Perhaps an odd request?

camperbc

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For the past couple of months I have been toying with an idea, and it may come across as a strange one, I don't know, but I would appreciate any and all input you might have. But first, let me explain for those of you who don't already know me, nor my circumstances.

I am for the most part bedridden, due to suffering a serious and unfortunately permanent spinal injury after a bad fall back in 2004. I have perhaps two or three days each month when I am well enough to get up and about, and with some luck, outside with my cameras to photograph this windswept little island in the North Atlantic which I am fortunate enough to call home. (a one hour ferry ride off the northeast coast of Newfoundland)

As I get so very few "good" days (health-wise) I have, at least for the foreseeable future, given up on my plan to get back into developing my own film; preferring to spend these precious "good" days out photographing, if at all possible. I want to start shooting more b/w film and less digital. The plan is to ship the film out to some urban centre for developing, (there are no labs within hundreds of kms of my little Gilligan's Island!) have the negatives scanned at a high enough res for printing at least 8X12's, and then get everything shipped back to me, so that I can then send some of my favorite images back out again for printing. (Yes, I know it would help if I had a film scanner, heck even a good flatbed scanner... and a printer... but this is just not in the cards, on my fixed disability pension) The trouble I am finding, however, is that it appears to be a futile effort to locate a quality film lab in Canada that can develop my film AND do quality hi-res, (affordable) scans, meaning much back and forth postage between at least two different labs. (then back out for printing) So a lot of wasted time and expense!

This got me to thinking. What if I was fortunate enough to hook up with a fellow forum member, (who just so happens to do their own film developing AND owns a nice scanner!) to whom I would of course be happy to pay a fair price for their time/materials, etc., who just might be interested in earning a bit of extra cash, to develop perhaps an extra roll or two per month, and scan the negatives at a decent resolution? This way, I could simply mail them my film, and they would mail the scans back to me, or upload them, or whatever. Then all I would have to do is send any favorites off to Shutterfly for printing.

OK, so tell me straight up; is this a dumb idea, and perhaps I never should have even mentioned it, or is there a chance someone on here with a proper set-up might want to make an extra few bucks by taking me up on my silly idea? Or maybe you could steer me to someone you think might be interested? As I stated at the beginning, I would love to hear everyone's opinions, and possibly other (better?) solutions to my problem.

Naturally, in a perfect world I would much prefer to set up a complete darkroom again, and do it all myself, and in fact up until these past couple of months I was indeed planning on at least doing my own developing, if nothing else. But the fact is that I am almost always flat on my back in bed, often for a week or more at a stretch, and it would just be too difficult for me to take this on myself. When I have one of my blessed "good" days, I would admittedly prefer to spend it out in the fresh air taking some pictures, rather than developing film.

Your thoughts?

Glen
Focus On Newfoundland: about my photography:
 
Hello there!
Unfortunately I live in the other end of the continent and don't own the equipment nor knowledge myself, but it seems to be a win/win situation, so someone will show up ;)
Good luck and make sure to upload some photos for us to see and pretend to be cheap critics for a while jajaja
 
I don't think your request is odd at all, in fact if we had our darkroom up & running right now I'd be happy to throw your films in with ours to develop.

There's a group of analog photographers here in Toronto who regularly offer the same favours to each other; I've met a few of them in real life and they are a very friendly bunch. I don't know them well enough to connect you directly, but if you want I can PM you the link to their forum and then you can go from there.
 
I don't think your request is odd at all, in fact if we had our darkroom up & running right now I'd be happy to throw your films in with ours to develop.

There's a group of analog photographers here in Toronto who regularly offer the same favours to each other; I've met a few of them in real life and they are a very friendly bunch. I don't know them well enough to connect you directly, but if you want I can PM you the link to their forum and then you can go from there.


Thank-you BlackSheep; I would indeed be interested in contacting this group of photographers! I await your PM. And thanks also to dxqcanada for providing the link to "Camera 35" ; I'll check it out!

Glen
Focus On Newfoundland: about my photography:
 
Not a dumb request at all. I would do it (hell, I would do it for just the cost of shipping), but I think you can probably find someone that wouldn't require international shipping each way (not sure how much that would be, but it sounds expensive). There's got to be at least a few Canadians who still develop their own film, lol!

I hope you can find someone closer, or even a good lab that can do it all. Good luck!
 

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