Scanning Negatives

Composition of Negative Film

Negative film is a photo material that, after development, displays the opposite color tone. The development of negative film generates the actual color tone of the image; the image transfers from a negative to a positive. Negative film comes in various sizes. The most common size is the 35mm film cartridge. In the middle of the 1930’s, 35mm film was also given the designation “135”. The film is, including perforation on both sides, altogether 35mm high and depending on photo quantity (12, 24 or 36) can reach a length of 1.6m. The format of 24mm (height) x 36 mm (length) for an image is designated as the normal format and has remained unchanged to this day. Digital camera image sensors with a size of 24mm x 36mm are referred to as full format sensors. Other common formats are 4.5 x 6cm, 6 x 6cm, 6 x 7cm, 6 x 9cm and are commonly referred to as middle format. The 6 x 7cm format is often considered an ideal format due to its appropriate size, fitting to most paper formats. On the market, middle format film has the designation 120, a designation given to the film by Kodak.

Negatives are available in both black and white and color. Besides the fact that black and white film is developed into a positive via tonal correction, there are several other key factors that differentiate black and white from color film. We will cover these specifics in detail.

As mentioned at the beginning, negative film is currently very popular among analog photographers. 35mm Film is available from manufacturers such as Agfa, Fuji, Ilford, Kodak and Rollei to name a few. These manufactures offer films with varying exposure sensibility (ISO/ASA), granularity, resolution and orange masking. A few of these parameters are not only important for photographers but also for analog photo scanning. This will be touched upon in greater detail in the “Scanning” section to come.

Negatives in the Digital Age of Photography

Nowadays, negatives are regarded as something special. Older negatives stand for the past; a past we would like to preserve; a piece of history we want to bring into the present. Like nothing else, contemporary analog photography and negatives embody the idea of conscious photography, of decelerating the pace of our hectic day-to-day lives; they embody the idea of manual, technical work with a result that we can hold in our hands.

Of course, this in no way means we have to rid ourselves of the digital world. On the contrary: digitalization provides us with the possibility of making the second step. Digitalization takes the analog, negative image and converts it to a digital, positive image that we can optimize and archive according to our needs, sharing the image with friends and family or posting it online. There are, however, several things we need to keep an eye on, which we will cover on the next page.

First Choice: Negatives

Today, negatives are highly valued by enthusiasts and analog photographers. Whereas slides, which in the past enjoyed a lot of popularity due to their quick development time, are no longer popular. We of course also have the digital camera for images that need to be accessed quickly. While on the other end of the spectrum, it can be said as a rule of thumb that those who practice analog photography must have the required patience as they wait for the enjoyment of their photos. And it is of course needless to say that these long-awaited photos should be digitalized in the highest possible quality, preserving them for life-times to come.

Exposure

Although the repro-workflow for imaging editing normally begins with the setting of lights and shadows in the image, when working with negatives, the exposure is first and foremost adjusted. In the NegaFix-dialog, there is an exposure regulator that can simulate the adjustment of exposure up to three apertures in either direction according to the selected film profile. The exposure of the scanner isn’t touched by this method. The exposure is then adjusted by NegaFix so that lights aren’t burnt-out and details in the shadows are clearly visible.

In the input-histogram, the distribution of image data remains unchanged. The output-histogram illustrates how all image details are shifted; when the exposure is decreased, the dark tones are stronger and when the exposure is increased, the bright tones are stronger. The data spreads out between the two extremes, dark (value 0) and bright (value 255) and nothing is cut off on the margins. All image details remain. Only thereafter is the brightness determined via the brightness regulator in the histogram, either manually or with automatic image optimization.

Color Cast Removal

Color cast negatives are no rarity. If after the tonal value conversion, a color cast remains, you can remove it quick and easy with the Neutral Pipette. One click on a point in the image with the Neutral Pipette removes a simple color cast. Neutral means that the point has the same values for R, G and B. Concrete is a good example for a neutral point. For example, when the last value is increased (135/135/150) this is an example of a blue color cast. After using the pipette, the three values for RGB are on the same level. A complicated color cast can be repaired with up to four neutral points in Ai Studio.

Dust and Scratches

Fortunately, dust and scratches are much easier to remove from color negatives than from black-and-white film or Kodachrome images. When working with color negatives, the dust and scratch removal tool iSRD performs an infrared scan using the scanner’s infrared channel. In the majority of cases, it is fully sufficient to simply activate iSRD.

Which SilverFast Version is Most Suitable for Me?

We recommend digitalization to be carried out by the user themselves. When carried out by a third party, the user loses control over the final result. In particular, when a certain look is desired, it is always best to take matters into your own hands, influencing every step of the process and paying attention to contrast, exposure and saturation. With the basic version SilverFast SE, negatives are ready to scan. SilverFast SE Plus profits from additional features such as Multi-Exposure. SilverFast Ai Studio offers a number of extra features for example for the NegaFix dialog. The optimal solution for archiving is the SilverFast Archive Suite and its raw data concept, which removes the image editing feature from the scanning process.

We wish you every success in scanning your film negatives!