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This was my first time shooting both film and on a 35mm SLR camera (Pentax K1000). The lens that it came with is a vintage Hanimex HMC 28mm f2.8 and the film is Kodak Gold 200.

When receiving the scanned photos from the local lab, I found these lines on every photo (being more noticeable in the underexposed ones). Since I am new, I asked the lab for their opinion on what could have been the problem and they told me this occurs when there is not enough light for the camera to create the image, but the lines are present even in the photos with good lighting and exposure (to a lesser degree but still there).

I wanted to also ask for the opinion of experienced people in this community. Do you think this could be a problem with the camera? Or the lens? A mistake of mine when loading/removing the film? Any advice would be very appreciated.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ For me these scratches looks like things, created by the transport of the film inside camera. Check the surfaces inside the camera where film move. \$\endgroup\$
    – Romeo Ninov
    Commented May 3 at 6:38
  • \$\begingroup\$ Beside the scans, you surely also received the negatives from the lab. Have a close look at them. Probably you'll see physical scratches on the surface. (Be careful not to leave fingerprints.) And they'll probably correspond to imperfections on the inner surfaces of your camera, where the film is transported along. \$\endgroup\$
    – Ralf Kleberhoff
    Commented May 3 at 9:05
  • \$\begingroup\$ I agree with the lab here. At least the three images you post here seem underexposed, which the scan software will try to counteract by increasing the brightness and contrast, hence making noise from the scanner hardware more visisble. I have no idea why the other commenters seem to believe that there are scratches on the negatives. That would look completely different on a scan. \$\endgroup\$
    – jarnbjo
    Commented May 3 at 14:42
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    \$\begingroup\$ I also don't think it looks like scratches - the lines are simply too "uniform". To me it looks like patterns of noise created by the scanner... But having said that, I wouldn't really expect this from a good, properly-functioning scanner either. You need to examine the negatives closely, and confirm whether or not the lines appear on the negatives also, or only on the scans. It could be worth having a few of these frames re-scanned if possible, to see if the results are the same again - but another scanner/lab may not be available to you. \$\endgroup\$
    – osullic
    Commented May 3 at 14:52
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    \$\begingroup\$ If you try a film from another source, and use a different lab, you can pinpoint the cause more easily. \$\endgroup\$
    – Weather Vane
    Commented May 4 at 11:52

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These look to be 'continuous' artifacts- they don't appear to be related to the intermittent frame-to-frame motion of the film, so I don't think it's a light leak on the camera end of things.

By all means, look at the negatives to see if there is some physical damage but I don't think that's it, based on the width of the lines.

I'd place the blame on the photofinisher. Perhaps a light leak in the development process or perhaps a dirty sensor or some other issue in the printing end of things...

Underexposed images would mean thin negatives, which would mean that the scanning software would not need to increase brightness. Overexposed negatives would be dense and might cause noise problems for the scanning process. Again, take a look at the negatives and see if they are dense (overexposed) or almost transparent (underexposed). That should point you in the right direction...

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  • \$\begingroup\$ "the printing end of things" Note that the film has just been developed and scanned - I don't believe there's been any printing done. \$\endgroup\$
    – osullic
    Commented May 3 at 15:01

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