I tried the Picture CD route, was initially encouraged by the results, but
have been disappointed recently. All the CD's coming back this year have
been poorly scanned with frames not squared in their scanner during the
scan (I can see part of the film between frames), poor contrast and color
balancing off.
I should have taken them make and made them do it over again, except you
must return all the prints, negatives and CD. I was able to pull something
reasonable out of all of them, but not without considerable effort at
working with the contrast, color balancing and saturation. Measure the
manipulation time in tens of minutes per image. Oh yes, they've even
skipped a frame on two of them.
My conclusion is you are completely at the mercy of the person running the
scanner at Qualex, just as you are at the mercy of a print machine
operator. You takes your chances with the regional Qualex lab in general
and more specifically its scanner operator(s). The one that serves my
region must have had their good operator quit last year. Chip, you just
might have a decent operator in your regional lab. Enjoy it as long as it
lasts!
As for Photo CD's, I've gotten two done by a lab in Indianapolis and been
pleased with both. Went the cheapest "just scan the things" route. No
contrast adjustment or color balancing, or making the vertical shots
vertical in the scan (they're sideways, but you can turn 'em 90 degrees
very easily yourself). So, there has been some color balancing and
contrast adjustments to them, but overall they've been better with a much
higher resolution to work with.
All the hassle this year with Picture CD's and I was hauling around two
camera bodies, one with Kodachrome and one with negative, and double
shooting everything. The *only* reason I was shooting any color negative
to begin with was for the Picture CD's. Phooey. I'm giving up on color
negative again for everything except panoramics and family group photos,
going back to having the Kodachromes done on Photo CD's in spite of the
cost, and saving my nickels and dimes for a good film scanner!
-- John
At 00:07 8/14/00 , Chip Stratton wrote:
>For dipping your toes, try getting a 'Picture CD' next time you have a roll
>of color negative film developed - only costs about $8 on top of your
>regular developing and printing. The scans are usually good, though only
>about 1500x1000 pixels. These 1.5 megapixels will be roughly equivalent to
>what a 2 megapixel digital camera will deliver to you - and the color will
>be better with the Picture CD too.
>
>I've only tried gen-u-wine PhotoCD once, from Dale Labs, and was bitterly
>disappointed in the quality of the scans. I got much better results using
>my lowly HP Photosmart S20 on the same slides. I don't know if this speaks
>to PhotoCDs in general, or only this batch from Dale, but I'm not inclined
>to try again, particularly given the cost.
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