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<p>A lot of people who can't afford digital cameras still buy and use the single-use film cameras that come pre-loaded with film. Or they only buy and use the regular consumer film (which is perfectly good film, by the way) that is still sold in drug stores and probably even in Walmart. It's very possible that a significant number of these people don't really care about the negatives. They just want prints. If they can get prints and digital scans on a CD, all the better. For these kinds of film users, the new Walmart "service" may seem perfectly fine. If they get their prints and CD sooner than they would compared to waiting for the negatives to be returned with the accompanying prints and CD, they may see it as an improvement.<br>

<br />What Walmart is offering seems fine to me, so long as the people who are using the service are aware that they wont get their negatives back and they accept that. I'm sure these same people know they could send their film to a lab that will return their negatives, or that they could take their film to Walgreens or CVS or another store that still processes film. </p>

<p>I wonder if Walmart considered offering to return film to people who want it as an extra-cost item? I'm sure they could justify charging for something that used to be free (included in the price of processing) based on the added cost relative to their standard offering. They might actually be able to make money on it from photographers who value their negatives.</p>

<p>Don Bright said:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Costco is not the problem. They are the solution. They do great work, and their proud of it, I can sense it within the workforce at the Costco lab.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Psul aul said:</p>

<blockquote>I agree with the above posts about Costco. They do a great job, the employees care and its very affordable. $3.99 develop and print a roll of 24. Add an extra 2.99 to burn a CD. We need to keep using them (and other film processors) so they will keep doing it!</blockquote>

<p>I thought this too until my Costco stopped processing film. I had some film processed there about six weeks ago. Two weeks ago I went in with another roll of film and discovered that their film processor and printer is gone. They only do digital printing on an ink jet printer now. There is another Costco several miles further away that still does film processing, but for how long is a question.</p>

<p>Well, this is maybe 15 months too late for you, but I can scan them if you still need them.</p>

<p>This should work too.<br>

http://www.amazon.com/Exell-S27PX-EPX27-Silver-Battery/dp/B005AWNUIM/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1341123089&sr=8-1&keywords=px27</p>

 

<p>I sent him my Canon F1 for a CLA. Turnaround was really fast, and my camera seems as good as new. That makes me another one of Ken's happy customers.</p>

<p>Has anyone tried the Linux version of Vuescan?</p>

<p>I like the idea of the SF-210 John, and I've also read that the 5000 is a little faster than the 9000. But half of my slides are Kodachromes, and the reviews of the 9000 suggest that it is the only scanner that does a good job with ICE dust/scratch removal on Kodachromes. It has a special setting for Kodachromes, according to the reviews. Apparently Kodachromes are tricky to scan and most scanners don't do a great job, from what I have been reading.</p>

<p>I don't plan to rush this project. If I could do it in half a year, that would suit me fine. </p>

<p>I wish there was something like the SF-210 for the 9000. If I decide to go with this scanner, I may by an extra slide carrier for those occasions when I can afford to devote a lot of dedicated time to scanning.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Thank you all for the responses so far. </p>

<p>The 16mm slides are in 2x2 inch mounts, so it's good to hear that most 35mm scanners will handle it. </p>

<p>I really like the feature set and the reviews of the Nikon Coolscan 9000. It doesn't sound very fast though. One review I found said it takes 7 minutes and 40 seconds to scan 5 slides with 4000 dpi with ICE, auto focus and auto exposure. I'm guessing that's a best case. That's 4.25 days of continuous scan time for 4000 slides scanned 5 at a time. But of course that doesn't factor in setup time for each group of 5 slides and whatever other work is needed to get the job done. Can any of you with real world experience doing slide scanning five at a time give me a more practical time, inclusive of all tasks involved to get finished but not edited scans? </p>

<p>Someone on Amazon dinged this scanner because he claims it is six year old technology. That doesn't bother me if it works. My 1955 Deardorff 8x10 is still my favorite camera. </p>

<p>The main problem I've read about with flatbed scanners is that they take more fiddling with the scans to get good quality. Is this true, or are there flatbeds that do a good job with ICE, auto focus and auto exposure, and minimal operator work?</p>

<p>JDM, I have an Nikon LS-4500 AF multi-format scanner. It's a old and slow 4x5 film scanner that also handles 35mm and 120 format. It doesn't have ICE, and the last drivers Nikon released for it were for Windows 98. I checked VueScan, and sadly this is not one of the supported scanners. Maybe that's a good thing since I expect it would take three years to scan 4000 slides with this old scanner.</p>

<p>There are a lot of scanner questions already, and I am working my way through the most promising ones, but I haven't found any so far that consider my particular needs.<br>

