[Henrico]

I never developed film and prints in the analogue era. But I think the type of film, the used chemicals and process, and the used paper and chemicals / process was critical for the final IQ. Film has a layered construction, each color layer (3 or 4) is sensitive for a certain part of the light spectrum, out of that a color space can be extracted that has its limits and certainly has not the same sensitivity in the covered spectrum. That results in that typically different look using Kodak, Fuji and other brands.

In the digital era things are a bit the same. The covered spectrum is a result of three or four channels (most RGB) with a limited sensitivity curve around a certain wavelength. With this combination it is difficult to get all possible colors and intensities in the spectrum of a human eye. Using RAW gives some more space, but it still is a projection of looking at a scene in real life.

Scanning color negative on a decent scanner or RAW camera, using 3x16 bits capture gives a lot of space for post processing. But still it is difficult to remove the orange mask properly, and only using levels, curves and contrast in PS to get the best result. I done it a lot and there remain differences in what brand and age color negative was used in the first place. I like the modern Ektar 100 now best for scanning, saturated colors and fine grain. To tweak the scans to the best looking result I often also use the more sophisticated functions in PS like color balance, saturation per color etc.. Doing that you can tweak a lot, but a good film, well exposed and developed is crucial to achieve the best results.

I did a thread on scanning and color balances years ago when I sold my Coolscan and started to learn scanning with my RAW camera. Maybe that is helpful too.

My best methodology for film scanning with RAW-camera - PentaxForums.com

[BigMackCam]

Thanks for the excellent feedback, everyone. With your help, my understanding of negative film continues to grow, and there's lots of good take-aways from your responses - but perhaps the most useful for me is that for a given, consistent development approach, the character of each film will differ relative to others. That makes absolute sense. Of course, it also highlights the fact that different individuals and labs may obtain different results for the same film based on their specific "standardised" processing factors (chemistry, temperature control, timings, agitation and so on); yet certain characteristics - grain, shadow detail, overall colour balance etc. - should still be identifiable when compared to other films. Thanks again!

[tuco]

The figital workflow can mask some inherent characteristics of a film vs old school wet printing with BW film. The density of the film's base plus any developing fog varies among films from as much as 0.06 to 0.35 that I have measured (eg RPX 25 and Delta 3200).

When we scan a negative, we can 'zero' the RGB value to either the film's base density or some higher density value if we want. So pure black in a scan could start at some measured density value greater than or equal to the film's base density. And subsequent lighter tones with more density in the negative will start having increased RGB value from that point on.

When we wet print, there is no 'zeroing' the blacks apart from increasing the paper's exposure which affects everything if you're not burning/dodging. So a film with a low base + fog density of 0.06 like RPX 25 will have its deepest printed blacks in a density range from 0.06 to 0.16. But a film like Delta 3200, with its base + fog density of 0.35 will only have its deepest printed blacks starting at a density range from 0.35 to 0.45. So the blacks are not nearly as deep and rich from a well balanced print from Delta 3200 as say RPX 25.

[LesDMess]

With the move to digitizing film - color negatives in particular, I feel the "true" color characteristics of the film is now a moot point. I recall when Kodak Ektar 100 was first introduced there were a lot of posts about the perceived color from this film varying from super saturated to other wordly. I seem to recall this was about the time Kodak started using the phrase "scanner friendly". I don't recall Kodak clarifying what that meant but at the same time they did acknowledge there were no "standards" in scanning color negatives.

The other character of film that I think is lost is contrast and latitude. When I see results from Kodak Portra 400 - and others, that clearly have blown out highlights I wonder if it is just an artistic choice or just a bad scan/copy. Obviously Kodak Portra - and others, have so much latitude that it is practically impervious to blowing out highlights during the capture process - even if you tried.

