analog-film on Cliff538

Thoughts From My Recent 3 Roll Develop and Scan

Mon, 21 Sep 2026 11:16:07 -0700

I posted some of my Pacific Northwest photos over on 365Pixels. I thought I’d write out some tips and tricks for this latest three-roll develop and scan.

Developing

I had my first fairly major leak using the AGO processor. It’s just a press fit, and it can come loose when you’re dumping out chemicals. You have to press it back in place after each dump just to be safe. I poured in my bleach, looked away for a while to prep for the next stage, and looked down to a bright yellow towel! I lost about half of my bleach and thought, well, this is going to be my first developing failure. I stopped the leak and let it process with the reduced amount of bleach, hoping for the best. I was doing 3 rolls of 35mm and just cringed at the possible loss. Thankfully, I don’t see any damage done to the photos. The process is more forgiving than most people think online.

Scanning

Scanning photos is going well. I use my Nikon Z8 and a macro lens with the Valoi system. The big upgrade this time was using an one-time $9.99 app called Orion, along with a $19 HDMI to USB capture card dongle, you can use an iPad as a HDMI monitor. This works for many things like game consoles, etc., but you can plug it into your camera via HDMI so you have a big, beautiful screen to align your negative and check focus. Highly recommended.

I’m learning to be more efficient and use batch processing better with NLP (Negative Lab Pro). This just becomes mandatory when processing several rolls at once. The time required to do each picture individually is just unrealistic. NLP has a very good help section. Take the time to read all the tips and tricks, especially on batch processing. NLP only works with Lightroom Classic, so if you are not a keyboard shortcut kind of person, you soon will be. The time savings are considerable. Consistent scans are very important when it comes to, say, cropping. You can crop one photo, then copy and paste, or use sync to crop all the rest of that roll. It’s beautiful and a massive time-saver, but only if your scans are consistent. If each scan is wonky in placement, you won’t have this sync option, and you’ll have to crop each photo manually.

The next new thing is dealing with 120 film. I haven’t spooled or done any 120 yet. The processing is the same, but I haven’t tackled spooling it in the dark bag yet.

📚 Twentieth-Century Color Photographs - Identification and Care

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 11:05:47 -0700

I recently stumbled upon this book by Sylvie Pénichon, and it is a wonderful deep dive into the history and care of color photographs. The appendix includes a chronology of several film types, including Kodachrome and Ektachrome films, Polaroid-Kodak-Fuji instant films, and more. It also has sheet notch codes, which are really nice. Just a great resource.

From the book description: This abundantly illustrated volume provides an accessible overview of the history and technology of the major traditional color photographic processes and promises to become the standard reference in its field. Following an introductory chapter on color photography in the nineteenth century, seven uniformly structured chapters discuss the most commercially or historically significant processes of the twentieth century—additive color screen, pigment, dye imbibition, dye coupling, dye destruction, dye diffusion, and dye mordanting and silver toning—offering readers a user-friendly guide to materials, methods of identification, and common kinds of deterioration. A final chapter presents specific guidelines for collection management, storage, and preservation. It also includes a glossary of technical terms, along with appendixes presenting detailed chronologies for Kodachrome and Ektachrome transparencies, Cibachrome/Ilfochrome printing materials, and Instant films.

360 pages with 375 color and 70 B&W illustrations.

It covers the identification of:

chromogenic color prints
dye-transfer processes
Kodachrome
Ektachrome
Cibachrome/Ilfochrome
Polaroid instant films
Kodak instant films
Fuji instant films
deterioration and storage issues

If you’re interested in the history and the how and why of color film, you will enjoy this book. You can read it cover to cover or use it as a reference. I’m slowly working my way through it alongside The Darkroom Cookbook.

I’ve also updated the Film Journey & Resource page with it.

Learning the Trade - Becoming an Aircraft Mechanic

Tue, 11 Aug 2026 13:12:11 -0700

This deep dive back into film has started me rooting around in old boxes looking for my old negatives and polaroids. I found a bunch. Got some of the Polaroids scanned today and uploaded. I had more than I thought. I picked the best ones, and you can see them below. I’m not using my new fancy Polaroid Frame that’s CSS-made because I wanted the worn, dirty, real look of these old Polaroids. I have a lot more negatives, and when I get time, I’ll start scanning them. I’m excited to see what’s on them. Seems daunting; I may research having someone else do it because there are so many. After I see the price, I’ll probably just decide to do it myself.

