SilverPan Film Lab – My Choice for Film Development Services

By Hamish Gill

I’ve been using SilverPan Film Lab for my film development for a little while now, and have been really very happy with the service I’ve received. Like everything in life, what Silverpan do isn’t flawless, but it does fit perfectly to my current needs. I expect there are a lot of people out there who might feel exactly the same too, so thought it about time I shared some thoughts on my experiences.

I first met Duncan at The Photography Show last year, he came along to the meet-up that the Sunny 16 Podcast organised there, and though we didn’t get much of a chance to chat at the time, putting a face to his company name nudged me in his direction when I made the choice to explore an alternative to AG. He seemed like a nice bloke for a start, but as much as anything else, it was me discovering that he himself was the entire operation that became the primary deciding factor for me.

I should say, I wasn’t ever particularly dissatisfied with the results I was getting from AG, they were largely fine and often returned the negs within a week. The problem I was having was in fact more an issue with me. Working with a larger lab I had started feel like I was just part of their daily churn. This was fine when my goal was to just get reliably good results back quickly. But I was beginning to feel like I wanted something else. I wanted something more bespoke to my needs. I also wanted to be able to experiment a bit, or at very least feel that there were more options open to me in terms of the type of development processes available to me.

Why not home dev

Of course, the obvious answer might seem to be to start developing my own film at home. I have thought about this option quite a few times, but ultimately I always come to the same conclusions. I used to develop at home myself quite regularly and had fairly consistent results too. I found the process quite tedious though. It was fine when it went well, but a jammed spiral, crinkled neg or whatever used to drive me nuts.

I also don’t get through chemistry fast enough. Even just running one development chemical I sometimes wouldn’t finish a bottle before it was past its best. This would make experimenting with other chemicals or even having different chemicals for more regularly shot different films prohibitively expensive or wasteful. I know some people make it work, but for me, for the amount of film I shoot, and the fact that I find the process of doing it myself a little more tedious than many others seem to ultimately turned me off the idea of attempting to walk that path again.

Ilford Ortho 35mm test roll
Ilford Otho developed in Perceptol for 8.30 minutes at 24 degrees in Duncan’s Jobo Autolab

The alternative

The alternative, I felt, was a lab that provided a little bit of a half-way option between developing at home and a quick turnaround bigger lab. This is exactly where Silverpan Film Lab comes into play. Duncan’s service is a lot more bespoke than that which is available from a lot of the bigger labs. In fact it’s a lot more bespoke than a lot of the smaller labs I know too. So for example, whilst a lot of the bigger labs run everything that’s black and white through Fuji Negastar Chemicals, Silverpan Film Lab offers a whole host of different options even just in the checkout process.

Duncan is also open to having the conversation about what particular chemical he doesn’t list in the checkout might be right for the job too. And that’s just black and white development. He also offers a much broader spectrum of other processes from C41 colour film process to E6 and even ECN-2 for movie film stocks with Remjet. Then there’s all the pulling and pushing options he offers for all the different types of film and process too. In short, if you can shoot it, it’s very likely SilverPan Film Lab can develop it exactly how you want it to be developed.

First Roll with a Pentax MX
Kodak P3200 shot at EI400 – Duncan developed the roll for 11:30 in 1:1 XTOL by hand initially agitating for 30 seconds, then every minute inverting 5 times.

It’s also worth noting that he processes 110 as well as 35mm and 120, and that he scans with his ridiculously high quality Hasselblad Flextight offering scans in some fairly huge file sizes and types. He even does a bit of inkjet printing. More importantly though, Duncan is – at least for now – the only guy at Silverpan Film Lab, so he’s always the guy you speak to if you get in touch. As such, if you don’t know how you want a roll to be developed, scanned or printed etc you can talk directly to the guy who’s going to do the work for you so he can share advice and ideas he might have to achieve what you’re looking to achieve. The result of this, at least for me is that I’ve achieved exactly what I was looking for in every signal roll I’ve sent him!

Welsh Coast
Portra 400 (shot in a Mamita 7) developed and scanned at SilverPan

The catch

So what’s the catch? Well, it’s bespoke, so whilst he’s about the same price as a lot of other labs at the moment, I know he’s intending to put his prices up a little but this year. As he well should in my opinion – bespoke service is not something I associate with being cheap, and I’d argue he is too cheap for what he does now. In fact, a few of us who work with him have been encouraging him to put his prices up recently. It might sound mad to be demanding to pay more, but actually I’d rather he made a success of what he does through charging more than if he had to stop doing it altogether it through not charging enough!

Even outside the higher price though, turnaround time is a good bit slower than somewhere like AG too. So for example where AG would often have begs back to me within a week, working with Silverpan Film Lab I don’t even think anything of having to wait 2 weeks or more. And that’s if he doesn’t decide to go on holiday – he’s the only guy there, so when he needs a break, the whole place shuts down for the time he’s away and then runs at slower pace whilst he deals with a backlog. I must admit, it took a bit of getting used to this after working with the almost unflappably quick service from AG, but once I set my expectations right I was fine. Christmas comes around just that bit slower these days…

Finally, there’s also the fact that he does everything by hand. The result of this is a very slight increase in dust on the negs compared to some of the other labs I’ve used – though in saying that, he’s clearly honed his neg handling processes as I have noticed a marked decrease in dust lately. And besides, I’ve never had anything a bit of pec-12 and a pecpad can’t fix – I’ve certainly never received a scratched negative back from SilverPan Film Lab which is more than I can say for any Lab I’ve worked with before I think… at least the ones who I’ve worked with a lot.