[Dartmoor Dave]

I seem to recall this was about the time Kodak started using the phrase "scanner friendly"

That's a good point. Makes me wonder if the attempt to make the colour negative films that are around nowadays "scanner friendly" is why they behave so differently to the ones I was using back in the eighties and nineties. Although weirdly, it seems to me that my negatives from ye old dayes actually tend to scan a lot better than modern films.

Personally I'd always rather shoot slides than negatives. And the nice thing about slide film is that you can scan it and then process the scan with the slide on a daylight balanced light box next to the computer, giving you a chance to make the scan look as truthful to the original slide as you can possibly get it. But darn, slide film is expensive nowadays, and I've had a couple of bad experiences with labs doing poor quality E6 processing and leaving me with slides with horrrible colour casts. In those cases I've been glad of the chance to fix it in Photoshop.

[LesDMess]

That's a good point. Makes me wonder if the attempt to make the colour negative films that are around nowadays "scanner friendly" is why they behave so differently to the ones I was using back in the eighties and nineties. Although weirdly, it seems to me that my negatives from ye old dayes actually tend to scan a lot better than modern films.

Personally I'd always rather shoot slides than negatives. And the nice thing about slide film is that you can scan it and then process the scan with the slide on a daylight balanced light box next to the computer, giving you a chance to make the scan look as truthful to the original slide as you can possibly get it. But darn, slide film is expensive nowadays, and I've had a couple of bad experiences with labs doing poor quality E6 processing and leaving me with slides with horrrible colour casts. In those cases I've been glad of the chance to fix it in Photoshop.

I really like and appreciate the contrast, color and grain characteristics of slide. Wish I had gotten into slides sooner to experience printing slides via cibachrome/ilfochrome. At least with slides you always have the positive source.

Regarding "scanner friendly" I wonder why maskless color negatives didn't become bigger? You would think that since C41 chemistry and scanning became the norm that this type of film would become the next big thing? I tried a few rolls of Rollei ScanFilm CN400 Pro and found it's apparent grain to be a little intrusive as you can see from scans using Epson V700, Coolscan 5000 and 9000. This clearly shows the advantage of the Coolscan 9000's diffused light over the 5000 as well as the "mottled" grain from the V700. You'll notice that not having the mask didn't seem to affect scanning negatively even with completely automatic scans.



Since there seems to be no continued development of maskless color negatives there must be an advantage to having the mask?

I should revisit these rolls of Rollei ScanFilm with DSLR scanning as I would think the post work would be a far simpler.

Were there other maskless color negatives released?

[Alex645]

One of the hardest films to scan was Kodachrome. Ektar was introduced during that transition from film to digital and Kodak wanted to advertise and assure photographers that their finest grain, top shelf product would scan well for future-proofing.

I don't know the technical reasons, but I have noticed that some films do indeed scan beautifully, such as Ektar and Ilford XP2 Super. Perhaps all films can scan with great results, but I've found that some films just make it easier without tweaking scanner settings.

[Dartmoor Dave]

One of the hardest films to scan was Kodachrome.

Kodachrome's an odd one. As you say, it's a really difficult film to get good scans from with any dedicated scanner I've ever tried. But it's a fantastic film for DSLR scanning, and I've had some good results from that method.

My theory is that it's because of the thickness of the film and the quite dense shadow areas that you tend to get with Kodachrome. I don't think most scanners can put enough light through the slides to pull out the detail that's actually there in those shadows, so you end up with scans that look way too contrasty. But with DSLR "scanning" you can use as long an exposure as you need to get the shadow detail out, and of course any DSLR has got more than enough dynamic range to capture the full range of tones from the darkest to the brightest on a Kodachrome.

[Henrico]

I still have some rolls Ektar 100 here, exp date is 12/2016. I bought these years ago with the idea it would be nice to use my K2 and ME super sometimes. But with a K1 and KP in hands it never came to it. Now I doubt if these rolls are still worth using. I stored them cool and dry (no frid/freezer), do you have any experience in degradation risks when I should use these?

