Heres a sample, few more there on the pix.ie.
N70 , fujicolour pro 400 H


Heres the same shot taken with the D70S.