Why are wal-mart scans so soft?

<p>Over the past few months, I've been sending my (cheap) c41 film to wal-mart for development. 100% of the time, the scans are soft, as if treated with a very slight gaussian blur — I don't know if they do or not, but it just has that bad look to it. Two samples will be included here.<br>

Can anybody provide insight into this? Why are their scans so bad? Does this happen at the lab they send the film to, or does it happen later?<br>

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/18073780-md.jpg" alt="" width="453" height="680" /><img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/18073779-md.jpg" alt="" width="680" height="453" /></p>

<p>The samples we have here are surely not the original scans, but resamples with smaller dimensions? It is easy to achieve soft look with certain resampling filters like Cubic or Bi-Cubic smoother while resampling. These are not screen captures taken with new win10 image viewer, that is known to make certain portions of images appear softer than they really are? Atleast last used jpeg quality appears to be good.</p>

<p>However I would guess that the fault is in shooting technique, first image may be or may not be front focused with too open aperture. Second image is not that unsharp and is made in dim light so there are more possibilities for error. Like camera shake, focused somewhere unknown and too open aperture.</p>

<p>It is strange though, if for months there are not single sharp picture in the lot. I would look for the best ones and begin with original scans. Make adjustments like levels in full size and resample again with filters like Lanczos or Bi-cubic sharper, film images should not need much sharpening after that. If still soft, try high intensity, small radius, small treshold unsharp mask sharpening to images. </p>

<p>If this fails, do a rescan in some other place and if results are similar, check that camera operates like it should. Even try a another camera setup.</p>

<p>Can you see grain, or hints of it? That would further enforce that the scan is decent, but your focus was off.</p>

<p>You went to a place known for the cheapest and worst quality overall, for all of the inventory they sell, not to mention the issues with workers and such, and you are surprised that their scans are low quality? </p>

<p>Very good scans (and above) are produced by people with good equipment, who have trained to work with their tools, who analyze the images carefully. Good scans are not made but sticking them in a device and pressing Go. They probably have consumer level flatbed scanners that are traditionally soft to begin with. Some folks get these to work for them by using creative sharpening techniques, or much larger film. Scan prices range from .60 to $100 for 35mm. Scanners range from $250 or so to $40K. There is a reason for this, one gets what one pays for and everyone has to find the happy medium for their work, whether it be professional, professional artist, hobbyist or someone shooting family snapshots.</p>

<p>Tuomas, when I took that picture, I remember focusing on the people, if not the circle at the bottom. Unfortunately there is no way for me to rescan because Walmart does not return negatives. As far as I know, it's the full scan. are soft. Walmart gives you prints and a CD with the scans on them, and on a mac the CD software doesn't work, so you have to go in into the files in order to retrieve the scans — the file folder is always called "hires" — hi-res. Here are two more samples: both the same picture, but one is edited to increase brightness, contrast, etc. I remember doing my best to get the photos on focus, but Mendel has brought it to my attention that it would be a better idea to look at grain sharpness. Grain is visible, but it is no longer grain, more like freckles.<br /><br />http://www.photo.net/photo/18074028<br /><br />http://www.photo.net/photo/18074027<br>

<br />Lenny, I am definitely <em>not </em>surprised at the results, at least not anymore. When I first got the scans, I was appalled. That was the first time I'd used walmart's services in years! I was just getting back into film photography. Now, like I said, I drop off my cheap film at walmart because I know that the scans are not of good quality, and the rolls I drop off are usually not important to me. This post is a post of curiosity, because from what I know, Wal-mart sends their film out to Fujifilm labs, where the rolls are developed and scanned without returned negatives. How can such a company not have trained people on the job? How can they not have good (i.e. decent) scanners? How can they give me scans which are light years behind consumer scanners such as the Plusteks (https://www.ephotozine.com/article/plustek-opticfilm-8100-film-scanner-review-18933)? Can't they at least offer a "high quality" scanning option to their service?</p>

<p>Ouch, ouch, ouch: they do not give your negatives? You need to make some changes, likely the simplest would be to go digital.</p>

<p>Look for alternatives to wall-mart service. You should demand at minimum that developed negatives are delivered in nice shape. If You have more money to spend, You can demand that prints are nice to look at. If You want to post images online, look for atleast 1500x1000 pixel scans or better yet 3000x2000 pixel scans, even this requires some computer time for resampling to smaller dimensions.</p>

<p>I do have a Digital camera, but find myself only using it when I don't have film, or if I'm being careful not to overexpose or underexpose my shots. Do you guys think Walgreens or CVS would be better for developing my cheaper film? Do they return negatives? I know there are some older posts about this, but things change over the course of even a couple of years. Right now, my more expensive rolls are going to The Darkroom for processing.</p>

