Thinking about taking the plunge into film photography

Finally got a few rolls developed. These are some of my favorites from our trip to LA, in no particular order:

Most of the pictures came out much better than I expected.

Very cool shots. Sure is nice to see some images that haven't spent an hour or so in Lightroom. The current rage on the photography groups to spend hours in post to make images look "more" is getting old. 

You're going to make me send in my K1000 for a rebuild. 

Yeah, very cool shots, Colin, and glad to hear that you're enjoying it. Very happy. 

Toyman01, I recently paid about $110 to have a K1000 full serviced, including fixing an inop light meter. 

Fuji Portra?

Portra is a Kodak product.  Those shots do not look like they came from a Fuji negative; not blue enough.

pres589 (djronnebaum) said:

Portra is a Kodak product.  Those shots do not look like they came from a Fuji negative; not blue enough.

Gah, I'm an idiot.

I've got some rolls of Velvia 50 in my fridge, not sure why I screwed that up.

Some local (Ormond Beach, Fla.) news regarding film processing: Our local lab, Reformed Film, is moving from the dude's two-car garage and into dedicated commercial space. 

And speaking of film photography, our local vintage camera shop (Kiwi Camera Service in Orlando) held a swap meet this weekend. Lots of cool stuff (and dogs). 

Dang, I could've used that Electro 35 parts box to hopefully get mine going again.

I've got the same Minolta Hi-Matic somewhere.

In reply to BoxheadTim :

Does yours have the infamous POD issue? If so, you really don't need anything more than a little square of rubber to replace the failed part IIRC. I did one a bunch of years ago - simple, if fiddly, job.

In reply to BoxheadTim :

Dang. Sadly, all I can tell you is that it was at the table on the end up against the trees. 

Does anyone have a recommendation on where to get a CLA on my Olympus OM10? The shutter occasionally sticks and it probably has never had one since my mom bought it. I had seen this guy recommended a lot in posts but this email no longer works so I don't think he does it anymore. http://www.zuiko.com/index_009.htm

Nevermind found a facebook page for them.

Do any of you guys scan at home? If you do, what software do you use? 

In reply to 93EXCivic :

I do, at least B&W. I have the capability to do color, but for reasons I will explain I've been sending it out lately.

I have two scanners: a Canon 8800F flatbed and a Pacific Image XA. I use the Canon for B&W, with the ancient software that shipped with it - Arcsoft Photo Studio. It's clunky and old, but I've got a workflow that I can do in my sleep, and the results are fine for my purposes. I've printed up to 13x19 with no problems. I bought the PI because the Canon never produced results with color that I was even remotely satisfied with, but it has its problems too. While the scan quality is good (but not great), it's painfully slow, and the software it came with (Cyberview X) is fairly awful. It also came with Silverfast, which I found incredibly confusing to set up and use, so I never bothered going too far with it. Since I have to send my color out for developing these days anyway, I just have it scanned at the same time.

No matter what you use, you have to expect to do some cleaning up and tweaking afterwards. I use GIMP and Corel PSP for that.

For reference, here's a full resolution scan from the Canon after light post-processing. It's TriX @200 developed in Caffenol C-H.

In reply to 02Pilot :

I got a PlusTek 8100. It comes with Silverfast. I was trying to decide if I wanted to spend the $100 for Negative Lab Pro or just use Silverfast. 

Not developing yet but the lab charges $5 for standard resolution and $10 for high so to save some money I figured I'd scan my own. 

In reply to 02Pilot :

I got a PlusTek 8100. It comes with Silverfast. I was trying to decide if I wanted to spend the $100 for Negative Lab Pro or just use Silverfast. 

Not developing yet but the lab charges $5 for standard resolution and $10 for high so to save some money I figured I'd scan my own. 

I use Negative Lab Pro.  If you've already got Lightroom and are dealing with film negatives, it's pretty fantastic.

I also use a digital camera to copy my negatives.  I don't know what it's like using a real scanner but I would assume pretty much the same. 

I really need to set up a rig to try scanning with a digital camera.

Never considered NLP since I don't use Lightroom. I've heard good things about Vuescan, but again, no personal experience.

I wish NLP was available as a stand-alone product, honestly, as I don't like how Adobe is charging for Lightroom like their other products.  I really like Lightroom and don't want to leave it but I'm stuck on version 6. 

Kind of annoyed how out of focus this shot came out and more overexposed than I would have liked, one of my struggles on film cameras has been focusing with glasses on. Might have to try to DSLR scanning the negative to see what I can do with this shot.