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Cheap prices and negative scanning

Pedroga

Member
Allowing Ads
Joined
Feb 4, 2026
Messages
30
Location
Brazil
Format
35mm
I found a hippie in the country who would develop and scan my negatives, but here's the thing, I'm very new to analog photography (new to photography in general, actually) and I needed to know if his offer was a load of crap or not.
In this case, he would develop any of my negatives, whether black and white, orthochromatic, c-41 or ecn22, for the price of 5.73 US dollars and would scan them for 2.50 US dollars, that's for each roll, i.e., 36 exposures.
I won't know the real quality of the photos unless I test them, but these prices make me very suspicious of this crazy guy.
I don't know if it's better for me to develop the negatives at home (if that interferes with the quality of the photo or not) or if I should just send everything to him and that's it.
but the negative scan is at 24MP resolution (that's what he said). Now I don't know if he would photograph the negatives with another camera and "develop" them, or if he would use a scanner like a Plustek.
 
I was that sort of a "hippie" (in my country). I'd develop your C-41/BW/E-6/ECN-2 roll with 4000dpi (24MP) scanning for 4 EUR. If you didn't have money for film I'd "sell" you a Vision3 roll for 1 EUR (ah, the days of dirt cheap short-ends). RA-4 print or drum scan if you asked nicely.

My intentions weren't solely altruistic, though. I liked having all the developers for color films at hand, but since I can't shoot that much film before at least one of those developers would go bad, I thought that if I had a group of people that would pay for the cost of materials I could put in my work for free...
 
Pedroga said:
In this case, he would develop any of my negatives, whether black and white, orthochromatic, c-41 or ecn22, for the price of 5.73 US dollars and would scan them for 2.50 US dollars, that's for each roll, i.e., 36 exposures.
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Here in Europe you typically pay twice that for processing and up to 6 times as much for scanning, but the latter is more variable.
I don't know about Brazil, specifically, but those prices look very reasonable to me. The price point @brbo mentions is IMO more of an 'enthusiast' pricing that helps to pay for materials, but is not really economically sustainable if you factor in labor etc., at least not in a European context and for a small operation (which is also what @brbo appears to indicate, cf. free labor). Even large-volume labs (the one or two that's left) where labor is only a fraction of the cost can't hit that price point anymore. The last one we had around here was a Fuji lab that offered C41 development for approx. €4.50/roll, but that proved to be unsustainable - the lab now only processes digital prints and dismantled their film operations.

Pedroga said:
I don't know if it's better for me to develop the negatives at home (if that interferes with the quality of the photo or not) or if I should just send everything to him and that's it.
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It depends on how much effort you're willing to put in. But it's definitely feasible to do high-quality film processing at home, even for color film. It takes some equipment (not much), some chemistry (B&W will be easy, color might be a little harder to get hold of) and some knowledge/awareness of how to do it. In terms of that knowledge - there's plenty around here and also plenty of people willing to answer your questions and explain everything, so if you end up trying, you've come to the right place.

Pedroga said:
the negative scan is at 24MP resolution (that's what he said).
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That's plausible. I bet he uses a digital camera for scanning. The quality can be quite good, but it depends on his setup and competence. One thing to keep in mind: don't compare digital camera megapixels to film scan megapixels. The image quality is very different. Generally the film scans look (much) more soft and there will be grain in them.

Welcome to Photrio!
 

If it sounds too good to be true it probably is. Consider how much your time is worth going out and taking your photographs and do you want to risk a compromise in quality? But at the same time according to Google the average hourly wage in Brazil is $3 so he's maybe charging a fair price with materials etc. Send one film to a photo lab and another to the hippie in the country and see what you get back, but make sure you do get your negatives back in both cases.
 
Speculation is futile in a case like this, because everything depends on the skills and integrity of one individual -- who we have never met.

If a person wants to wear their hair long and live a simple life in the country, that does not tell us anything about their ability and inclination, either in the darkroom, or as a business person. Where I live (in the Ozark hills, there are a lot of people who live back in the woods that have good skills. Some make excellent cheese from goats milk; some write best selling books. One guy makes custom fitted wooden display cases for firearms -- his clients are from all over the world.

So give the guy a try and report back. If you think his price is too low, you can always pay him more. ;-)
 
I developed and scanned film as a service for a year or two in college, with my Paterson tank and Epson flatbed... I think I charged $8 a roll if I remember correctly. It was basically a $2/hr wage at best that I just did out of interest in the topic.

Seems like you don't have much to lose by sending him a roll to try it out.
 





I asked him for some examples of photos taken using the method we're discussing here, and he sent me these.
 
marhalloweenvt said:
The result is quite good as I can tell. I really imazed by 4th photo. That image makes me thing he use DSLR/Mirrorless camera to scan 135 mm and the 3rd image (6x6 format) is from a flatbed scanner (my 2 cent opinion)
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He says that all the images were taken using the DSLR/Mirrorless method.

And he only has that method; it's a really small place in the interior of my country.
 
Did I get the result approved? Can I trust it?
 
One question I have about the forum is that I bought MANY, MANY, DIFFERENT types of 35mm analog camera film and others that I found among my grandparents' things.

Where can I discuss them on the forum?
 
The processing and scanning look OK as far as I can tell. I'd give it a shot with one or two test rolls and then evaluate the results.

Pedroga said:
One question I have about the forum is that I bought MANY, MANY, DIFFERENT types of 35mm analog camera film and others that I found among my grandparents' things.
Click to expand...
It depends on the questions. We have a subforum for 35mm here: https://www.photrio.com/forum/forums/35mm-cameras-and-accessories.73/
Assuming you have several questions that are more or less specific to each camera type, I would start by searching for existing threads/answers to these questions on the forum and see if that already resolves your questions. If not, then make one or more threads about your remaining questions. Generally it works best to group questions about a particular type of camera in a single thread with a title that clearly states the camera brand and model and a few keywords of the question.
 
Pedroga said:
One question I have about the forum is that I bought MANY, MANY, DIFFERENT types of 35mm analog camera film and others that I found among my grandparents' things.

Where can I discuss them on the forum?
Click to expand...

If there are Leicas included I am happy to help.
 
Pedroga said:
Did I get the result approved? Can I trust it?
Click to expand...

IMO, it's GO!.
Personally, whenever approaching a new lab/darkroom tech/... I will use at least 1 c41 and 1 b&w to test their capabilities. Then I will evaluate results and decide if I can stick with them for a period of time.
 
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