Nothing special, and won’t mean much to anyone, but I wanted them recorded and archived online. I also forgot how bad the quality of these Polaroids is, LOL. I have to admit, I was a little shocked at how bad the quality is and still is. Just a reframing after so many years of looking at digital quality. It’s nostalgic and fun, but ouch. I did brighten them a touch in post because they were so dark. Whatever Polaroid camera I was using was about two stops too dark.

The polaroids are circa 1987 to 1989. I started A&P school in 1987; that is the school to become an FAA-certified aircraft mechanic, with an Airframe and Powerplant license. Right away, a local shop called AeroTwin hired a few of us students to work part-time with full flexibility to go to school, which was ideal. We got to start learning the “real world” way of fixing airplanes while we learned the book way in school. It was an incredible experience and one that I’ll never forget.

We were thrown into the deep end right away. No sweeping floors and handing a wrench to someone. It was grab that bucking bar, crawl into that aircraft, and start bucking rivets. Of course, everything, well, most everything was supervised by a certified mechanic, as we were not allowed to sign anything off.

It was such a great group of mechanics. The friendships and camaraderie were something that I’ll never forget. I loved the work; I loved fixing things. Watching an airplane take off after we had spent weeks or months on it felt good. Plus, at that time in Alaska, it was a damn good career. Lots of work, many places hiring, and plenty of ways to move up.

Our bread-and-butter workload was rebuilding heavily damaged Cessna Caravans that had been wrecked or damaged while flying out in Western Alaska by Mark Air, now one of many out-of-business carriers. Not sure what those pilots were doing, but we had plenty of work.

After A&P school, I worked full-time at AeroTwin but left soon after for ERA Aviation. They needed DHC-6 Twin Otter mechanics, and supposedly they had a path to flying, which was what I ultimately wanted to do. I worked there for several years and learned so much; the guys there took me under their wing and turned me into a pretty good mechanic. After a few years, I learned the path to flying for them was really just a carrot and not real.

Soon after being strung along, a ramper talked to me and said he had received a strange phone call from a small operator in Kotzebue, Alaska. The owner hired him on the spot and said, “Can you be here in two days?” which made the ramper nervous and he turned down the job. I looked at him and said, “What’s this guy’s number?” I called him the next day; he said, “Can you fly? Can you be here in two days?” I said, “Hell yes, to both.” I talked to my boss that night, left on good terms, packed up my meager belongings and toolbox into storage, and jumped on a MarkAir B737 jet to Kotzebue.

The story from there will have to be another blog post. But that’s where the fun really begins. Becoming a pilot.

** you can click on a photo to bring up a viewer and scroll.

Kodak Snapic Review

Thu, 30 Jul 2026 13:16:41 -0700

I posted nine days ago about a new flight bag camera I was carrying around the Kodak Snapic. I finally got two rolls of film shot through it, developed, and scanned. You can see what you get with this very small, lightweight point-and-shoot camera.

Pros:

very small
lightweight
double exposure feature
flash
macro setting
uses two AAA batteries, which are common and easy to find

Cons:

the placement of the flash setting in the upper-left corner is prone to bumping
there is no indication that you are using the macro setting, which in turn means you have to remember to switch it back
film door latch is not covered. If you carried this in your pocket, you could pop the back open. I’ve carried mine in my pocket for over eight miles without any issues.

One huge benefit is how small it is; you can shoot pictures without people really knowing what you are doing. I’ve talked in the past about street shooting and feeling self-conscious about it, or people giving you the stink-eye. I haven’t had any of those issues with this. It fits in the palm of your hand, and when you hold it up to your face, it doesn’t look like a camera.

This is perfect for parties or being out with friends and passing the camera to them to shoot some. I used to carry a full-size camera on the road, but the weight and bulk just aren’t worth it. The Snapic will stay in my bag and go with me on my walks alongside my iPhone for shooting. You can see Becca Farsace’s video on why cheap cameras are better.

Let me add, just because I’m super proud of it, that both of these rolls were developed and scanned by me. The Tri-X was my first roll of film I’ve developed since 1987. Film borders, as you can see, are all over the place. I did not take the time to crop; you get the real deal of film border with these shots, no fake film borders on digital pictures with these! I intentionally used generic Frontier scanner settings so you can see what you get with this little point-and-shoot. Overall, I’m very happy with the quality of the shots. The Tri-X is just old-school, iconic, grainy black-and-white. The Portra is just the classic 1970s muted look that I’ve always loved. There are some low-light and very low-light shots, so you can get a feel for them.

Kodak Portra 400 Photos Shot With The Snapic

*Click the first picture to open a full-size viewer, then use the arrow keys to navigate through the whole set