Digital BW, The Print

randyrancier writes:

> I'm a real stickler for quality, coming from a large format camera 
> background.  I'm planning on purchasing a MF (medium format) camera 
> in the near future; I've been seeing some good deals.  BUT, I feel I 
> will have a hard time justifying the expense of a 4000 dpi scanner.

Quality isn't free.

> Are there any labs that will scan to that resolution?  If so, how
> much are they getting for a roll of 120 film?

About 1/3 the cost of a scanner (I'm not kidding).  For the cost of
scanning several rolls of film at a lab, you can buy your own scanner.
Lab scans are often of much poorer resolution, anyway, and they don't
optimize the scan unless you pay (a lot) extra.  You're far better off
buying a good scanner of your own and scanning yourself.  It does take a
lot of time, though.

I'm quite enamored of my Nikon LS-8000, which scans MF beautifully.
There are other scanners as well.  None of the MF film scanners is
cheap, but you can go the flatbed route and scan MF with lower
resolution, which is ten times cheaper.  Of course, the flatbed scans
are also many times poorer in quality, too.

See

 http://www.mxsmanic.com/street.jpg

for a scan of Portra 400BW on the LS-8000. The original shot was taken
with a Hasselblad on a tripod. See

 http://www.mxsmanic.com/street1.jpg
 
for a full-size excerpt of the same image, showing the original scan.
Two other examples:

 http://www.mxsmanic.com/salute.jpg (full frame)
 http://www.mxsmanic.com/salute1.jpg (excerpt at 100% scan size)

 http://www.mxsmanic.com/stairs.jpg (full frame)
 http://www.mxsmanic.com/stairs1.jpg (excerpt at 100% scan size)
 
> Would it be more economical to send them already processed film and
> just have them scan the images that I want?

Not at all.  See above.  Labs charge so much for scans that you can
amortize the cost of your own scanner with the savings in lab costs
after only a few rolls.