p.1 #1 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
I recently revived my Nikkormat and shot a roll of Ultramax 400. I was hoping to convert the negatives to digital pics by scanning them with my Z5ii and converting to positive in software. I tried both Paintshop Pro X which I've had for years and GIMP on a Linux computer It didn't go well. Pics which should have been straightforward or at least with realistic color typically came out with a blue overcast. I could tweak a few to look okay but not real, and too soft.
Obviously I'm missing something, or there is no easy 1-button way to do it. Or perhaps the camera applied some sort of color correction or white balance shift and I need to re-scan them with all that stuff turned off. Or I need to use Darktable or similar which might have a functional tool.
If you are "scanning" with your camera, make sure to set the white balance based on the light that you are using, not the negative (sorry for stating the obvious). Also, try to capture a part of the negative that has not been exposed in order to help the converting program to correct for the film base color (the orange tint).
1. Camera Settings: Use manual mode (M), lowest native ISO, RAW (NEF) file format.
2. Set custom white balance based on the light source illuminating your negatives.
3. Use a dedicated macro lens (e.g., 100mm) for a flat field of focus and high resolution.
4. Use a high-CRI (Color Rendering Index) light panel (95+ CRI) to ensure accurate color reproduction.
5. If film holder is not attached to the lens, ensure the sensor is parallel to the film. Use a small mirror on the light pad to align the camera by centering the reflection of the lens.
6. Use a dedicated film holder or a sheet of Anti-Newton glass to keep the negative perfectly flat.
7. Expose for the darkest part of the negative (which is the lightest part of the final photo). Use a live view histogram to ensure the brightest highlights are not clipping, keeping the histogram generally in the center or slightly right.
p.1 #3 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
Negative Lab Pro is a plug in for Lightroom and was designed to deal with the orange cast of color negatives. It does involve the expense of a Lightroom subscription and the cost of the plug in but makes converting fast and easy.
Darktable is the low cost alternative. It has a fairly steep learning curve but offers a lot of manipulation once you become comfortable with using it.
Since you’re using Linux, it might be worth exploring Darktable. If you were using a lot of film on a regular basis, then NLP is the way to go.
p.1 #5 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
Thank you all for the great replies. Here I naively thought there would be a one- (or maybe two- or three-) click tool in software I already had. Silly me. Maybe there is. I got about halfway through the Alex Burke article before I remembered my eye-of-newt was well past its expiration date. Will have to read it again after translating some of his terminology and installing software.
If you are "scanning" with your camera, make sure to set the white balance based on the light that you are using, not the negative (sorry for stating the obvious)....
Thanks. I had played with Darktable a few times already (tried the Windows version too but...it...ran...so...slowly), learned my way around but generally had no need for it with the pics from my digital camera. I wasn't sure what the purpose was for so much of it. I will see how those two programs work, maybe learn something from them.
As for scanning with my camera, obvious or not your comments are welcome. I have a nice scanning rig with WHITE!! light source and film holder, and a 1:1 90mm Tamron macro. I've already scanned more than 650 slides shot during my previous life and they always came out exactly as expected. But it didn't occur to me to set white balance to non-auto, may have to re-do them. Negatives have very, ah, non-typical color content.
p.1 #7 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
Well....., I downloaded Filmvert 1.1.2, ran it, or rather tried to run it. it complained about no signature (as expected) but I ran it anyway. My laptop froze, keyboard, touch pad, ctrl-alt-delete, and everything, or rather nuthin'. Complete paralysis. After hacking around I finally poked at the power button for 10sec to force power-down, waited five minutes for Windows to wake up, tried again. Same thing. So I figured maybe 1.1.1 would be better. Went to github, found the entry for it but no obvious way to download the 1.1.1 exe or zipfile. (And did I mention how much I despise github? It was written by people who took joy in making nothing intuitive, labels all made up, millions of options leading to obscurity.)
p.1 #8 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
Welcome to the pain of converting color negatives to realistic looking positive images! I consider it to this day as one of the most painful parts of film processing from my experience in over 10 years since I do film development (B&W, C-41, and E-6) myself. As others earlier mentioned, there is now better software available which does a good job converting color negatives more accurately. Vuescan does a pretty good job here, too - stay away from SilverFast 8 version which often came free with scanners. The latter can be very frustrating to use to get colors right from the negative scan plus often makes some yellowish borders which neither exist in the negative itself nor in the original negative scan.Not sure if newer versions solved these issues - I gave up on this one and use Vuescan since which is much more comfortable to operate.
