----- Original Message ----- From: Keith Whaley Subject: Re: Dumb Newbie Q - What Color ARE Color Negatives?
> William, > > Given your responses below...I'm amazed a lab is able to come up with > the right color balance at ALL! It's not as bad as all that. The machines I run are pretty maintenace intensive. My processors have 10 replenisher pumps each, any one of which crapping out will toss the chemistry out of control. This is a compromise to get chemical mixing out of the lab and into the machine. Other processors have as few as 3 pumps for paper and 4 for film. > > Is there a good subject/color scene one might expose the first frame > to, in order to guide the lab in getting all the rest of the colors > right? In particular, ignoring color at the moment, if I can, I have > frequently lost shadow detail in all the prints I get back from the printer. > I frequently expose for the shadows, here in frequently sunny Southern > California. If you can't get shadow detail, you'll end up with strange > looking, very high contrast prints, and not at all like I saw when I > esxposed them! Unfortunately, no. Because the machine treats each negative as a new job, and this cannot be turned off, it is better to find the best printer operator you can, and treat him or her like gold. Ultimately, that person is in control of the final result. One of the problems you are running into is that while the film may capture a 9 stop range, the paper can only pring about 4 stops of it. Colour photographic paper is way to high contrast. This is, in part, to compensate for low contrast lenses used in the el cheapo point and shoot cameras that are the dominant camera these days. It's also easier to sell a snappy colour print with vibrant colours than one with muted colours. This is a perception issue with the buying public. This is why O am very excited about the film-digital-photographic-paper machines such as the Fuji Fronteir and the Noritsu 2810 (which I think I am slated to get one of, perhaps this year....). These machines can be set to alter the gamma of the output, in effect giving us variable contrast control in addition to the variable colour and density controls that we already have. Think of it as contrast masking withou needing to make the mask........ > > Shall I go to the expense of purchasing some recognized standard color > chart and shooting that as frame one? > Someone mentioned a gray card. Would that be sufficient for what I'm > aiming for? Seems inadequate, but you're the boss... If you want to make yourself a colour reference chart, wander down to your local Wal-Mart and get a bunch of the paint sample cards that they keep at the paint desk. They have em by the million, and want you to take them home. Get some that appear neutral gray (take a gray card for reference if you have one) and you can make a gray scale. Get some in pure red, green and blue and you can make a colour scale. Glue em to a sheet of foam core and you have a cheap, but perfectly usable colour chart. You can go out and buy an expensive Macbeth one if you like, but I don't really see a reason to. In 24 years in the business, I have never seen one. You and the lab are a closed loop system. This means you can make your own reference materials, as all you need is something that is consistent. Now here is the unfortunate reality. I have seen a lot of photographers try the same thing. I have tried it myself. Its a good way to get a good global colour balance for one film type, but it isn't going to do anything for individual negatives. They are judged individually, with the machine determining how far the neg deviates from it's reference standard, and the operator throwing his 2 bits worth in when he thinks the printer is going to kaak on the negative. William Robb