<br /> I have between 3000 and 4000 slides taken from the late 1940's to recently. They are family photos, just snapshots mostly. The vast majority are 35mm, but I have a few boxes of 16mm slides too. About half of the slides are Kodachrome and the rest Ektachrome. Some are in poor condition, dirty, marred by fingerprints, faded or with red-shifted colors, and many of them are over or under exposed. But a great many of them are still brilliant and beautiful. Most of the slide mounts are paper, and some are fairly ragged and beat up or swollen around the edges.<br>

<br /> I have two goals.<br>

<br /> 1) I want to scan all of them at a moderate quality level so they look good when viewed on a computer screen. I will archive the raw scans, and then convert and store them as jpegs on CD to distribute to my family for viewing.<br>

<br /> 2) I want to be able to rescan the best images, or the ones that my siblings ask for, at a high quality for archiving and printing up to 6x9 or perhaps 8x11 if the image warrants it and I can get a good enough scan.<br>

<br /> For the first goal, batched unattended operation would be a plus so that I don't have to individually attend to capturing each separate slide. I have seen scanners with magazine or carousel feeders, and I wonder how well these will handle damaged slide mounts. A scanner with ICE or similar capability that does a decent job of hiding dust and scratches and that does automatic color adjustment is another plus. I don't want to spend the scanning and editing time to optimize every image. I just want reasonably good and viewable scans.<br>

<br /> For the second objective, I don't mind putting some effort into getting a good scan and further cleaning up the capture in a photo editor. I'm not experienced in this, but I'm willing to learn.<br>

<br /> Non-essential extra capabilities that would be nice, so long as they don't compromise my primary goals, would be multi-format B&W and color negative and unmounted color transparency scanning (120 format, 4x5). But I suspect this may not be compatible with my first objective that may favor a dedicated 35mm film scanner.<br>

<br /> My budget is $2500, but I'd stretch it a bit for sufficient advantage.</p>

Hey Scott, you say that Velvia 50 was first produced in 1992? I just shot two 4x5 sheets from a box of RVP 50 with an expiration date of May 1994. It's been in my freezer since I bought it from a seller on Ebay who also had kept it frozen. The stuff is gorgeous. I wonder if it was a box from the earliest days of RVP?

Hey Van, Hey Edgar,

 

Shoot it man. Put it in your camera and shoot it up. Koda-junkies know all about it. It's a good feeling. It's ok, really. Withdrawal comes later, don't even think about it now. Hell, what am I talking about? Kodachrome will be here forever. Like Rock-n-roll, it's never gonna die. (Denial is one of the symptoms of Kodaddiction.)

 

Buy 8 rolls at a time. That's a nice binary order of magnitude. 2 to the 3rd power. Power, that what it's about. You have to have completeness in the universe, and the levy ain't gonna break, we'll have a place to stay. So shoot it. I'm telling you us Koda-homies got Koda-love, and you can get some too. It gives us those nice bright color, Momma.

 

Skip. (It's in my Barnack. It's in my Beaulieu. I got it under control, I swear! It's IN my camera. Thank you Momma.)

This might help. http://www.jobo-usa.com/faq/cpevscpe+.htm It's a comparison of CPE-2 to CPE-2 Plus, and says to use the higher speed (65).

 

Also, see "Rotation Speed" in the E-6 Color Transparency (Slide) Film link on this page

 

http://www.jobo-usa.com/instructions/instructions_process_index.htm

I just bought 50 carts of Super 8 K40, so my deep freeze isn't nearly full. Just 1/3 of one shelf. I'm considering another 50 carts, but that's about as much as I'll risk having on hand. And I'm shooting it, not hoarding it. I shot four rolls within the past couple of weeks.

Does anyone know where I might obtain figures on market penetration of

various film and digital file processing/printing technologies in

commercial/retail print labs (mainly mini-labs and full service photo

labs)? Or are any of you industry insiders who can tell me from your

own experience?

 

I'd like to know what kind of technology is most common today, optical

film exposure to RA-4 processed photo paper, digital file or film scan

with laser exposure to RA-4 processed photo paper, or digital file or

film scan to inkjet print.

 

Everywhere I go, I see mini-labs with built-in chemistry tanks. I

presume these are using photo paper in RA-4 chemistry. I don't think

I've ever seen a mini-lab printer that didn't have chemical tanks,

which might indicate that they use inkjet technology. If scans to CD

are offered, does this imply that the machine is scanning and printing

via laser or LED to photo paper, or is it possible that they may scan

and optically enlarge/print onto photo paper?

