Grrr. Photo developer

[luckykaa]

I took my photos to be developed. I asked for the 4 hour service. Went back at the end of the day. He though I said 24 hour service.

So, Next day, I went in again. He was on the phone. Quite rudely he served me while still chatting to his mate. My pics came in a grotty paper envelope. I had to ask him for a decent box. Twice. He wasn't exactly giving me his full attention.

And some of those shots were screwed up. What can cause a big verticle brighly coloured splodge to appear across the negative? (Example) Sigh, if only someone who knows a lot about photography read this and could comment on what caused that to happen.

Other news - Downloaded Sidplay. A very accurate implementation of the C64's remarkable SID chip.

And I would really like to go to a sci-fi convention to play with my new camera sometime. I just can;t see one happening anytime soon, apart from a Buffy one, but I've seen enough of those recently.

Comments

[raygungothic.livejournal.com]

Eww, ugly! Judging by the shape of the mark, since you say the fault's on the negative, I can only really think of one likely cause. It really looks like a light leak to me - not a bad enough one to wipe out the entire frame, but enough to make a serious mess. If it's not the same on every frame, it's more likely to be in the camera than the processing machine - as the machine is in a constant light and each frame of the film spends the same amount of time in any given place, whereas the camera's sometimes in the light, sometimes in the dark, and you don't shoot at a constant rate, so some frames will spend a long time next to the crack and some far less.

From the shape, I'd say there's probably a hairline crack in the camera's case. It might be very hard to see, especially from the outside. If you can spot it, try painting it black and covering it in a couple of layers of black gaffer tape; if not, swathe the whole thing in paint and tape, or abandon it. (well, don't throw it out, hang on to it and I'll take a look when I get back to London)

[luckykaa.livejournal.com]

Okay, thanks for that. Poor thing has been treated rather roughly.

Mark seems to be on three frames, alternating shots at the end of the reel. There's a slight splodge at the top of another couple (alternating shots again, but this time it's the other ones).

In the mean time, I'll keep it in the dark. It will be retired once I use up this film. Might take it to bits and have a look after thet.

[raygungothic.livejournal.com]

Seems to me like your timing buying that digital was spot on...

Does there seem to be any correlation between the marked frames and time spent in sunlight/long time gaps between frames? 'cos that would prove it.

As for dismantling... A crack that doesn't totally wipe out the image on the film will be a tiny hairline on the side of the case, probably not in the middle of the back (the pressure plate's there, generally metal) or at the film spool end (the can would have gotten in the way)

I can just about imagine that a damaged film cartridge might cause the problem, but I find it hard to imagine ways a film cartridge might be damaged that wouldn't just wreck the entire roll.