I guess whether a lab's scans will be good enough will depend on the individual lab. You could try a few, Eckerds and, well I don't know what labs you have over there... but if you find the results good enough for Photoshopping and printing then you may want to stick with that. Personally my experiences with the standard scanning service provided by most chemists or shop labs has not been good - often not even good enough for web use, never mind printing, they seemed more like a digital contact print than anything really useable. Plus even if the scan is decent it'll almost certainly be a Jpeg, and I'd rather have a lossless format for Photoshop.
Of course cost is the other issue. I completely agree with the point about the scanner paying for itself vs shop scanning costs. Time is also an issue, and scanning a whole roll of 35mm film with a flatbed scanner is not a quick process, but you can always read or something while it's scanning.
Mysteryscribe, you don't feel like you need a digital camera? This is news to me You make a very good point though, one that I agree with. Everyone's busy enough convincing themselves they need to go digital without us telling them that too. I went digital because I wanted to rather than because I needed to. It wasn't to replace film, but to complement it. I still see definite advantages to shooting film and processing digitally. Even if I manage to get a darkroom set up again then I'll probably still continue to scan film for Photoshopping as well. I just like the variety, the different work processes and different results. Insert generic analogy about painter's palette here.
Of course cost is the other issue. I completely agree with the point about the scanner paying for itself vs shop scanning costs. Time is also an issue, and scanning a whole roll of 35mm film with a flatbed scanner is not a quick process, but you can always read or something while it's scanning.
Mysteryscribe, you don't feel like you need a digital camera? This is news to me You make a very good point though, one that I agree with. Everyone's busy enough convincing themselves they need to go digital without us telling them that too. I went digital because I wanted to rather than because I needed to. It wasn't to replace film, but to complement it. I still see definite advantages to shooting film and processing digitally. Even if I manage to get a darkroom set up again then I'll probably still continue to scan film for Photoshopping as well. I just like the variety, the different work processes and different results. Insert generic analogy about painter's palette here.