Walgreen's (Fuji Lab) black & white film processing

Even in the 80s-90s, asking a minilab (or just a local photo shop) to do black and white if it wasn't C41 was expensive and slow. I don't remember any local (or even major) minilabs that had on-site B&W developing. I seem to recall it was almost always twice as expensive.

Even the grocery stores that used to ship film to Pathé to be developed and printed beautifully had weirdly long turn-around times for B&W film. You could always get one day turnaround on colour that was even shipped off to be centrally processed. B&W seemed like it was always a minimum of 3 business days.

I do remember people playing with black and white films, not realizing there were different rules about development, taking them in only to be coerced into purchasing a little darkroom kit to develop it themselves. Then they'd rig up the bathroom, process a few rolls (often failing) and forget about ever running traditional B&W film ever again. lol!

voceumana said:

They don't really want to do it. If they drive the price high enough they can stop offering it!

I can't imagine paying anyone $19 to process a roll of 35mm B&W film, about the easiest thing to do in the world of film photography.

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+1

RalphLambrecht said:

+1

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It may not be that they don't want to do it, they just want to make it profitable.
In a lab where C41, E6 , RA4 are mainly automated processes, processing a B&W film by hand is time-consuming and since time is money, the price must reflect that.
Also there is the workflow and time versus quantity to be factored in.
What is simple and easy (B&W developing) to some, can appear complicated and mysterious to others.
Does everyone know how to make a hollandaise sauce?

wyofilm said:

1. thefilmhound was once listed on Northeast Photographic as the place that would store your negatives until you asked for them back at a cost. I no longer see the thefilmhound as a partner.
2. Go to their website and it lists under the 'Advanced Services' menu 'Return Stored Film'. What does this mean? It doesn't sound to me like negs are returned in the normal course of business.
It appears there is a change in the policy at NP because there appears to be no charge for returning negs (only an expected shipping cost). I most certainly put off with the prior relationship with thefilmhound. I hope NP can comment. NP is a regular and beneficial contributor here at Photrio, which I appreciate.

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You could just email me and ask! However I do see that I could clarify the language on the "Info" tab.

Once you go through the checkout procedure you will see a number of options. We don't cut film, but we do full roll sleeving. When your order is completed you can either have your film returned immediately, you can have it destroyed, you can have it sent to The Film Hound who will cut and sleeve and store it, or you can now pick it up in store. We don't charge you to forward the film to The Film Hound, but their service costs do apply. Return shipping is a flat $8.00 fee regardless of order size, or $12 for print sales.

The return stored film option remains from the days when we used to store film for extended periods while people filled up their boxes. I keep in on the site in case someone selects film hound or destroy or pick.up and changes their mind mid-order. We stopped storing film because people would just forget they had film here, or send in film too infrequently for it to make sense. Then tracking them down to pay return shipping was a chore.

If you need to contact me or the shop generally our instagram is fast (@NortheastPhotographic), or conversely the contact tab on the site allows you to email us. You could even message us here if you wish, though there is less of a guarantee of fast response.

Agulliver said:

But the average user doesn't understand that negatives are better for storage than CDs or other digital files....after all, the last 40 years of marketing have pressed the message that digital storage is "perfect". He also doesn't understand or care enough that the scans won't contain as much detail as the negatives, and that he might want to revisit those negatives several decades into the future.

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bck in teh 70s, the short time I worked behind a photo counter. (and this was before anyone had even seen a computer that was not in a data centre) I was taken aback when one customer picked up thier Photos, and I pointed out that their negatives were sticking out of the print folder, and The customer said, "I don't know why they even bother to make Negatives anyway?" I shook my head, and told her that the Negatives were the actual film that she had used in her camera, and that they would allow her to get enlargements that show more detail than the 4X prints the lab defaulted to - if she has a shot she really liked. She just looked confused.

voceumana said:

They don't really want to do it. If they drive the price high enough they can stop offering it!

I can't imagine paying anyone $19 to process a roll of 35mm B&W film, about the easiest thing to do in the world of film photography.

