About
Welcome to Hillvale Photo. We're an independent photo lab created by photographers, for photographers, located in Melbourne, Australia. We specialise in film developing and scanning across all formats, including 35mm, 120, 110, slides, APS and many others in C-41, BW and E-6 types.
As well as our lab in Brunswick, we offer multiple dropbox locations around Melbourne for you to drop off your rolls. From there we collect orders, process, scan and email digital files for download.
Since first opening our Black Street roller door in 2013, we've grown along with the Melbourne photo community. We've always had a DIY mentality with many other projects on the go. Hillvale Gallery is our dedicated artist-run space that aims to support, elevate and exhibit emerging local artists working in the area of photography and lens-based image making, and also where we house Hillvale Photo’s black and white dip-and-dunk processor and other machinery. We collect 35mm film canisters at Flat Film Archive, and have crushed 50,000 used film canisters to create the Hillvale Cubes.
In April 2022 we moved to our new location at 43-45 Edward Street Brunswick, comprising our all-in-one purpose-built lab and gallery with new C-41, BW and E-6 dip and dunk processors.
Read more about us online:
British Journal of Photography, On Location: Melbourne, 2021
Urth Magazine, Hillvale: More Than a Photo Lab, 2019
The Art of Film, Lab Chats: Hillvale, 2019
PetaPixel, 50,000 Film Canisters Were Crushed to Create These Cubes, 2017
Japan Camera Hunter, The Hillvale Cubes, 2017
HandZaround, Made in Australia: Where to develop negatives in Melbourne?, 2017
ProCounter, ‘Alt-photography’ lab flourishes with film, 2016
The Hundreds, "We Saw It Before You": The Story of a Photo Lab Called Hillvale, 2014
Asia-Pacific Photobook Archive, We Saw It Before You, 2014
Sprudge, Hillvale Photo in Melbourne, 2014
The Design Files, Jason Hamilton and Andy Johnson of Hillvale, 2014
Broadsheet, Hillvale Wants to Develop Your Film, 2013