Wales 2019
Ektachrom E100 developed by Silverpan Film Lab
Bristol
Ektachrom E100 developed by Silverpan Film Lab

In conclusion

As I said at the beginning of this post, whichever lab you choose there’s going to be pros and cons. If you just want speed of turnaround then it’s quite likely somewhere like AG are going to be a better fit for you. In return for this speed though, you might get the sense that you’re a little bit disconnected from the process. That’s certainly what happened to me in the longer run.

In the end, I really wanted to gain something more of a connection to the process of having my film developed without actually having to do it myself. I wanted to be able to choose the chemicals and make decisions about what I was trying to achieve from my negs without having buy and experiment with loads of different chemicals myself. For me, this is where SilverPan Film Lab really hits the mark. Yes he takes longer, and yes he might be a little more expensive (at least if he takes the advice he should), but that’s what should be expected from a more bespoke service.

As I suspect it’s quite obvious, I am going to be sticking with Duncan at SilverPan Film Lab for the foreseeable future. And I have no reservations in recommending him to anyone else out there who’s looking for the sort of service he offers!

If you want to see/hear more from and about Duncan, I made this video on a visit to him sometime last year:

His website with all the info including prices etc hee: silverpan.co.uk

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About The Author

By Hamish Gill
I started taking photos at the age of 9. Since then I've taken photos for a hobby, sold cameras for a living, and for a little more than decade I've been a professional photographer and, of course, weekly contributor to 35mmc.
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Comments

Philip S on SilverPan Film Lab – My Choice for Film Development Services

Comment posted: 31/01/2020

Big recommendation for Duncan and SilverPan lab. Bought a reel of 400ft of Vision3 5219 and about to ship him my last 20 rolls. Whatever pushing and pulling I request he does it all, and turn-around time for a one-man operation and a huge work-load is completely fine.
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Andrew on SilverPan Film Lab – My Choice for Film Development Services

Comment posted: 28/01/2020

Hamish, have you tried the Exposure Lab in Hereford?
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Hamish Gill replied:

Comment posted: 28/01/2020

I haven't, any good?

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Neil Woodman on SilverPan Film Lab – My Choice for Film Development Services

Comment posted: 28/01/2020

Interesting article which for me raises a bigger question around what we are doing as photographers. How much of the finished work is the photographer and how much is the lab? Does that matter? If the photographer is getting the neg developed and scanned by a lab, then making adjustments in lightroom, it seems the image is going through a lot of interpretation before it's finished, it's a collaboration between the photographer, the lab, and software I guess, is that bad and does it mean the finished result is less worthy artistically? Does it even matter?
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Stephen J on SilverPan Film Lab – My Choice for Film Development Services

Comment posted: 28/01/2020

Excellent stuff Hamish, many thanks.

Getting in to what happens after you press the button is for me, one of the great attractions of film. There is a pure analogue process, the sort of thing that men have traditionally been valued for. The idea that merely washing the film in various chemicals reveals the image, rather than a computational process that is completely divorced from the real procedure of loading a film and winding it on after each shot.

I realise that the image that we eventually arrive at doesn't care how it got there, but it is nice that we do.
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Charles Morgan on SilverPan Film Lab – My Choice for Film Development Services

Comment posted: 27/01/2020

I do my own developing but the results I've seen from SilverPan are excellent, and anyone who offers bespoke developing is worth their weight in gold - especially using Perceptol! Also scanning with Hasselblad scanners is another thing of joy. I've had good results from FilmDev too, how they all do that work for the money is a mystery to me. I still keep several developers on the go, but Perceptol only makes up a litre, and my PMK Pyro or indeed HC110 (old formula) or Rodinal will be around long after cockroaches have been wiped from the face of the earth...
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Roger B. on SilverPan Film Lab – My Choice for Film Development Services

Comment posted: 27/01/2020

American readers might consider The Darkroom in California, for a similar range of specialized services at reasonable prices. They partner with The Film Photography Project and will process the obscure emulsions sold there. The Darkroom also offers pull/push services. www.thedarkroom.com
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Huss replied:

Comment posted: 27/01/2020

The Darkroom is awful. They have messed up my film too many times, and have done so for others I know too. On top of that, no offer to make things right, not even refunding the money I paid for express service when their machine(s?) went down and there was a long delay. I recommend northcoastphoto, thefindlab, Dwaynes etc etc.

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Mike Hannon on SilverPan Film Lab – My Choice for Film Development Services

Comment posted: 27/01/2020

Yes, I've used Silverpan for ECN2 processing of Kodak and Fuji motion picture stocks and I was really happy with results and the service.
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