One easy way I found to convert color negatives into positive images is by using Photoshop with black point, white point, and maybe grey point setting. It still takes a bit of color adjustment within the Hue/Saturation option afterwards, but results came out decent this way. I often referred to this method when I nearly gave up on getting the scan right with SilverFast.
Now very different question to get the exact color film negative "look". Some films are easier here to adjust and where you see the distinctive film look easily - Kodak Ektar is one example with purple shadows but vibrant red and yellow colors. Much more difficult because a lot more flatter in coloration are IMO the Porta films. Wasn't thrilled by them after color negative conversion - much cheaper Kodak Gold did a better job here for me. Fuji negative film colors tend to be more vibrant in the greens and blues. Each on their own to decide if the final image color is different enough from a post processed color based digital file. I often had to admit it isn't with few exemptions (Kodak Ektar based mostly which I like). Different story when looking at color slide films - Fuji Velvia 50 is much harder to process in a similar way with colors from a digital file.
p.1 #11 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
jimmuller wrote:
I got Darktable to work. First effort.
Excellent. If you are willing to share your raw file, I would gladly give it a try and share the xml file (development parameters) if it comes out ok. Not that I pretend that I am an expert, but I did spent endless hours trying to figure out a proper workflow with darktable ;-)
p.1 #13 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
AmbientMike wrote:
If its a blue cast have you adjusted basic color temperature?
Noop, haven't adjust anything specifically. Probably got it wrong in the scan though the film was shot in daylight and the scanning light source is a cool, broad spectrum white that has scanned old slides just great. The scanning rig was designed for 35mm film but a colleague with a 3-d printer made a slide holder for it.
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mskad2 wrote:
Excellent. If you are willing to share your raw file, I would gladly give it a try...
I would willingly share a raw file if I had any. I've been shooting jpg exclusively.
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mattdev222 wrote:
I'd also recommend giving Filmlab a shot. Negative Lab Pro never really clicked with me for some reason but Filmlab has treated me absolutely amazing.
p.1 #14 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
I like Filmomat SmartConvert. You only need to buy once for a perpetual licence for all upgrades. It replicates the workflow of Fuji frontier scanners and is pretty simple to use.
p.1 #15 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
jimmuller wrote:
I would willingly share a raw file if I had any. I've been shooting jpg exclusively.
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Forget about ever getting good conversions then.
Converting a color negative image involves a pretty extreme white balance shift and stretch of the histogram. The 8bit color depth of the jpg just completely falls apart, you need a 14bit raw file for good results.
p.1 #16 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
fjablo wrote:
Forget about ever getting good conversions then.
Converting a color negative image involves a pretty extreme white balance shift and stretch of the histogram. The 8bit color depth of the jpg just completely falls apart, you need a 14bit raw file for good results.
Then I shall have to switch to raw format when shooting film, won't I?
p.1 #20 · Convert scanned color negatives to positive pics?
madNbad wrote:
That's because we've already have made our share of mistakes.
Yes, well, in photography we all try to find new things. I have spent much of my life discovering new mistakes to make.
I've found my way around negadoctor in Darktable. Sometimes it works okay but I'm not happy with everything. I intend to re-scan my film to produce raw images, then work with them. We'll see. Literally.
Pics which should have been straightforward or at least with realistic color typically came out with a blue overcast. I could tweak a few to look okay but not real, and too soft.
I've been shooting jpg exclusively.