I'm not interested in making digital prints but I do need digital images for website presentation. I'm sure that's quite common around here. What's the common practice? Do people scan negs and work the images in Photoshop, trying to duplicate the appearance of prints or do most people scan finished prints? What if the prints are bigger than the bed of the scanner?

I am sure there is already a discussion of this somewhere and I apologize for the new thread. If someone wants to point me to an appropriate thread, I'd be grateful. There are 11 pages of threads in the gray area forum and "search this forum" is not enabled in it.

I prefer to scan from my prints, since that is my finished product. I would be most likely to scan and manipulate from the negative in Photoshop only if the original negative had sufficient problems that I needed to fix. While you can fake the results of certain processes to a degree digitally, it just isn't the same thing (think borders on a real hand-coated print, for example, or an albumen print from a wet-plate negative).

I prefer to scan from my prints, since that is my finished product. I would be most likely to scan and manipulate from the negative in Photoshop only if the original negative had sufficient problems that I needed to fix. While you can fake the results of certain processes to a degree digitally, it just isn't the same thing (think borders on a real hand-coated print, for example, or an albumen print from a wet-plate negative).

Do you ever have to deal with scanning prints that are larger than your scanner's bed?

Do you ever have to deal with scanning prints that are larger than your scanner's bed?

Yes, I lower myself to using my wife's digital camera; but I wash my hands immediately after.:rolleyes:

I'm thinking I'll end up scanning film for inventorying negatives, scanning small prints for web presentation and using a digital camera on a proper copy stand for larger prints. Some clamp lights, polarizing filters and a tripod can make for a workable copy stand.

There is no real difficulty in scanning a negative and manipulating contrast in Photoshop to produce a result that matches the print you visualise. Certainly I don't think that there is anything ethically wrong in taking that road. However if you are radically changing the image by adding elements from other images that is a whole new ball game and totally against the spirit of what we all belive in here in APUG. I can see no reason why a small print should be made solely to scan although it is a different matter if the print is used for another purpose. Every image that I have ever shown in the APUG galleries has been from a negative scan simply because I don't have time to make 8 x 10 prints only for scanning purposes.