peter_andrew Posted June 16, 2004 Share Posted June 16, 2004 Ladies and Gentlemen, I have just come back from 6 months in Japan and South East Asia. I have roughly 35 rolls of print and 15 rolls of colour slide film. Where should I go? I'm looking for quality and price. Costco, at this point, is not even an option, so really it is between possibly Henry's or Black's. In the past with Blacks I have gotten 1 set colour and the 2nd set B&W with borders and have been very pleased. However, I now use an SLR with good lenses and I'm not sure if this makes a difference. As for slides, the processing in Japan was excellent and very economical. I didn't trust the labs in S.E. Asia for niether slides or negatives regardless of the savings. Does anyone have any comparisons between the two or alternatives? Thanks in advance, Pete Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Crowe Posted June 16, 2004 Share Posted June 16, 2004 For high quality slide films like Velvia, E100VS, that sort of thing I recommend one of the independent pro shops. They charge about $10 CDN to mount 36 exposures. I use 2 places in Mississauga, I will add there names once I remember (I know exactly where they are so the names mean nothing to me - sorry). Honestly, I have no problem going to Black's for important high quality 25-50 ASA negs. For 100-400 ASA neg I have no problem with supermarket processing. If you want to be sure of the best then Silvano's (Keele and Dundas) is probably it, but they do not handle slides. I have never trusted any of the camera stores for processing, I just figure it's not their reason for being. As for the slide places I know one of them is called Colourchrome and I will find out the other one. BGM on King street may also be worth condsidering but probably too expensive if they still handle processing (they're mainly into digital printing now). Good luck and I will add more info when I can. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Crowe Posted June 16, 2004 Share Posted June 16, 2004 Also a high end fairly expensive place on the side street that takes you from Queen St. East onto the DVP North. I'll get more info for this one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robert_davis2 Posted June 16, 2004 Share Posted June 16, 2004 Silvano's is Weston road south of Rogers I think. Assuming you mean these guys http://www.silvanoimaging.com/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Crowe Posted June 16, 2004 Share Posted June 16, 2004 That's the one, I just remember to follow Keele north of Dundas. Commercial Colour Labs is the other Mississauga place I get slides done. The other one at DVP and Queen is called Colourgenics on Davies Avenue. There are plenty more independent pro places all over the GTA to check out, you can find lots at yellowpages.ca. That is how I found these and then I went and checked them out in person before using. Hope this helps! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Taylor Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 The one John's thinking about is Colourgenics. Good all round lab. Steichenlab is generally considered the best E6 (slide) lab in the city. (Richmond & Berkeley). Check out Prolab Digital on Queen East for your C41 (print) stuff. They have just relocated out here and do excellent work. Many wedding pros have switched to them. Maybe try and couple of rolls with them and see if you're happy before doing it all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robert_davis2 Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 Depending on where you're coming from it might make the most sense to take the Allen south to Weston road. The Allen from the 401 is a pretty quick drive if you avoid the worst times of the day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
taner Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 Colourgenics INC! www.colourgenics.com I use their westend (Dupont and Landsdowne) store for E-6 (no extra charge push processing, now that is something), and could not be more pleased. This westend store does not do C-41, and send C-41 stuff to their main store at Queen and DVP. Not the cheapest, but definitely quality service. If you want small prints, try their 4x6 in matte finish with white borders - my small prints never looked better. Good Luck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jordan_w. Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 Members of my family have had very nice results from Korner Color on the north-west corner of Bay and Bloor. They seem to do a pretty good job for prints. Never seen their slide processing so I can't comment on that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YS2 Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 I've tried Black's for C-41 and was unimpressed by their print work. They never ruined the negatives though. Check out Imageworks at King and Spadina. I never had a problem with them with either C-41, B/W, E-6 or print work. BGM seems to send C-41 and B/W jobs there now, but I don't know if they do the same with E-6. http://www.torontoimageworks.com/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danny_marcuzzi Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 Downtown Camera on Queen Street, a few doors west of Henry's, does a great job. