How stupid am I?

Tomorrow morning I take the van over the Cascades to eastern Washington to pick

up my Noritsu QSF-R410 E-6 processor. I told the current owners I'd take it off

their hands, so I'm committed, but I really have my doubts about keeping it busy

enough to actually be an improvement over my little Photo-Therm Sidekick. On

busy days it will be a wondrous thing to not have to load reels and babysit the

processor, and I'll spend fantastically less time mixing chemicals.

 

I guess I'd better go renew my pitch to the local drugstore to see if I can get

their trickle of E-6 business back. Then I need to find the right foam to cut

some floating lids!

 

I hope this isn't too much of a disaster, between dramatically increasing my

capacity in this market and the fact that I've never even peeked inside a

leader-card processor before!

 

Van

One tip: don't use inversion agitation.

Maintain high standards and set up a good mail-order system.

Some of the greatest people in the world took a chance on something everyone else said would not work.

 

Have a budget for advertising so you can get this off the ground.

First I would practice with the machine until you've got it down cold. Then if you're going to make a business of this I would not rely on local customers. I would set up a web site offering my services, and advertise it nationally -- the business card ads in Shutterbug, Popular Photography if you can afford their rates, photography web sites that take advertising, etc. Try to market yourself as the best E-6 processor in the country, willing to cater to people who want quality but also at a reasonable price, and be clear that you're committed to film for those who don't want to go digital. Film is on its way to becoming a niche market in photography over the next several years. Niche markets can be highly profitable if you work them right.

You've inspired me to have a thought (that's a real occasion, me having a thought...), to whit:

 

One could probably surmise that one attribute of genius is the ability to make terrific results from acting on stupid ideas.

 

"Oh, that'll never work" or "Why is he doing *that*???" are typical responses.

 

Anyway, keep us informed as to how it's going, and when it's up and running, etc. I for one would be happy to mail away; I haven't been real happy with local E6 processing, or its pricing....

Well, the van is in the back yard and the monster is laying in the back. There was a lot more chemistry inventory than I expected, and I've got most of that schlepped into the lab. (All of it was dated on arrival, so I can easily tell what can and can't be used and put it in the right order on the shelves.)

 

The machine was in pretty good condition in terms of internal cleanliness, although not quite to my standards.

 

I haven't yet figured out what the power, water, and drain requirements are, although I don't think any will be a problem. I was a little surprised to see that the unit had been hard-wired and it's a 220VAC circuit. That will mean a little wiring, but nothing too intimidating. (Just a little heavier wire, I mostly run Cat5+ for networks, although I've certainly done plenty of power circuits.)

 

It came with the Noritsu splicing block, something I hadn't thought of before, although it happens that I have plenty of splicing film. There were also two boxes of test strips, kept in the freezer, so I'm glad I bought a densitometer a couple of months ago.

 

I read the operations manual while waiting for the ferry on the way back, everything seems to make sense but I can see why some minilab operators get lax about maintaining their machines: There's quite a bit to do, even if all the steps are pretty easy.

 

And Ian, you're a pip! I see a bright future for you in consulting.

 

Van

Hi Van, shoot me an email when you get it running. You can have my business - I shot about 60 rolls of E6 last year...not sure what this year will bring yet with my move coming up, though.<BR>

I imagine there would be quite a few people in my category still around...<BR>

Jed

With all Kodachrome going to Dwayne's and all Kodak and Fuji slide mailers also going to Dwayne's, they must have a fairly large share of the chrome processing market in the U.S. If you add A&I in Los Angeles and Denver Digital Imaging I don't know how much slide film is left to be processed by everyone else. I have started to project slides again and I'm enjoying it. Many local retailers like drug stores and even camera stores no longer have an outlet for sending out slide film so if you can get enough of them to send you business that might be helpful. I would also suggest that you consider selling slide film to the people who send you film for processing.

You have a lot or work cut out for you. You're going to have to get a Kodak E-6 manual, E-6 test strips, and a densitiometer plus chemicals to massage the ph up or down--especially if you intend to take in work from outside.

Process control of any processing line is paramount and you will have to hold the hand of this leader card machine very tenderly. I have run one of these Noritsu E-6 machines in a fairly busy camera shop, and it can go bad quite easily. Chemical mixing and replenishment rates are critical, not to mention temperature control. Plus, you will have to filter your water supply. This is way beyond a Photo-Therm sidekick.

Gosh, Paul, it's not like I'm new to this. I have all the Kodak E-6 manuals, the test strips, the densitometer, and reagents to adjust the pH. I even have the Kodak Q-Lab software, I just haven't had any occasion to use most of those things. The mixing requirements aren't much different than for the Photo-Therm, except that I have to mix both working tank solutions and replenishers in some cases. Of course, if Noritsu got the replenishment rates wrong, I'm screwed.

 

So far I don't see anything about this system that should be any harder to keep up with than any other commercial-scale system, although obviously there are some things that need to be attended to with a leader-card machine that didn't come up with a one-shot system, but then there are things that I've had to deal with in the past that I can forget about now.

 

Is there really any reason to think that the temperature controls on the Noritsu are less capable than the ones on the Sidekick? It looks to me like they are dramatically better.

 

I am curious why I would need to filter the water supply for the Noritsu when I never felt any need to do it with the Photo-Therm. If there is a good reason to install a filter, or even a cascade of different filters, I'm not going to worry about it. It's not like it would be much different from the filter under the kitchen sink, although it would be more accessible.

 

Van

I am with Jed. I don't shot so many rolls maybe, but rather deceived with E6 processing from local labs, I could be sending to you 10-15 rolls every 3 months and take advantage of the Euro/USD rates.

The magic number of rolls per day on a 410 is 10, less than that your plots will go haywire.

 

We ran one for years but once the local optician went digital and our counts dropped from 30 to 6-8 rolls per day we found ourselfs spending $300-400 in chemistry/starter and labor to keep the processor going.

 

Finally scrapped it and a film recorder.

 

Sad day... The good news was the space it took is now filled with a Chromira ProLab 5x 30" silver halide printer/processor.

Good luck in your venture. We were the very first lab to run E6 in North Jersey and we're about to be the last, so I've been monitoring dip 'n dunk hanger processors for over 31 years.

 

E6 does require a minimum quantity per day or else you need to spike it with replenisher and starter as if it had film run through it anyway just to get the necessary tank turnover to keep the process active and stable. It shouldn't be much of an issue on a small machine like yours, but you get very little warning before you reach the tipping point unless you know what to look for. It would be good for you to get Qlab training from Kodak before risking customer film.

 

We only get one shot at perfection with E6, and while I don't agree that Kodak has the corner on all things photographic, the training teaches you a lot about the more subtle things that are happening in the process, even if you wind up using Fuji chemistry at times. Kodak doesn't even make their own any more since they outsourced their production to Russell, aka Champion so you may even discover Fuji to be an attractive alternative.

 

If you get very successful with this and need a high production slide mounter or two, let me know. I've got more than a few scheduled to meet the scrap metal yard.

 

john castronovo

tech photo & imaging

fairfield, nj

1-800-242-3686

Hi Van

Will your processor be exclusivly for 135? You may be able to expand your client base with processing of 16mm (sub-mini still cameras) (very few choices available for that). How about 120/220?

Set up your website, make it easy to navigate, get listed in the search engines, get ready for an interesting ride!

Paul