Shooting Film On The Cheap!

Keith said:
I notice the Arista Ultra EDU is $1.89 per roll at Freestyle which seems to be the cheapest black and white 120 they stock ... does anyone use this and if so what's it like?
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The Arista II is supposed to be Agfa APX and is really good.

Arista.EDU is actually Fomapan.
 
Bijesh said:
The Arista II is supposed to be Agfa APX and is really good.

Arista.EDU is actually Fomapan.
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Exactly right.

I've been using the Arista/Fomapan in D-76, but haven't liked the results too much. I've got some Diafine on the way and some Arista/APX in the camera right now, so I will have some fun trying different combos.
 
I tend to flirt alot with my local 1-hour person, mostly 'cause I'm so freaking bored out here. Today it yielded me 2 rolls of dev, scanned to cd, with an index print...for a total of $2.11. Scans look pretty good :)

2153167836_96fb5e8665.jpg
 
gregg: Have you tried pre-soaking the film for 10-15 minutes? It might help get some of the blue out (it works wonders for the purple base on Tri-X).
 
The blue base was not a problem but the extreme curl was. No matter what I tried, it kept curling up tight which made it a pain to sleeve and place in the neg carrier.

ymmv
 
gregg said:
I use the 100 speed Arista.EDU Ultra / 120 in my Rollie TLR and like it quite a bit. In D-76 it fits me pretty well. Didn't like the look of it in Diafine though...

Even after long washing it retains the blue tint of the base - not sure how that affects wet printing but it hasn't been a problem on the scanner.

A recent studio shot:
image01yq6.jpg
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Gergg,
It's called >Rollei<.
-a
 
SteveM(PA) said:
I tend to flirt alot with my local 1-hour person, mostly 'cause I'm so freaking bored out here. Today it yielded me 2 rolls of dev, scanned to cd, with an index print...for a total of $2.11. Scans look pretty good :)

2153167836_96fb5e8665.jpg
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I like this photo a lot.
 
Stu W said:
I have my new-within the last year-technique for keeping my costs down.
1-I keep my eyes open for out of date or soon to be film. I usually don't pay more than $1 a roll and I have a big tupperware in the fridge to store it. I bought a bunch of c-41 b&w a couple of years ago and still have some left.
2-The local 1 hour lab I found is excellent. They charge $2 a roll to process, cut and sleeve the negs, and print out an index sheet.
3-My on sale half price negative scanner. If anything looks really good it's back to the 1 hour guy for an enlargement.

I admit it's not as cheap as digital but it ain't bad. Stu

B&H and Focus used to be great film sources, but I guess the times they are a changing.
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Since about 18 months or so, I get my C-41 film developed and scanned for $4 at Sam's Club. This keeps expense to a limit.

Since the scans are not large at Sam's Club [around 2MB files], and they don't handle B&W film, I am now trying Dwayne's Photo for developing and scanning if B&W film and also C-41 film. They charge $3 for developing and $3 for scanning (4MB files). It applies also to 120 film.


Result; As Stu said: I admit it's not as cheap as digital but it ain't bad
 
4MB files from 35mm? That's very good indeed.

I have mine scanned at the Fuji Frontier max of 3360 x 2240 and they are about 2MB.
 
Jon,

Sam's Club uses the Fuji frontier too. I keepon bugging them to check with headquarters about raising the max file size for regular scans. They told me that they will get a new computer and maybe then they will allow larger scans.

The 4MB scans from 35mm negatives look great, and that's why I am willing to pay $2.50 extra to Dwayne's Photo. They charge $5 shipping for the first roll and then 25 cents for each additional roll. I send them twenty rolls, and so shipping cost per roll is 50 cents.

==> $6.50 for 4MB scans C-41 or B&W, 35mm or 120.

It allows me to shoot more B&W too. Same goes for 120 film.
 
I don't know why, but here in Italy is very hard to find out of date film... Not to say that italian photographers don't let film get out of date, because they use almost only digital!
 
I've been considering using Dwayne's, and emailed them asking for some samples of the scans in 35mm and 120. Unfortunately I never heard back from them. If anybody here has some, would they mind posting them up?
 
I spend waay too much for film. 75% of the time I need film I over pay for it because I can't wait to get downtown to adorama or B&H.
 
Well, nice information

Well, nice information

ClaremontPhoto said:
I use out of date film all the time.

Out of date film is not like out of date cheese.
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But it probably is like well maintained out of date ladies. Reliable and fun to see the results with the uncertainty involved.
 
I too often overpay for film at local stores because i need film immediately and cannot wait for a shipment from adorama or B&H. While I'd love to constantly stay stocked up on film, I am just a lowly student (not even a photograhpy student) who can only buy so much film at one particular time... so i often find myself running out before i have a chance (or even thought about) ordering more.
 
35mm color frame has 12-14 megapixels>>

35mm color frame has 12-14 megapixels>>

ClaremontPhoto said:
4MB files from 35mm? That's very good indeed.

I have mine scanned at the Fuji Frontier max of 3360 x 2240 and they are about 2MB.
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I have a chart somewhere in my computer that shows the relative equivalent of information contained in different size color film frames.

35mm has between 12-14 megapixels of information, so the scanner quality and proper scanning could turn out files in this range.

I don't have all the breakdown in my head, but I do know that the medium format megapixel equivalent, properly scanned on a quality scanner, yield from 25 to 80 megapixel depending on the various formats.

4X5 megapixel equivalent is 150 Mp and 8X10 goes to 600Mp equivalent.

Another bit of information:

If you have three digital pictures taken identically from a tripod at the same subject, How can you tell which one is the best focused other than by loupe. The picture that is the smallest byte size is the best focused. I've tested this with three digital cameras.... same scene, same time, same settings. On one I did not use the tripods which created larger file size discrepancies, with the smallest files clearly the best focus.
 
I tried the local Target for their cheap develop and scan...but all I got were scratched negatives and lots of sofware correction to hide them on the low resolution scan.
Not satisifed at all.

I may try Walmart.

Someone mentioned in another thread recently that Snapfish will scan/print/and post online for as little as $2/roll if you buy service for 50 rolls in advance.
I'm wondering if you can download decent files from them?
 
My home scans (CanoScan FS 2710) at full resolution for colour are ~27MB, monochrome are ~9MB. I know I could cut back the resolution, but then I paid good money for the glass, so ????

One thing I've seen is that film handling really, really varies in the mini-labs where I get my C41 done. I've eliminated 2 or 3 drug stores, won't go to several others because the operators are scary just to look at (no offense to them, they just don't seem to be highly committed to the art of photography :rolleyes: ), so I'm probably going to go to a "prosumer" lab from now on. A very, very good minilab I had been using went out of business last May.

I too get a lot of film from Freestyle. I buy film made in Rochester (guess!) from Freestyle cheaper than I can get it here... even with double shipping. Go figure.
 
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