 

Do any of these mini-lab print processors ever use inkjet technology?

Do any high volume print processors use inkjet?

 

Can I tell by looking at a print what kind of technology was used,

whether scan and laser print to photo paper or inkjet print, or

optical print to photo paper, etc?

 

I'm just curious about what printing technologies are in common use

for commercial color prints, and whether or not you can see

differences in the output.

Mike, the new 64T is definitely reversal film. It is EPY.

 

Ron, double 8mm is not exactly the same as double perf 16mm. Double run 8mm has twice as many sprocket holes as 16mm film. See what Kelly Flannigan said above.

 

Also, here is a picture on this site of 16mm, double 8mm, 9.5mm, and Super 8mm film side by side that shows the difference in sprockets.

 

http://littlefilm.org/

On www.filmshooting.com, a representative from Dwayne's in Kansas said they plan to process Super 8mm Kodachrome for the foreseeable future. It is only the Kodak lab in Switzerland that will process Super 8 for only another year.

 

So, call 1-800-621-FILM and order some Super 8. I ordered 50 cartridges today for $10.83 per cart. There is a lot of K40 in the rest of the distribution channels too.

Scott, use your cameras, man! Don't forget that Plus-X reversal is another really nice looking film on the silver screen. Fomapan 100 is another lovely black and white film with a tone that is markedly different from that of Plus-X. Unfortunately, you can't get it in Super 8, but it is available in regular 8mm and in DS8. Sad to say, I can't recommend Tri-X reversal unless you want lots of grain.

 

Check with J&C Photo or John Schwind for regular 8mm and DS8 Fomapan. Call Kodak direct for Super 8mm Plus-X or Tri-X or K40. I hope they release the new EPY before August. The Kodak number is 1-800-621-FILM (3456). And stock up on a few more rolls of K40, and use it while you can. I'd definitely suggest K40 for your Grand Canyon trip, but bring along some Plus-X too, and some EPY 7280 for the sake of comparison.

 

Personally, I'm about to place an order for 100 carts of K40, and I'll shoot everything I can think of for the next year or so.

John, you may be right about the processing difficulty for S8 films. Hard to say. That's one of the things that Kodak impies in the announcement.

 

Yes, the "new" film is, in fact, EPY. Those two links at the bottom of the announcement were added today. They weren't there yesterday.

 

I haven't tried the new and reportedly wonderful Vision 2 negative films partly because I can't transfer them myself with my WorkPrinter, and it is expensive to have them telecined by a transfer house. But mainly because I can't project them, and that is one of the most important and magic aspects of movies for me.

Christopher, I have continued to shoot regular 8mm, Super 8, and 16mm film instead of digital or analogue video because I like the look of film, because I like the challenge of working with film, because I like old cameras and their heft and quality and intricate machining and amazing mechanics, because I like to project my film on a silver screen, because I'm a nostalgia junkie, because I like tinkering with old stuff, because I like to relive my past, and to recreate the feelings and the magic that my Dad created with his regular 8mm camera in the '50s to the mid '70s. That's all.

 

It's similar to the reason why I shoot 8x10 with an old Deardorff, and 8x20 with an old Korona, and why I converted a spare bedroom in my house to a permanent darkroom (really nice), and why I develop my own E6 and black and white films, and print my own RA-4, and mix most of my processing solutions from bulk chemicals, and print my LF negs on platinum and palladium paper that I coated myself.

 

Frankly, I'm not a very good photographer or cinematographer, but I sure love the process and my modest accomplishments.

 

Oh yes, I have a Canon mini-DV cam, but I only use it with my WorkPrinter from MovieStuff to capture my 8mm films to my computer, frame by frame.

 

That's why I still shoot movie film.

I'd shoot that old roll if I were you. K40 holds up pretty well even at room temperature, so it's probably fine. If you don't have a cart with pre-paid processing mailer or a PK59, you can drop it off at Walmart and have it processed at Dwayne's in Kansas for $4.88 per roll.

 

I don't think we can assume that the new stock is the same as EPY, and therefore we can't assume that characteristics like RMS granularity are necessarily the same as EPY either. Kodak in the announcement says the new film is super-saturated, and that is not a characteristic of EPY.

 

I've heard that the new film emulsion number is 7280. Hopefully more info will come soon.

Might be possible to recalibrate or replace the meters on some cameras. That's an interesting thought. But most S8 cams are downright scary to open up. All full of PCB boards and electronics... Not my cup of tea.

Yes, Kodachrome projects so nicely. The only thing I ever shot that looked better on the screen than K40 was K25.

