Photo developing?

Question

Among the national chains- Who does the best job of developing 35 mm prints?

Answer 1

Labs among the mass market retailers, drug stores, and camera shops vary greatly in their product and expertise. One Eckerd (or Walgreens, or WalMart, or Ritz, whatever) might be great, and the one across town might be awful.

My suggestion is to try your local labs. Look at the lab, does it seem neat and clean? Are the technicians friendly? Watch them while they work.Are they wearing gloves to print and handling the film carefully? Do they fiddle with the printer controls, or just feed the roll through without looking. (Fiddling is good.) Do they have work displayed in the lab?

Ask if their parameters were in control in the morning tests. How often do they monitor their chemistry?

If all seems well, then leave a roll. Assuming that you have a somewhat correctly exposed roll of film, your prints should look fine, neither dark nor washed out, and with no color cast, no lint, and your negatives should be sleeved and free of dirt and prints.

If you think a print is too light or dark, the lab tech should offer to reprint and be able to adjust the print to your liking. Do be aware, though, there might be more than one way that a print could look and still be a good print. Some people prefer darker prints, some like warm tones, etc etc. But the lab should be able to produce a good print from a good negative.

If you're not happy at lab #1, try another one. Unless you're terribly unlucky, you should be able to find one that you can work with. Most towns have at least a couple. If you have a friend who always seems to have good prints, ask where they have their developing done.

On-line, MPix and Snapfish seem to have pretty good products and service.

If you live in western NC, come to my lab! :-)

Good luck!

Answer 2

I use Walgreen's but I have Photoshop and can correct some of their errors like my black lab's face is featureless because their comuter used the background to set brightness. I think a new store will have modern equipment and maybe you can tell them what kind of pics you have. For example, I can ask them to make the prints brighter so the black lab face shows and they can. This works in a low volume setting.

Answer 3

They all really do the same. Badly. The best way would have them develop the film, then print out the ones you like yourself. You'll get a lot better results.

Answer 4

I think your best bet would be to use a local photography company. It might be a little more expensive but it definitely worth the money you pay for them to take the extra time and care to treat your prints properly.