Chriscrawfordphoto
Real Men Shoot Film.
After I made my color negative scanning tutorial, I bought a bunch of Portra 400 to shoot in my Leicas. I had not shot any film in over a year, until I bought a roll just to do that tutorial. It was fun using my film cameras again. I'd stopped shooting film because with all the health issues I have, I just have not felt up to standing in the basement to develop film, and there are no good labs around here.
After I shot that roll for my scanning tutorial, I decided to shoot more film. I also decided that scanning it myself was too much trouble. I just don't have time; I'm tired all the time and don't want to sit in front of the computer that much. Home film scanners have never been great for color negatives; they always need a lot of editing because the scanner software doesn't do a good job of removing the orange mask from the film base. I wanted to find a lab that could develop the film and give me scans that were good enough for me to use for making exhibition-quality prints. That means a 16 bit uncompressed file that has not been edited by the lab employees or processed by the scanner software. I didn't want them sharpened, noise-reduced, or auto-corrected for color and contrast as all those things making editing the file harder. I wanted flat uncorrected scans like my Nikon scanner gives.
The problem is that most labs deliver jpegs, horrid 8 bit files that have been compressed, and the don't usually offer very high resolution scans, either.
I finally found a place that offers high resolution scans (4492 x 6774 pixels from 35mm film) and delivers 16 bit un-edited TIFF files, and that doesn't charge a fortune. A place in New Jersey called Gelatin Labs offered this for $7 a roll for the developing and $20 per roll for the scans. I sent them a couple of test rolls a few weeks ago, and the quality of the scans was incredible. I was seeing more detail than my Nikon Coolscan V was pulling from the films. The files needed editing, but were a lot easier to get good color balance from than the Gelatin Labs scans compared to the scans from my Nikon.
Here's some examples. All were shot on Portra 400 and were resized to 1000px on the long side and saved as JPEGs for posting online.:
The unedited scan
The picture, after I edited it. There's a lot more shadow detail in the original scan that I could use, but I like this rendering.
Leica M4-2 and 35mm f2.4 Summarit-M
100% crop of the fullsize image, showing detail. No sharpening applied; this is the scan with just the color and contrast corrections.
Unedited scan
Edited. Leica M4-2 and 50mm f2.4 Summarit-M
100% crop from the fullsize file. No sharpening applied; this is the scan with just the color and contrast corrections.
Unedited scan
Edited scan. This has a lot of shadow detail in the original scan that I could have used, too. Leica M4-2 and 90mm f2.5 Summarit-M
100% crop from full size file. No sharpening applied; this is the scan with just the color and contrast corrections.
I'm happy with the quality of these. I just sent them seven more rolls yesterday. The only downside to them is they're kind of slow. Their website says it takes 5-7 business days; in reality it takes about 10. Worth the wait, though. Its too bad no one else seems to be offering scans like this. They use a Noritsu 1800 scanner. I'd buy one for myself if it didn't cost $20,000!
After I shot that roll for my scanning tutorial, I decided to shoot more film. I also decided that scanning it myself was too much trouble. I just don't have time; I'm tired all the time and don't want to sit in front of the computer that much. Home film scanners have never been great for color negatives; they always need a lot of editing because the scanner software doesn't do a good job of removing the orange mask from the film base. I wanted to find a lab that could develop the film and give me scans that were good enough for me to use for making exhibition-quality prints. That means a 16 bit uncompressed file that has not been edited by the lab employees or processed by the scanner software. I didn't want them sharpened, noise-reduced, or auto-corrected for color and contrast as all those things making editing the file harder. I wanted flat uncorrected scans like my Nikon scanner gives.
The problem is that most labs deliver jpegs, horrid 8 bit files that have been compressed, and the don't usually offer very high resolution scans, either.
I finally found a place that offers high resolution scans (4492 x 6774 pixels from 35mm film) and delivers 16 bit un-edited TIFF files, and that doesn't charge a fortune. A place in New Jersey called Gelatin Labs offered this for $7 a roll for the developing and $20 per roll for the scans. I sent them a couple of test rolls a few weeks ago, and the quality of the scans was incredible. I was seeing more detail than my Nikon Coolscan V was pulling from the films. The files needed editing, but were a lot easier to get good color balance from than the Gelatin Labs scans compared to the scans from my Nikon.
Here's some examples. All were shot on Portra 400 and were resized to 1000px on the long side and saved as JPEGs for posting online.:
The unedited scan
The picture, after I edited it. There's a lot more shadow detail in the original scan that I could use, but I like this rendering.
Leica M4-2 and 35mm f2.4 Summarit-M
100% crop of the fullsize image, showing detail. No sharpening applied; this is the scan with just the color and contrast corrections.
Unedited scan
Edited. Leica M4-2 and 50mm f2.4 Summarit-M
100% crop from the fullsize file. No sharpening applied; this is the scan with just the color and contrast corrections.
Unedited scan
Edited scan. This has a lot of shadow detail in the original scan that I could have used, too. Leica M4-2 and 90mm f2.5 Summarit-M
100% crop from full size file. No sharpening applied; this is the scan with just the color and contrast corrections.
I'm happy with the quality of these. I just sent them seven more rolls yesterday. The only downside to them is they're kind of slow. Their website says it takes 5-7 business days; in reality it takes about 10. Worth the wait, though. Its too bad no one else seems to be offering scans like this. They use a Noritsu 1800 scanner. I'd buy one for myself if it didn't cost $20,000!
Dan
Let's Sway
Thanks for being the guinea pig and letting us know!
ranger9
Well-known
Hey, did you know pineapple rings are great with Spam? Seriously, absolutely no downsides at all, other than being slow? You've compared them to other labs offering similar services (e.g. theFINDlab's uncorrected 4492x6774 "straight scans" at $19 per roll?)
Chriscrawfordphoto
Real Men Shoot Film.
Are you seriously accusing me of spamming the forum?
The lab you suggested does not offer 16 bit TIFS; its JPEG only according to their site. Knowing what you're talking about before spouting off and attacking a contributing member of this forum goes a long way toward people respecting you.
CMur12
Veteran
Thanks, Chris. This is worth knowing.
The challenge with film is getting scans that can reveal all that is in the image frame. This is especially valuable with the paucity of good scanners available now.
- Murray
The challenge with film is getting scans that can reveal all that is in the image frame. This is especially valuable with the paucity of good scanners available now.
- Murray
wlewisiii
Just another hotel clerk
My local lab offers similar scans from a Noritsu, but I don't get the high rez/"expensive" scans even though it's only $5/roll more. The simple reality is most of my film shooting these days isn't worth that level. I am thinking about home scanning solutions for B&W and doing my own developing of that here at home from bulk rolled film. C41, as you say, is a very different kettle of fish for both dunking and scanning and with a sanely priced ($10.50 with tax for dunk & basic scans uploaded to Dropbox) lab here in my town I see no reason to fight with my own color film.
But trying to figure out what to do for my scanning is driving me nuts. Probably will start with a rig for my D810 & Micro-Nikkor.
But trying to figure out what to do for my scanning is driving me nuts. Probably will start with a rig for my D810 & Micro-Nikkor.