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B&W film is certainly very easy to process at home, and the simplest process in many ways. However, for a commercial lab the opposite is the case. Remember with E6 and C41 all films have a standardized process. With B&W each film has a different development time, or different needs. There are some machine processors for B&W but they're either big dip and dunk machines, or roller transport machines. The smaller roller transport machines are very rare. Colenta will make you a new one for about $30k, but it's far more likely a lab would invest in a C41 machine. So smaller operations like my shop use either Phototherm Super Sidekicks, or Jobo ATLs. I'm sure there are some other machines out there, but rotary is more common. These dry to wet processors usually require external photo flo dunking, and an additional drying stage. Then don't even get me started on the requirement that all frames be dusted, which we only do for Pro Scans. Even without dusting care must be taken to minimize dust presence while scanning.

While it's the most attainable home process, it's also the most complex to do at scale.

cmacd123 said:

bck in teh 70s, the short time I worked behind a photo counter. (and this was before anyone had even seen a computer that was not in a data centre) I was taken aback when one customer picked up thier Photos, and I pointed out that their negatives were sticking out of the print folder, and The customer said, "I don't know why they even bother to make Negatives anyway?" I shook my head, and told her that the Negatives were the actual film that she had used in her camera, and that they would allow her to get enlargements that show more detail than the 4X prints the lab defaulted to - if she has a shot she really liked. She just looked confused.

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The first thing my ex-mother-in-law would do it throw away the negatives. I would explain to her why she needed to keep them and she would tell me to mind my own business. Then after her husband died she came to me crying that the old photos of her husband were creased and worn and now she wanted new copies. I told her that there was nothing I could do without the negatives. Then she said, "Why didn't you tell be back then?"

Sirius Glass said:

The first thing my ex-mother-in-law would do it throw away the negatives.

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I do wonder if the advice in the 1920s may have been given that the negatives (in those days) were dangerous and highly inflammable. and that echoed into the 50s and 60s

cmacd123 said:

I do wonder if the advice in the 1920s may have been given that the negatives (in those days) were dangerous and highly inflammable. and that echoed into the 50s and 60s

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It had nothing to do with fire. She consider negative junk.

Sirius Glass said:

It had nothing to do with fire. She consider negative junk.

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like my customer, above, the process was a mystery and the funny little backwards pictures where some sort of techno-joke played by the industry to jack up the price.

Sirius Glass said:

Then after her husband died she came to me crying that the old photos of her husband were creased and worn and now she wanted new copies.

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I would have been hard pressed to avoid trying to keep a straight face and and say, OF COURSE we can get beautiful large clear prints made, as many as you want, Big enlargements also, we can share them with everyone in the family, Just send me the Negatives and we can get right on it.

NortheastPhotographic said:

You could just email me and ask!

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Well you are correct of course, but I haven't had the need for outside processing since I looked at your website.

Yep....the average consumer never handled or used the negatives themselves, so had no understanding of their importance. I also find that the average human (especially adults) is remarkably uncurious. I curate celluloid and digital images of family photos and cine film going back to decades before I was born. When an elderly relative died at the turn of this century I practically had to beg to keep a box of negatives due to the attitude that anything good had been printed and the negatives were just a waste of space. She'd been a very keen amateur photographer and I managed to save all her slides and about 1/3 of her negatives before they were binned. 20 years later lockdown happens and another relative has a lot of time on her hands....contacts me to see what I've got. I was able to scan all those negatives, email the images to said relative who was able to put names, rough dates and places to these pieces of my family history and share them more widely. It has even resulted in tracing a long lost branch of the family. The paltry 1/3 of the negatives that I was able to save had many more images than the prints and better images too as the 40-70 year old prints were damaged or faded.

The colour lab I used throughout the 80s used to put a little bit of text about keeping the negatives safe, not getting fingerprints on them, because they would be needed for enlargements and reprints. But I am sure that 90% of the end users had no real clue what they were.

Anyway...thread drift....I would always advise anyone getting any film processed to keep the negs as you just never know what you might want to do with the images years or decades down the line. Even stored with the most basic care the negatives will give you flexibility to use whatever technology exists in decades time to revisit those images with all the detail and quality they contain. I'd still advise OP finds someone local who will process B&W film by hand, but if they use a commercial laboratory.then find somewhere with a good reputation which returns negatives by default. I am firmly in the camp which views non-return of negatives as theft. Luckily I've never come across a lab in the UK or Europe which doesn't return them by default, even if the lady I know who does film processing does say that many people don't bother collecting them.