Digital Negatives for Alternative Printing

[Donald Miller]

OK Guys forgive me for this, but this would be more fun than an in camera negative Why?

Carrying a 12X20, holders, tripod, and lenses further then 50 feet from the car becomes daunting at times.

[sanking]

[QUOTE=L GebhardtI guess waht I am questioning is - has Mark found a way to make a smooth digital negative from the 2200? I want smooth tones on the negatives and don't want to rely on a rough paper surface to hide the blemishes.[/QUOTE]


Larry,

I wonder if there may not be somethiong wrong with your printer? As I indicated before I know quite a number of people who have been using the Epson 2200 to make digital negatives for alternative processes and so far as I am aware they have not had problems of banding or blemishes. And I am not having any problems of this type either, although most of my work so far has been with slighly textured papers with kallitype and palladium printing. However, I have seen some work by my colleague Sam Wang on silver gelatin papers that is very smooth and totally without printer artifacts. Later this week I am going to work out a curve for AZO and that should fully answer my own questions about smooth surface papers.

I might also mention that you will get a much better negtive if you scan and make all of your corrections with the file in 16 bit. If you change to 8 bit there is a big risk of posterizatio.

Sandy King

[Joe Lipka]

OK Guys forgive me for this, but this would be more fun than an in camera negative Why?

For reasons that the two previous posters mentioned, plus....

There is more control over burning, dodging and spotting in ps than when you do film interpositives and enlarged negatives. Every negative is perfect for the alt process of your choice. No burning, dodging, identical exposure times...

It is a great time saver if your goal is to produce many prints rather than slave over a single image.

Again it's always your choice on how to work. Personally, I love doing digital negatives. But I'm still a throw back in that I get my negatives made as film negatives, not from an Epson printer.

[sanking]

OK Guys forgive me for this, but this would be more fun than an in camera negative Why?

Several reasons.

1. Control. You do all of your tonal corrections on the computer and the negative prints pefectly with straight printing. First time and every time.

2. Rescue. Most of us have nice negatives that for one reason or another (scratches, fogging from light leaks, wrong negative DR for a process) simply can not be printed without an unreasonable amount of dodging and burning. You can salvage virtually all such negatives in Photoshop.

3. Size. So you have a 5X7" negative and it makes a nice 5X7" print, but you like the print so much and want it larger. Solution. Scan it and make a digital negative of the size you want.

Sandy King

[matt miller]

It's just amazing how far photographic technology has come in the last few years. Very exciting to say the least. There are many different ways to get great results, each with their own intricacies and expenses. I'm enthusiastic about the possibility of taking one of my favorite 8x10 negatives and enlarging it to 11x14 or 16x20. I have a lot of negatives that are so contrasty that they require extensive dodging & burning; a difficult task with contact printing. To be able to fix these in photoshop so that they are simple to print, consistent, AND with the ability to enlarge them is fascinating to me. I look forward to the day when I have the means (funds) to try this new process. I am very appreciative to those who spend their resources of time & money on these innovations.

[photomc]

All of your comments are convincing, but I wonder if everyone stays with smaller formats, then why do we need 11x14, 7x17, 16x20 etc film, cameras etc. There may be many times when it would be 'eaiser' to use a smaller format, process the negative and then output a larger one, but as we have all discussed before, some enjoy the process, some are more interested in the finished product. Neither is right or wrong, just satisfying different paths.

My original question was really intended to ask, is it more fun to sit in front of a computer than to be in the darkroom? For many it sounds like the answer is yes, for others it is no..but if less film is sold, there may be less film available.

Just random thoughts...

[Joe Lipka]

mark - As long as the final product gets slopped through a bunch of chemicals, it's an analog product to me. I don't get hung up what is digital and what is analog. The final image came out of a darkroom and not a printer. It's analog. The advantage of the hybrid method is that it uses the advantages of photoshop to create a perfect negative which fully exploits the ability of silver or other wet processing printing paper.

Francesco - We are there already. The LensWork Sample prints and the Special Edition silver prints are made from digital negatives and printed on Ilford or Forte paper. And yes, they are gorgeous.

[roy]

I am not too sure whether anybody worries too much how the negative (sic) is produced. How the end result, to whit the print, was achieved seems to be the bench mark for deciding whether it falls into the digital category or not. That to my mind, is where the craft element lies. in the process. I gather from another list that about a month is being mentioned for the publication of the book.

[Jeremy]

If you're interested in the book email Mark and he'll put you on a notification list for when the book on sale. He'll also include a quick over-view of what's included (though understandably not the process). He told me he plans to start shipping at the end of the month.

[Jim Moore]

The LensWork Sample prints and the Special Edition silver prints are made from digital negatives and printed on Ilford or Forte paper. And yes, they are gorgeous.

Yes, the Special Edition prints are gorgeous. I received one as a Christmas gift last year and can say that the quality is superb.

Jim