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QUESTION: The place where I get my pictures processed went out of
business. I am trying to find another place that I can trust to do a good
job in making my pictures. How do I find that magic place for film
processing?
ANSWER: Owning a good camera and knowing how to use it is most
important to a good photographer. However, if film is used, a good
processing lab is just as important for the creation of good pictures.
Poor processing will create poor pictures no matter how good the camera or
photographer might be.
There is no magic recipe for finding a good
place to have your film processed. First check with your friends to see
what places have made a favorable impression on them. Next, buy a number
of twelve exposure rolls of the film that you most often use. Take outdoor
and indoor pictures of the same set of subjects under similar conditions
on each roll of film and leave one roll at each place that you have
decided to test. As soon as you receive each roll back mark the date,
place of processing, and negative number on the back of each print for
that roll of film. After all the rolls that you have decided to use are
processed divide the prints up into two stacks, one indoor scenes and the
other outdoor scenes. Now thoroughly shuffle the pictures within each
stack so that they are randomly arranged. Now pick the best ten percent
and the worse ten percent of the prints with regard to color and density
(light or dark tones) from the outdoor and also the indoor stack. Does
this tell you which processor to use? Notice that I did not promise that
this would be an easy task. To make the job easier (and possibly less
expensive) you might try to convince a friend or friends to collaborate
with you.
If you find that one place is superior to the others then
try several more rolls to determine if the quality is consistently good or
does it vary due to such things as personnel changes. Although it is
tempting, do not let price be the most important factor here. If the
prices are the lowest |