<p>Walmart is the last place I would send my film both for processing and especially for scans. You definitely get what you pay for. If you are still using film, as I am a lot of the time, I would find a good quality scanner and scan my images myself. Granted, I use a very expensive Nikon Super CoolScan LS-8000 that I have had for many years now, but that is because I scan a lot of Hasselblad negatives. There are lots of other much more reasonably priced scanners there if all you are going to do is 35mm. And get a lab to do your processing, not Walmart.</p>

<p>I can't believe that Walmart does not give you your negs back. I certainly will not use them if that is their policy.</p>

I am surprised that most/rest of the people in this thread were astounded about not getting negatives from Walmart as it had been old news ...

 

- Walmart no longer returns negatives, http://www.photo.net/film-and-processing-forum/00aakr

 

... rebuttal(?) ...

 

- WALMART does return NEGATIVES, http://www.photo.net/film-and-processing-forum/00agad

 

.... but wait ...

 

- Where to develop 35mm films?, http://www.photo.net/film-and-processing-forum/00bZP6

<p>Tony, thanks for additional explanation. Seems to me professional labs and their foibles are the main issue. Not sure if it'd work for you but what I do:</p>

<p>Shoot digital in the main, and with a film slr shoot Kodak Tri-X. I home process the film, b/w is relatively easy, and chemicals still available. I then scan myself. Acquiring a scanner is getting tough now, though. And the learning curve for DIY scanning is daunting.</p>

<p>Depending on your perseverance it may or may not work for you. Good luck, anyway.</p>

<p>P.S.: my film shooting and home processing/scanning has slowed to a snails pace. Even my digital slr use is getting sporadic: just shooting pics with my smart phone more and more. I'm becoming a photography drop out, lol. Kinda sad, in the '60's I was mixing my own chemistry from scratch.</p>

<p>Mendel, thanks for the advice. I'll definitely look more into developing my own b/w (after my living situation gets sorted out — long story). The digital camera I have is a Lumix LX7, and while I do love it (and would love a DSLR even more), I simply cannot see myself going primarily digital. Whenever I get my film pictures back, even if it is from wal-mart, they have a special 3-D "naturally suspended in time" sort of look to them — especially slides. When I look at digital, it just seems off. Full frame digital photos look close, but not quite. My LX-7's photos don't come close. And then you have the experience of waiting to see those photos you think were <em>awesome, </em>and getting something out of that regardless of whether or not they came out well or how you expected. With digital, I take my picture and, well, there it is on the screen. I could go on and on.<br>

Any way, thank you all for your help. I've heard that the walgreens nearby (the specific walgreens) still develops in-store and returns negatives, so I'll check them out with a old undeveloped "mystery roll". If I don't like what I get, I'll probably just drop cheap consumer film (unless I decide to develop and/or scan b/w myself) and wal-mart all-together. Only time will tell! Here's a picture which I think exemplifies that 3-D "suspended in time" look. Maybe it's just because I took the photo and I was there, but man.</p><div></div>

<p>My guess:</p>

<p>1.) Walmart uses Noritsu scanners. In fact, a relative who works for Walmart told they do, if memory serves.</p>

<p>2.) They have the grain removal filter on.</p>

<p>I can't tell from your samples, because I can't enlarge them enough to see whether they have the tell tail "wax museum look".</p>

<p>Can you ask them whether they are using Noritsu equipment? </p>

<p>I don't use Walmart if I can possibly avoid it. They are known for low quality. I'm sorry your pictures are ruined, but you got what you paid for. </p>

<p>No reaction to my comment? Well, this happens to me a lot. I don't have time to read a post of interest immediately when it is posted. So I catch up reading the original post and comments several days later. By that time, the original poster has moved on, and everyone has lost interest.</p>

<p>It doesn't seem to me Tony's problem was resolved. Getting sidetracked with discussion of his shooting technique, whether his shots are in focus, and whether to shoot on film in the first place is not the answer. I am interested in Tony's problem, because I am no longer able to find any service that will scan film with Noritsu equipment without the default grain removal filter turned on. A&I (under new management), Richard Photo Lab, and ScanCafe are all doing Noritsu scans with the grain removal filter on, in my humble opinion, based on my earlier experience of having Noritsu scans done of 3,000 film negatives. Instructions on how to turn it off were once posted on this forum, but either nobody can do it, or nobody believes me it can be done. </p>

<p>Tony, are the pixel dimensions of the scans 5035 x 3339 by any chance?</p>