Maybe I should do it just for fun. But my experience is that a same scene taken by an SLR and a DSLR, my K1 always wins hands down for IQ. The first generation 6 MP DSLR's outperformed film only a bit, but with nowadays gear there is no competition anymore.

For what about orange masks, in the past I used color negative films of many different brands. Most showed rather dark orange masks, some others were rather transparent light orange, almost a negative slide. The latter was easier for scanning (color reversal) but also seem to have less dynamic range, just like slides.

[house]

I

Maybe I should do it just for fun. But my experience is that a same scene taken by an SLR and a DSLR, my K1 always wins hands down for IQ. The first generation 6 MP DSLR's outperformed film only a bit, but with nowadays gear there is no competition anymore.

Most people shoot film mainly for IQ. Not resolution though but the image qualities such as colours, tones, highlights, halation and grain. Its really hard work to get close when post processing a digital capture.

[Alex645]

I still have some rolls Ektar 100 here, exp date is 12/2016. I bought these years ago with the idea it would be nice to use my K2 and ME super sometimes. But with a K1 and KP in hands it never came to it. Now I doubt if these rolls are still worth using. I stored them cool and dry (no frid/freezer), do you have any experience in degradation risks when I should use these?

If kept in a refridgerator, Ektar 100 that expired 6 years ago would have been absolutely fine. In a cool room that never gets warm? You will lose some contrast and saturation, but it should still be worth shooting. At least shoot one roll and find out!

[filmmaster]

its mainly a myth, compounded upon by using VERY specific developers and processing methods.

For instance look at David Hamiltons color photo work, standard film, but the look was all done via the way it was developed.

True Fuji spent a fortune putting "accurate" film emulsion filters into certain cameras to give digital photos the "look" of specific emulsions of their past glory days. But the look was all particular upon "this lotdate did this with this processing setup,,, etc"

[Dartmoor Dave]

its mainly a myth, compounded upon by using VERY specific developers and processing methods.

For instance look at David Hamiltons color photo work, standard film, but the look was all done via the way it was developed.

True Fuji spent a fortune putting "accurate" film emulsion filters into certain cameras to give digital photos the "look" of specific emulsions of their past glory days. But the look was all particular upon "this lotdate did this with this processing setup,,, etc"

I did an image search for David Hamilton and I wish I hadn't. I thought I vaguely remembered the name from somewhere, and I should have trusted my memory. Now I'm going to have to clear my search history. I strongly recommend that forum members DO NOT go looking to find out what I'm talking about, because that stuff might well be illegal in your country.

[BigMackCam]

I did an image search for David Hamilton and I wish I hadn't. I thought I vaguely remembered the name from somewhere, and I should have trusted my memory. Now I'm going to have to clear my search history. I strongly recommend that forum members DO NOT go looking to find out what I'm talking about, because that stuff might well be illegal in your country.

The intro paragraphs of his Wikipedia entry were enough for me

[LesDMess]

Maybe I should do it just for fun. But my experience is that a same scene taken by an SLR and a DSLR, my K1 always wins hands down for IQ. The first generation 6 MP DSLR's outperformed film only a bit, but with nowadays gear there is no competition anymore.

You're being generous citing a 6MP dslr. When Canon introduced it's first DSLR in early 2000 - a 3MP D30, a pro photog compared it to Provia 100F scanned with a $10,000 Flextight and concluded, "The first thing I looked at was, of course, resolution. As can be seen by the detail blow-ups immediately above, the D30 image shows finer detail." Referenceat The Luminous Landscape - D30 Vs. Provia 100F. There were some epic discussions about this then . . .

These shots (100% cropped not resized) were taken many years after the dust had settled - Sony 25MP A900 at ISO400 compared to Fuji Sensia 400 scanned at 4000dpi. I think even a handheld shot at higher ISO the film scan compares very favorably. BTW, the Sensia shot was taken years before the A900 even became available. Although these are two different cats from two different continents their markings look so similar!



No doubt that realizing what may have been captured on film can be very challenging.