Stupid Camera House in Canberra City
Apart from taking photos with our digital camera, I have really got back into film recently – I’ve discovered the joy that is professional quality film and I bought a second hand Canon EOS 30 last year, which is a rather excellent film camera and a decided improvement on my Dad’s old Pentax SP1000 which I had previously used. Using great film like Fuji Velvia or different varieties of black and white film gives better colour and tonality than in digital format, and I can scan them in on my computer to get a digital version afterwards. I have many photos displayed on my account on Flickr taken with film – you can particularly notice the black and white ones and the ones taken with Velvia, which have such wonderful colour.
I took a roll of black and white film into Camera House in Canberra City (Civic), which is right near my work, the other week to have negatives developed. I normally go to another excellent photo shop a bit further down the mall, but it was raining and I didn’t feel like running through the rain.
I should have braved the rain.
The shop called me back an hour later to say they had accidentally put the B&W film through the colour development process, which had the effect of wiping my film – the negatives are almost completely clear. You can imagine how massively upset and angry I was about this. The people at the shop apologised, gave me a new film and offered to process it for free – which is something, but still left me feeling sour.
I got my next B&W roll developed to negatives at my usual place today (it looks great) and I was re-reminded of how disappointed I was about the loss of my previous negatives. I not only lost photos from our holiday to South Australia (taken on the way back between Nerrandra and Canberra) but also more photos than I thought of friends in Sydney. So, Mandy, Byron, Jess, André, Charmaine – I’ve lost my photos of you. Mind sitting for me again next time?
I went to the Camera House in Canberra city to ask about the 40D (as I want to buy one), after telling me that was discontinued, I tried to get more info about the later model – They told me to google it and then go back to them if I still want to buy it… ridiculous suggestion and I wont be buying from them!!
I bought a telescope from them and my only two prerequisites were that I could focus my camera on it and it would track stars. The salesman said it did both and when I got it home it did neither. After 6 months of trying to get adapters and motors to get it to work, most at my expense or when I nagged them to try something, I finally said enough and took it back for a refund. “You’ve had it too long” they said. I said I had only kept it trying to get it to work and avoid having to bring it back in. They finally caved and gave me back half of the purchase price and let me keep the telescope which now gathers dust in a corner taking up room while I use a scope from another place in Sydney that actually met my two prerequisites. Avoid them at all cost as they appear professional but know less than I taught myself on google in 6 weeks.
so, where is your usual place to develop the black and white film? i was about to go there and get my film developed.
I now develop black and white film at home – I discovered it is actually quite easy to do. But if I wasn’t prepared to do that, I would take it to the Bica Photographics in Kingston.
Ah!! The joys of film, brings back many memories. Film destroyed in airport x-ray machine, film lost (Kodachrome) in mail, other peoples slides sent to me (Kodachrome), broken film in camera due to cold, scratches on film due to dust in camera, scratches on prints due to faulty printing, incorrect developing when using other than film’s ASA rating, slides popping in projector, mould on slides and negatives, finger marks on prints, slides and negatives, hundreds of rolls of film when on trips in remote areas, etc etc etc, not to mention the expense.
I could go on all day, still love the stuff, BUT, OH, the cost.