Welcome to film? It costs money? This is a key reason why everyone switched to digital...
You can Google around and find mail order processing for ~$5 a roll, and scan it yourself (flatbed with film-adapter, or for more money, dedicated film-scanning hardware that's usually much higher quality). You can develop black-and-white in a dark room yourself and probably get it cheaper. Not sure HN is the best venue for film-specific info, though; perhaps a film forum somewhere?
I'm not sure if that has ever been a thing in the US but here in Germany you can drop off 35mm film at most drug stores for less than 5€. They even give you a 9×13cm printout.
This has been a thing for a long time, I remember going with my mom to the drugstore after a holiday to develop a bunch of them. I bet they've thought of axing this for cost saving in the past but are now more than happy that they didn't do so with the resurgence of film photography over the past years.
In the past you could get film processed at most drug stores and many larger supermarket style stores like Walmart, Meijer, etc. Many times you could get the entire process done in one hour or less.
Now I cannot recall the last time I saw an in-store film processing setup. From a quick google search, there are a couple of specialty shops, but the pharmacies mention 7-10 day turn arounds, so they're sending it offsite somewhere.
I remember those machines being above the size of 4 office photocopy/print machines- it’s pretty amazing thinking of all the mechanical internals that must be in those things.
I’ve sometimes wondered what became of them all, were they able to recycle some of the materials, or are they in a bunch of landfills?
It was like that about 10-15 years ago in the US. But in the last decade as analog film died all of the drug stores got rid of their photo developing equipment--it took up a lot of room, required chemicals and training to use, etc.
You don't even need a whole dark room. You can get a kit that has a development tank about the size of a coffee cup. It comes with a dark bag. You need to practice a little bit to learn how to get the undeveloped film into the tank by touch alone while in the bag but it's not super complicated. Once that's done the rest of the process is done outside the bag.
In the US, “drugstores” are also historically neighborhood stores: they contain both a pharmacy and a convenience section. It’s not common anymore, but many drugstores also had lunch counters.
I’m not exactly sure why that was the case, but convenience is a plausible reason: you need to be there to pick up your medicine, so why not get your photos developed at the same time?
I'm not 100% sure on how they got this way, but from what I hear from my one time interviewing with Capsule, most US pharmacies run a not-for-profit convenience-store operation in the front 80% of the store so that they can attract people to build it into their routine, and then make money off the highly profitable prescription-medicine counter in the back.
So the corner drugstore will have prescription drugs, and over-the-counter drugs, and bottled water, snacks, school supplies, greeting cards, basic climate-specific items (winter gloves, sunglasses and flip flops), shaving, cosmetics and makeup.
And to maximize these economies of scope, they'll also have services: an ATM, Western Union money transfers, film developing, digital-camera printing, passport photo printing, photocopying, package drop-off, maybe even a key duplicator machine... you name it.
Drugstores in the US are a general store for the most part. They carry many things, but they are usually priced higher than a regular supermarket for convenience.
You can buy food, drinks, condoms, makeup, medicine, photos, and other things. It's a good business because most people need something to do while they wait on the pharmacist so they can purchase anything they need while waiting.
No, the cost for developing rolls (or the price per roll) wasn't why photographers switched to digital. It was about speed, convenience, and having the blessing of spending a lot of shots on a subject without running out of film.
You can Google around and find mail order processing for ~$5 a roll, and scan it yourself (flatbed with film-adapter, or for more money, dedicated film-scanning hardware that's usually much higher quality). You can develop black-and-white in a dark room yourself and probably get it cheaper. Not sure HN is the best venue for film-specific info, though; perhaps a film forum somewhere?