robert_fisher4

Are you using good profiles for your the various papers you use? Good paper profiles are key to getting good results, especially with pigmented inks like in the 2400. Standard profiles from Epson for their own papers or from the paper manufacturer in the case of third party papers are certainly going to be better than nothing but custom profiles for your own printer will be even better.

 

If your monitor is properly calibrated and there's a significant difference between the print and the monitor then it could very well be the paper profile you're using.

 

Keep in mind also that prints will never match what you see on screen exactly. Monitors are transmitted light which will be a bit brighter and prints are reflected/absorbed light. You should also try to make sure you're viewing the prints under the same light conditions as your monitor is set to. So if the colour temp of your monitor is set to 6500k or D65 (daylight) you should be viewing the prints under daylight balanced room lighting.

I've been looking at the same monitor and have decided to go with it when I build a new computer in a month or so. What you need with an LCD for photo editing is one that has a full range of user adjustable controls and this one does. Most other LCDs in this price range don't. This makes it better for calibration. And it's got a good static contrast ratio at 700:1. This is on par with some La Cie monitors and better than others. It's also on par with some Eizo displays although not as good as others. I'm not saying the Samsung is as good as a La Cie or Eizo, just that it has good features for its price point. It's brightness level is down a bit compared to some others but not dramatically and chances are you're not going to have it set to full brightness anyway.

Turn off Adobe Gamma and Adobe Gamma Loader entirely.

Depends how you have your exposures set up Daniel. I've done multiple exposures in camera without the ghosting effect.

For b&w film, you're best to stay away from the Nikon film scanners. The light source these scanners use is not conducive to really good results on b&w film.

 

If your film is all 35mm then something like the Microtex Artixscan 4000tf or the Minolta Dimage Scan Dual IV would be good choices. You'd have to look for the Minolta used probably because it's not being made any longer.

 

If you've got medium format or large format film in the mix then a good flatbed like the Epson V750 will do a very good job on both the 35mm and the medium format.

Depends on the camera. With one of the new Pentax DSLRs (K100D, I think) it has a multiple exposure mode which allows you to shoot up to 9 images on a single frame. Using a DSLR without this capability then as Bob suggested, a fairly high speed frame rate and the digital darkroom. You shoot each frame individually then layer them in your image editing software.

Thanks for the follow up Tim. I wanted the clarification because doing it the way I thought you were describing didn't seem like the best method, frankly. Changing the numbers in the values of the Output boxes will drastically clip the colours and I didn't think that was what you'd want.

 

The technique you're using is not a lot different from the Levels adjustments many make in PS once they have the image scanned or uploaded. It's an adjustment that I make routinely, to bring the sliders in to where they meet the ends of the image information.

 

By doing it in the scanning process, you're basically profiling the film as I mentioned earlier.

 

Since this is basically the first time I've looked at Epsonscan in like 4 years or so and since Epson's documentation is pretty bad, do you know if you can name the settings or do you have to take Epson's default of Setting 1, Setting 2, etc. It'd be nice if you could save it with the proper film name (e.g., NPS 35mm or Portra 120).

Sorry for the double post Tom but something else occurred to me after I hit Submit.

 

Basically since I started scanning film, when I need to scan neg. film, I scan it as a positive and then invert it in PS. I find that it allows for a much better overall scan with ability to capture greater photographic latitude than scanning it as a neg. and having the scanning software do the inversion and compensation for the film mask. I've found it works exceptionally well for b&w films as well. Have you tried this method?

Tom, this is interesting. It seems like what you're basically doing is profiling each film you use to correct for the orange mask (and opening up some shadow detail). I had to update EpsonScan because I hadn't used it for film in the entire 4 years I've had my 3200. Is this something you could not do in say Silverfast or VueScan? Or is it something you find works better using EpsonScan?

 

Let me see if I understand what you're saying. When I adjust the endpoint sliders on my Input curves for each channel, the image is obviously affected. Then, what you're suggesting is that the Output value boxes should be the same? So if my Inputs are 75 1.5 175 then I should type 75 and 175 in the Output values?

 

I did this and yes the Input and Output curves were basically the same (as might be expected) and the image I tried it on was indeed very flat in terms of contrast, but..... it also had almost a fog over the entire image. That will be in part due to the flat contrast but still, not sure it's something I want to have to mess around correcting in PS. Or did I do something wrong when I was setting up the scan?

