How about Cloud? I seem to think that when my son takes pictures they appear on his iPad with no intervention from him at all, similar to an automatic backup.

Or use Bluetooth?

How about a USB adapter and just plug the iPad into the computer?

Oh my goodness, I can feel the photographers turning in their graves!

It's not so much the process, although more of that in a minute, but the relationship between the film choice and developer choice. I mentioned Tri-X plus FX-39. The result of that mix is sharp, crisp grain and moderately high contrast. Then there are softer developers that reduce grain but maybe make the grain "mushier". Then there are two step developers, high contrast developers, speed increasing developers.....

As for the process, do you use high dilutions and long processing times, or concentrated solutions and short, sharp processing...and so on, ad infinitum.

I would not trust my black and white processing to a lab by choice. It took years to get just the sort of negatives I liked to print and my option was just one option in a whole gamut of possible options.

Society photographers used to sometimes use gold plated cameras, or Platinum plated ones, to impress their clientele.

Unfortunately I have to rely on results speaking for themselves...

When you consider the limited facilities that were available on "professional" film SLRs such as the LX then there isn't a camera today that's "entry level" in terms of specification.

It's more about magnesium alloy bodies, weather resistance, etc. Oh, and cost...

This is all very well, but it would also mean a lot of inconvenience when buying and selling second hand kit. Project it forwards and HMRC would be totting up what you bought things for, when, what you got when you sold them, how much tax was due....I realise that's a long projection, but it's not impossible and after all, income tax was only a temporary measure to pay for the Napoleonic War.....

More control? No thank you, not considering that the percentage loss, however galling when it happens, is very low. In any event, to have such a register of items (not just Pentax) would carry an immense cost that we would have to pay for.

It could take a lifetime of photography to learn all the ramifications of different film/developer/paper combinations....but where to start?

Perhaps a good book on black and white photography would be helpful. Try the following for ideas of where to begin:

The Film Book by Roger Hicks and Frances Schultz, David & Charles, ISBN 0 7153 0150 0

The Photographer's Guide to Black and White by John Freeman, Collins and Brown, ISBN 1 84340 383 8

To get the best out of black and white you really need your own darkroom. Most of the interpretation of your images will come from how you print them - lab produced "literal" prints could be quite bland.

I don't suggest you mix colour into this as yet. It's not possible IMHO to think in both colour and black and white at the same time, so really stick with none until you need to explore the other.

My favouritr mix was: Kodak Tri-X, developed in FX-39, printed on Kodak or Agfa paper. A sample shot, Pentax MX, SMC Pentax 24mm f2.8 lens.
[IMG]http://i240.photobucket.com/albums/ff250/johnriley1uk/StAnnesonSea.jpg[/IMG]

Please don't go off-topic in Classified Ads.

I just wonder who won it and where it is now...