Most local scanning services are outrageous. Look for a good used film
scanner. You'll pay for it very quickly at their prices. However
you'll also learn the joys of digital spotting in Photoshop, or some
other similar program. Black and white film by it's nature will not
allow Digital Ice, which is very good for dust and removal at scan time,
to work properly. I can recommend the Benq/Acer Scanwit 2720s and 2740s
scanners they work very well, for an moderately priced dedicated 35mm
film scanner. The biggest problem is that their film carriers are a bit
fragile, so you have to be careful using and buying used. True they
only scan at 2700 dpi, but they give a full 36 bits of color depth.
That's /only/ 9 mp but your local shop was most likely going to scan at
24 bits and 6mp. They are a bargain if you can find one. You'll
probably have to invest in a modern SCSI card as the one supplied only
has drivers up to Windows XP. Unless that's what you're using. The
only difference the 20s and 40s is the inclusion of digital Ice in the
latter. Not something you'll need if you're shooting Silver based B&W.
One more thing you should probably invest in is Vuescan to replace the
supplied MiraScan software which sux.
On 5/29/2012 1:23 PM, Kenton Brede wrote:
So I decided a few weeks ago to give film a try. I bought a couple
old Pentax cameras and started shooting. Locally we have a camera
shop that will develop black and white film and scan to disk. So I
shot a few rolls and really liked the process of shooting a manual
film camera. So I thought I'd go a little deeper and start developing
the negatives and have the same shop scan them for me. So I worked
with the owner and bought all the chemicals. I mixed the D-76 and
Fixer last night in preparation of developing three rolls tonight. So
I called them this morning and asked what the price would be to scan
three rolls. This is the breakdown:
Prices for them to develop one roll of B&W and scan to disk.
$5.25 developing fee, $3.99 for the scan to CD = $9.24
Prices for them to scan my negatives, 36 frames.
69 cents per image, $3.99 for CD = $28.83
I asked why they were charging so much more for doing less work, and
the answer was, after consulting management, "We give a price break on
the scanning, if you develop your film here."
Needless to say, I won't be developing my negatives tonight.
Anyway, just a rant. Sorry it was so long. I know there are cheaper
scanning alternatives online. I really didn't want to purchase a
scanner right away. I wanted to wait to make sure I was going to
stick with film, before buying a scanner. But at those prices it
wouldn't take long for the scanner to pay for itself.
--
Don't lose heart! They might want to cut it out, and they'll want to avoid a
lengthily search.
--
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