Nice to see Van Camper took your comments about not spending a lot of money into account. The scanners he recommended are several thousands of dollars.

 

The Microtek Artixscan 120 is a fine scanner. Contrary to another's comments it is not a rebadged Polaroid, it's the other way around. The Polaroid was a rebadged Microtek. The only thing Polaroid added besides the name was some superb scanning software.

 

For about $750 you can get the new Epson V750. It's a flatbed but a very good one. It comes with a wet mounting accessory kit which will give you even better results if you want to use it. See the review at www.photo-i.co.uk for some pretty postive comments on this scanner.

 

Flatbeds don't do as good a job as dedicated film scanners. The main reason for this is that flatbeds have fixed focus whereas dedicated film scanners have the ability to adjust the focus point to account for things like film curl. Flatbed scans done by wet mounting are better because the film is kept flat which results in better scans. That said, flatbed scans do sharpen up quite nicely even though they may be a little softer initially.

 

If you have much b&w film to scan then the Nikon isn't the best way to go. Nikon scanners don't do a very good job with b&w film. The light source in Nikons is a series of LEDs and these are not diffused in any way. Actually, quite the opposite, the way some Nikons collimate the light makes the problem even worse. Grain edge is very enhanced which makes the grain more apparent in the image.

 

The Epson V750 would be a good choice if you're looking to go flatbed. In dedicated film scanners, the Microtek ArtixScan 120 or if you can find a used Minolta Scan Multi Pro for a decent price, either of those would do a very good job. The Minolta is kind of neat because it offers adjustable focus but both automatic and manual (some Nikons have this as well, don't recall that the Microtek does). A new Microtek will cost about double the Epson and the Nikon a few hundred more than the Microtek.

This is basically a variation on the idea of painting with light. Using an open shutter, the light (flashlight or whatever) is moved around the scene to light different parts of it at different times. Areas where the light are at a given time register on the film or sensor, dark areas don't. You get an accumulation of light in the desired areas and darkness in other areas. Same thing is often done outdoors by popping a speedlight with the test button to build up highlights in certain areas of a scene. The person popping the speedlight has to be careful they don't become illuminated by any light otherwise you'll get a ghosting in the shot too.

Check out Dan Burkholder's website, www.danburkholder.com, and perhaps look into buying his book on the subject. He is the master of this technique.

Nikon scanners are fairly notorious for not scanning b&w film overly well. It has to do with the light source. Nikon scanners use LEDs which are brighter and more intense than the softer cold cathode fluorescent light sources in most other scanners. A softer light source is better for b&w film. The softer light doesn't enhance grain edge as much. LEDs are also hotter and just as heat in a digital camera increases noise, it will do so in scans as well.

Yes, you can do this. You convert the colour image to black and white using your favourite conversion routine (e.g., Channel Mixer). You then invert the image to create a negative and print it onto special transparency media like Pictorico High Gloss White Film. It's not quite that simple but those are the basic steps. In order to optimise the image for printing and enlarging you need to do some more work to the file in the digital darkroom by making Curves adjustments to get the contrast right. You don't even need to output to a 35mm size. You can output to, say, 8x10 and contact print that larger negative.

 

Dan Burkholder is the master at this technique. Check out his website, www.danburkholder.com for some tips and tricks. He used to have some curves available for download on his website (don't know if he still does). Do a Google search for 'making digital negatives' or something similar and you'll get a ton of hits.

All else being equal, you have the potential of a better scan doing it yourself than from a minilab.

 

Minilabs only work in 8 bit files and in the sRGB colour space. Actually, Frontiers have their own colour space but sRGB is closest to the Frontier space (and sRGB isn't really even that close). You can get full 16 bit files in the Adobe RGB space by scanning yourself. You also have the ability to profile your own scanner yourself using an IT8 target which will generate even better results. You don't have that capability from a minilab and are relying on them for that.

