Photos from Film in Charlottetown

We have five rolls of film from our trip to Europe (we didn’t take the digital camera because we didn’t want to have to worry about getting photos out of it; turned out that EasyInternetCafe machines have USB ports you can use for this purpose). We want the photos developed and scanned so that we can use them as digital files.

PEI Photo Lab on Queen Street will develop and burn a CD-ROM of the photos, but you have to get prints made at the same time. CD-ROM costs $7 and developing costs $12, so it’s $19 a roll.

Wal-Mart will develop and burn a CD-ROM, again with prints required, for $9.97 for the prints and $4.97 for the CD-ROM, so it’s $15 a roll. But, to quote their clerk, “our APS machine is down today, but it should be up tomorrow.” Doesn’t bode well. Amazingly, they can return the prints and the CD-ROM in one hour (when things are working).

Zellers doesn’t do the CD-ROM burning in-house, but can send film away for this. Their cost for a CD-ROM — which took them a couple of minutes to look up — is $8.99 and they were unclear on the costs for developing and printing (which is, as with others above, required); they thought it was probably $7.00. So the price a Zellers is, maybe, $16 a roll.

Japan Camera in the Charlottetown Mall doesn’t do any digital work (though they do have a digital printer in the store, allowing you to make prints from digital files). Their prices for developing APS film are $13.99/roll for 1 hour service and $9.99/roll for 3-day turnaround.

Shoppers Drug Mart (three locations: Kent Street, University Avenue, Charlottetown Mall) will develop film for $7.99/roll until tomorrow night (on sale) and $9.99/roll after that. They’ll burn a CD-ROM for $7.99/roll. Film is sent away to Moncton for developing and burning and turnaround time is 4 to 6 days. Total cost, assuming the sale price, is $16 per roll.

Just by way of comparison, I checked the prices off-Island.

At Duncan & Wright in Waterdown, Ontario, which is where my mother gets her prints and files. They will develop without prints for $10/roll for the first roll and $5/roll for the second and subsequent rolls. It takes them “about a week.”

At Carsand-Mosher in Halifax for “standard” resolution scanning they charge $20/roll and for “low” resolution it’s $10/roll. Their developing costs (which appear to be required in addition) are $19.55/roll, making the combined cost for prints and files $40/roll. I hope they do a good job.

So, in the end, if we want to stay on-Island and get quick service, the best deal is Wal-Mart, where five rolls will take an hour and cost us $75. If we send my mother the film, and have her people do it, it will be $30 and take us a couple of weeks.

Next time, we take the digital camera!