What software can I use to invert Neg to Pos?

<p>I am experimenting using my DSLR to take photos<br>

of very old pre war B&W negs. I need a good<br>

software to invert the negs to positive. PhotoShop<br>

is too expensive for me at present and wonder if anyone<br>

could recommend a system that's as good but much<br>

less costly? </p>

<p>I don't want a dedicated film scanner at present<br>

as I believe I can get sharper results using my Nikon DSLR.</p>

<p>I am looking to make prints up to 20" x 30" size<br>

suitable for exhibition purposes as the subject<br>

matter is so very interesting.</p>

<p>Any help would be most appreciated.</p>

 

<p>Try GIMP, it's free.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>as I believe I can get sharper results using my Nikon DSLR</p>

</blockquote>

<p>You may believe so; some few others do as well.</p>

<p>Every photo editor I know of allows this sort of simple conversion.</p>

<p>GIMP is huge and overkill if this is all you want to do.</p>

<p>If you're running a Mac try Graphic Converter (<a href="http://www.lemkesoft.de/en/start/">link</a>). It's only $40 and will be useful even if you later go on to something like Photoshop Elements.<br>

I don't know what software you have for your Nikon camera, but it is possible that this can be done in something from them.</p>

<p>ImageMagick</p>

<p>I'll second the GIMP suggestion. Even though it may be overkill for simple negative inversion, but there is a batch processing plug-in for it that would allow you to do a lot of images without having to open each one individually. Irfanview is another free program that does batch image processing as well, I'm pretty sure inversion is among the available image manipulations. </p>

<p>Lightroom.<br>

Make yourself an inverted curve, save it as a preset. Works well with B+W negs, much more trouble getting the color right with color negs.</p>

<p>Lightroom.<br>

Make yourself an inverted curve, save it as a preset. Works well with B+W negs, much more trouble getting the color right with color negs.</p>

<p>Thanks to all with your replies, much appreciated.</p>

<p>Photoshop Elements is not very expensive and does it easily, as well as allowing many of the same features for photographers as its big brother.</p>

<p>For Windows, Irfanview is a very useful utility and is freeware. It has a negative option along with lots of others to crop, resize, sharpen, adjust colour, print etc.</p>

<p>Regarding scanning of negatives using a digital SLR, see the following three links for more information:<br>

http://www.addicted2light.com/2012/11/29/how-to-scan-films-using-a-digital-camera/<br>

<a href="/digital-darkroom-forum/00b7Fk" rel="nofollow">http://www.photo.net/digital-darkroom-forum/00b7Fk</a><br>

http://www.photo.net/digital-darkroom-forum/00bH3q<br>

I find that I can obtain excellent results scanning negatives using a digital SLR.</p>

<p>IMO Color Perfect is the best way to invert negatives, especially color negatives. It's a PS plug-in though, don't know if there's a stand-alone version.</p>