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peter_andrew Posted June 17, 2004 Author Share Posted June 17, 2004 Thank you all so much for the tips. After getting it all back I'll let you know. One more thing, is scanning the prints and slides upon processing a good idea? I have no idea of the cost involved. I'll probably just scan the best ones on my own scanner if it is too pricey.Thanks again! I'm amazed at this online community, I can't believe how good it is.Pete Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robert_davis2 Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 Most of the places mentioned have websites. Just surf over and check out the prices. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frankl Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 I use mainly West Lab on Queen st @ bathurst for my colour work. They have a fuji frontier and i shoot fuji film, so it comes out very nicely. They also can do full rebate (black) borders on their colour prints. West isn't super-cheap though (16.75 for 36) but they often will knock off some for a big order. It's convienient for me though, since it's on my commute home. They also do neg scanning at time of processing for $6/roll. The scans are pretty good, about 2 megapixels equivilent. If you want your photos on a CD, get it done at time of processing, it's far more economical. I haven't used the 'digital pro lab' on queen east yet, but i'm hearing good things about them. They're the same price as West i think. Henrys and Blacks aren't even in the running for where i'd take film in. Henrys service is crap for prints, they charged a higher for 5-day service than most labs do for 1-hour last I checked. I want to also suggest Pikto in the distillery district. I haven't used them for any film dev/printing, but the prints i've had made from my digicam there are great. Done while you wait at the great cafe next door. What more can you ask for? ;) Cheers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gary_watson Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 No Costco membership, Peter? The Heartland warehouse does nice work with its recently upgraded Noritsu line. For E6, Brown's in Mississauga(Tomken and Eglinton)does very nice work; they've also just opened a hi-end Durst scan/print line, reportedly the only one in the GTA. Henry's C41 service is mediocre; Black's is all done instore on Frontiers with variable results(too bad Fuji.ca, Black's parent, won't train its staff). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nshah Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 I'm fond of Photo123 located at Yonge & Charles (Just S of Bloor). <p><a href="http://www.photo123.com">http://www.photo123.com</a> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Taylor Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 <i>I haven't used the 'digital pro lab' on queen east yet, but i'm hearing good things about them. They're the same price as West i think. </i><p>They have one of the old West guys there. Ditto Pikto. Both seem to be doing pretty well with the C41 stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LenMarriott Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 Peter, I second Robert Davis' suggestion of Silvano's for your print film. Colour slides? Sorry I can't help there. Best, LM. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ehaque Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 Blacks is no where near pro as they claim. The take care of the film but their printing is way off often times. AND charges more than the real pro labs. The pro labs I know are: http://www.steichenlab.com/index.html http://www.pikto.ca/ http://www.torontoimageworks.com/ They all have cheap scanning options during processing of the film. Hope it helps. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jordan_w. Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 I have never heard Black's claim that they are a pro lab. I worked at a Black's location part-time many years ago and never heard anything like that then either. Black's is a consumer photo store along the lines of Japan Camera, Motophoto, etc. Many others have given great suggestions (many of which I'm looking forward to trying, I'm back in Toronto after a long absence). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
septimiu_pelau Posted July 1, 2004 Share Posted July 1, 2004 I had once my slides developed at blacks (they sent orders to some lab in mississauga) and one came up with a scratch, so good bye blakcs. I tried Japan Camera , so far they develop & mount slides OK. However they send them to a lab called photoclick (I couldn't find their website on the net and the lady from JP was very reticent to give any information but I did find out they used dip and dunk) but starting with JUNE they are dealing with TCN lab. So far all my slides are OK, no scratch. I live in Thornhill and all good pro labs are located downtown... I plan to test colourgenics and others....also I plan to have them developed by me in the future ;) I would need a cheap source of plastic mounts. Henry's is too expensive. anybody knows a source? regards, septimiup at hotmail dot com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
septimiu Posted October 23, 2006 Share Posted October 23, 2006 I have used uafphoto.com (Weston and Steels) services for my E6 processing for some time but lately I've got poorly processed slides (lots of grains). I thought at first my slides were stored in too high humidity in my fridge but after I've done some research I've found this problem has to do with poor bleach and fix and the grains are actually silver particles. I even suspected my scanner to be broken. For more information see this topic: http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=000k0Y Regards Septimiu Pelau Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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