If you shoot film and have it processed at a drugstore, watch out. Walgreens and CVS are trying to steal your silver. By Eastwind41 (Own work) [Copyrighted free use], via Wikimedia Commons That's the only possible explanation as to why they no longer return your negatives when you develop color negative film. Instead of giving you prints with negatives in your photofinishing envelope, they give you prints and image files on a CD. You don't get your negatives back. By SkywalkerPL (Own work) [CC BY 3.0], via Wikimedia Commons Why? The film contains tiny particles of silver, which can be extracted and recycled, usually benefitting the photo lab. Companies used to offer kits that allowed labs to recover the silver, and you'd get your negatives back. But that technology likely isn't widely offered, since film processing declined. This page of Kodak's website talks about the process. The labs want to keep the silver. So you don't get your negatives ...
The Oldsmobile of Point-and-Shoot Cameras Olympus Infinity Twin. (c) DKassnoff, 2016 It's a gray brick. Press the shutter button, and you hear the workings of your Aunt Stella's sewing machine. It's a 1988 relic from a time when Olympus believed you only needed two focal lengths: 35mm and 70mm. That's the Olympus Infinity Twin, a thrift-store find that consumed $3.99 and promised a photographic experience comparable to driving my Uncle Arnold's Olds Starfire F-85 around the narrow streets of Bayside, NY. It did the job, but felt clunky in the execution, like the ball joints were shot. The Infinity Twin (known as the Olympus AF Twin in some regions) had a twin-lens design. The 35mm lens was the default, but a button atop the camera activated a mirror that doubled the focal length to 70mm. The 35mm, f3.5 lens was sharper and faster than the 70mm. I'm fond of Olympus' clamshell lens cover design, which first appeared with the Olympus XA film camer...
Seriously: how long did you think camera companies could churn out higher- and higher-megapixel cameras before consumers became fatigued with it all? They're figuring out that a new 12- or 14-megapixel camera isn't a necessity when jobs, hours and salaries are getting cut. That 6- or 8-MP camera most of us bought a year or two ago will do fine, at least until the recession moderates. As a result: Ritz Camera filed for Ch. 11 bankruptcy protection this week. Hundreds of stores, stocked with Fuji, Nikon, and Olympus cameras that no one's buying. Most Ritz stores were mall-based, within easy clobbering range of the Target or Best Buy across the parking lot. If you bought a camera from Ritz, I hope you didn't pay extra for a Ritz warranty. Ritz's court filings say they owe Nikon USA more than $20 million. That kind of liability isn't going to make things easy at Nikon. Take good care of that D90 or D300; customer service may get whacked. Olympus downsized a portion ...
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