It’s more cost-efficient to buy a scanner and scan yourself at home than going into a lab and asking them to scan it. There are increasingly fewer photo labs that have darkrooms and a workforce to print out negatives. Scanning is also crucial for photographers who can’t afford to have their images printed. You should not forget to include your analogue photos in your online portfolio, site, or social media feed. Scanning makes it possible to edit and improve your picture for that unique print or share your work online. Scanning and printing your images hold a lot of weight outside of capturing the image. Developing is also technically challenging. This process requires you to invest time, precision, and money into a kit. If you are shooting colour negative films, you might not have the capabilities to print them yourself. However, with this method, you will lose more quality than by scanning negatives. The other option is printing your image in a darkroom and scanning it afterwards. Scanning is often the process you use when you want to digitalise your negatives.