 

I just got a reel of K40 back from Kodak today, as a matter of fact. When I screened it, I was as enthralled by the rich and vibrant color as ever. I'll miss it.

 

I plan to stock up and freeze 40 or 50 carts, maybe double that if I can afford it. Kodak says they'll continue to process S8 K40 for at least a year. Hopefully Dwayne's will continue to process S8 K40 for even longer. Interestingly, 16mm K40 is not affected by the announcement, so presumably Dwayne's and Kodak will continue to process the 16mm film going forward. (Until the next bad announcement, that is.)

 

I can set the ASA on my Beaulieu 6008 for the new film, no problem. I can meter and shoot manual on a couple other of my S8 cams. Depending on how an auto-exposure camera meters, perhaps a 0.2 ND filter would do the trick. We'll have to wait and see.

 

Buy it and shoot it now while you can. I'm excited about having a color reveral stock to shoot even though it won't be as archival as Kodachrome. And if it's E6, I'll be able to process it myself. But I'm really not happy about losing K40. Fortunately, I also love and shoot a lot of Plus-X, and that isn't going away. Yet.

I'm not sure which forum is best for this post. Please forgive me if

I'm off topic. This really isn't about slide film, but it is about

Kodachrome reversal film.

 

For all of you super 8 lovers out there...

 

Kodak has announced that it will cease production of Kodachrome 40 in

Super 8mm cartridges. They say that Kodachrome 40 will continue to be

available in 16mm film. I am saddened by the loss of the extraordinary

K40 film in S8.

 

http://wwwuk.kodak.com/US/en/motion/about/news/super8.jhtml

 

Kodak is releasing a new 64 ASA Tungsten film to take K40's place. I

doubt it's the same as EPY, since the new film is described as

super-saturated. I haven't been able to find any detailed information

about the new film yet. K40 was 3400K balanced film. EPY is 3200K

balanced. I have no idea about the new 64T Super 8 film.

 

Most of the low-end auto-exposure only Super 8 cameras that were

designed solely for use with 40T or 160T film will probably not

properly expose the 64T correctly.

 

Fortunately, most of my S8 cameras can be set for manual exposure and

will handle the 64T just fine. I'm looking forward to shooting it, but

I'll miss K40.

 

Has anyone heard any news of the new 64T Super 8 film?

I've searched for the answer to this, but I can't find it on PN or

anywhere. I'm trying to figure out the minimum E6 solution amount per

roll of Super 8mm film.

 

Kodak says to use at least 250ml of each E6 solution per square foot

of film. Then they say 235ml per two 136-36 rolls. That doesn't

compute, by my calculations.

 

I measured a 36 exposure length of 35mm film. It was 5.25 feet long.

35mm is .11 feet x 5.25 feet = .58 square feet. So 250ml x .58 sq ft

= 145ml, and two rolls is 1.16 sq feet x 250ml = 290ml. How did Kodak

get 235ml for two rolls? It's clearly more than one square foot of

film, and the minimum for one square foot of film is 250ml.

 

A roll of Super 8 film is 50 feet by 8mm = 50 feet by .0262 feet =

1.31 sq ft, which means 1.31 x 250 ml = 327.5 ml of each E6 solution

per roll of Super 8 film. But is it really correct, given the

unexpected recommendation for the 135-36 films?

 

This question is somewhat academic. There are no Super 8 films that

are processed in E6 chemistry. Also, my movie film processing tank

requires 1.4 liters for two rolls of Super 8mm film, so my real

minimum is 700ml per roll anyway. I'm just perplexed by the seemingly

inaccurate Kodak equivalents based on the stated 250ml per square foot

minimum.

 

I suppose if I could manage to process a roll of Super 8 film in about

300ml of E6 solution, that would be close enough for practical

purposes.

Well, I ended up buying two 50 sheet boxes of the 8x10 Kodak 64T Electronic Output film, and five 50 sheet boxes of 8x10 Kodak 64T EPY 6118 film, all for just $10 per box. Some of this film expired in 2000, some in 2002. But for $10 per box, I figured it would be worth trying out.

 

I haven't tried the Electronic Output film yet. I'll probably do that this weekend. But I've already tested the EPY 6118 that expierd in 2000, and it seems perfectly fine. It looks great, stunning even, on the light box. The colors all seem accurate to my untrained eye. Unfortunately, I don't have any fresh film to compare it with, and in truth, I've never used LF transparency film before, so I really don't know what to look for.

 

If this were black and white film, I could easily tell if it were too old by the degree of base fog after developing. What are the indicators that color transparency film, EPY 6118 in particular, has gone bad? This film is simply gorgeous.