 

The V700 is a very good scanner. Basically the same as the V750 without the wet mount accessories. Check out the review at www.photo-i.co.uk. He compares it to a dedicated Nikon film scanner and it doesn't come up too badly. He figures it at about equivalent to a 3000 ppi film scanner. Medium and large format on a V700 are very high quality. Minilabs can take medium format film, but not large format. If you're scanning any b&w film, minilabs don't handle b&w well either. I'm not sure minilabs can output as TIFF files either. Most places I'm aware of that do high quality scanning will scan with a dedicated film scanner rather than the minilab if TIFF is the requested file format.

 

The other issue is expense. Depending on where you go and what quality of scan you want you may pay up to $3 or $4 per film frame. That can add up pretty quickly and if you have a good amount of film to scan, buying a scanner and doing it yourself may be the more economical option. The extra cost then is your own time.

Monitors are transmitted light, prints are reflected light. There will be a difference in luminance between the two. The profiling exercise measures colour values, not luminance values. The profiles are created to a set luminance value (typically D50 or D65 and your software may allow you to set which).

 

How does the image look on screen when you soft proof it? Are you soft proofing? If not, you should. This will give you a better idea of what the final print will look like.

 

What are the lighting conditions in your room vs. what your monitor is calibrated to? If you monitor is calibrated to D65 (close to daylight) you need to view the prints in something as close to daylight colour temp. and intensity as possible. A daylight balanced light bulb will work pretty well.

Prokudin-Gorskii did something similar. He took three separate b&w images each with a different filter (RGB) and then combined them through a special projector that applied the proper colour filter to each separation and aligned the images on the screen where they appeared in full colour.

Craig's got it. It's a pretty cool process. Dye transfer printing is a similar process.

That information is different from what I've been seeing Jay. Anything I've been finding so far indicates that albumen emulsion is quite archival. I've not found anything so far that indicates an albumen glass plate is only sensitive to UV either. I'm still researching, obviously. Appreciate the help.

Thanks Stephen. Yeah, I understand the magnification issue.

 

As far as light tight seals go, I plan to use something like rubber innertube material to cover the slot on the side. I'll have a slit cut in the rubber to slide the holder in and out of. Or I may use felt like on the end of a film canister. Haven't completely figured it out yet. I've seen other pinhole cameras that use film holders with similar designs of a slot for the holder to slide in and out of. For the replaceable back I'll use something like black, high density foam rubber as a gasket around the outside to seal it or maybe black felt again. Similar to the way the rubber gasket seals light and acts as a bumper for the mirror inside an SLR.

 

Pico, thanks. I suspected as much.

I'm going to be building a wooden pinhole camera. It'll be 8x10 and I'll be

using a pinhole from Lenox Laser. Focal length will be 170mm and the pinhole

will be .022". Film will be held in large format film holders and I'm going to

leave a slot in the side of the camera to slide the holders in and out.

 

I'm also thinking about making it with a replaceable back. The second back

would have a 120 roll film adapter attached to it. This way I'd have the wide

angle view on the 8x10 film and I could get a slight tele view on the medium

format film.

 

Is there any reason I couldn't use the same pinhole with the 120 film? Focal

length may be about 9 3/8mm longer depending on whether I can figure out a

reasonably simple way to keep the film at the same focal length (9 3/8 is the

thickness of the wood I'm using, 3/8" mahogany plywood). I know pinhole size is

fairly crucial to sharpness depending on focal length. The site

www.mrpinhole.com has a camera design wizard and it tells me the same pinhole

size of .022".

 

Thoughts?

 

Thanks in advance.

Old fashioned stove pipe paint. It's blacker than black and flatter than flat.

Have you tried Duggal, www.duggal.com? Failing that, mail it to the Dr5 guys, www.dr5.com.

Thanks Jay. I do know it's a slow emulsion to be sure. There isn't a lot of silver that adheres to the albumen substrate. Liquid Light is as slow or slower. About a 5 ISO if I recall. Maybe even as slow as 1. I don't know how archival it is either. Albumen glass plates are very archival. Didn't know there was an Alt Process forum here though. Didn't see it when I was trying to figure out where to post this question. I'll have another look.

I'm looking at making some dry glass plate negatives to use in a pinhole camera

I'm going to build. The albumen process is the one I'm finding the most

information on. The albumen is basically used as a substrate on the glass to

hold the silver when the glass is coated later with the silver solution. My

question is, would it be possible to use gelatin in place of the albumen?

 

Thanks in advance.