Re: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask)
"Tony Sleep" [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Fuji recently launched a new version of the 400, which is supposed to be much better than the previous stuff and now uses the same grain technology as the 100. I haven't tried the new film, but the old was was dreadful. Is that the source of confusion? I was talking about Provia 400F not Provia 400. Rob
Re: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask)
When you push Provia F100 to 400 do you need to modify the film processing/development? Dale W - Original Message - From: "Frank Paris" [EMAIL PROTECTED] Forget it unless what you are after is highly visible grain. If you don't want absolutely appalling grain but want the speed, it is better to push Provia F100 to 400 than to work with straight Provia F400.
Re: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask)
"Li Xia and Dale Weedman" [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: When you push Provia F100 to 400 do you need to modify the film processing/development? Absolutely, yes, otherwise you aren't "pushing" the film. Rob
Re: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask)
I'm from the old black and white school of hard knocks. If I wanted fine grain I shot a slow film, asa 50 or slower. For a higher speed and still fine grain Tri-X. If I wanted a tighter grain in Provia why wouldn't I shoot 400 instread of pushing 100 to 400?
RE: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask)
I'm only going by heresay here, but what I've *heard* is that Provia 100 and Provia 400 are related in name only and that when you push 100 to 400, it has finer grain than when you use 400 directly. I would like to hear a good explanation for why Provia 400 even exists, the grain is so bad. Maybe because some people WANT grain, for effect. Frank Paris [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumList?u=62684 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, January 21, 2001 6:41 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask) I'm from the old black and white school of hard knocks. If I wanted fine grain I shot a slow film, asa 50 or slower. For a higher speed and still fine grain Tri-X. If I wanted a tighter grain in Provia why wouldn't I shoot 400 instread of pushing 100 to 400?
Re: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I'm from the old black and white school of hard knocks. If I wanted fine grain I shot a slow film, asa 50 or slower. For a higher speed and still fine grain Tri-X. With "fast" Provia 100F there isn't much grain to look at. :-) If I wanted a tighter grain in Provia why wouldn't I shoot 400 instread of pushing 100 to 400? Rumour has it that one gets less grain with 100F pushed than using 400F. 100F is a really nice film. Caused me to stop using Kodachrome 64. Mike K.
Re: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask)
On Sun, 21 Jan 2001 22:09:52 +1100 Li Xia and Dale Weedman ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: When you push Provia F100 to 400 do you need to modify the film processing/development? Yes. 'Pushing' with E6 means increasing the first development to increase the density of the silver image to compensate for underexposure. Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons
RE: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask)
Frank wrote: [I want a good] explanation for why Provia 400 even exists, the grain is so bad. Maybe because some people WANT grain, for effect. I didn't find the grain of 400F so bad at all. It seems to have the same amorphous nature as 100F grain, so it doesn't look anywhere near as ugly as the grain in (say) Kodak Gold 100. Rob Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wordweb.com
RE: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask)
Are you guys still talking about Provia 400F? If so, I don't get your point - it's a darn good 400 speed slide film in my experience, less grainy than any other 400 I've used, or Fuji 100/1000 / Kodak E200 pushed to 400. Pushed it also does better than these. Much denser blacks. Best thing around at 400. Tim A PS, checked the good reviews on PhotographyReview -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Frank Paris Sent: January 21, 2001 6:02 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask) If you could see my scans, you couldn't possibly say the grain on the rolls I scanned isn't so bad. Extremely disappointing. I subsequently went up on the PhotographyReview site to see what people are saying about this film and it's the same story I'm telling. Frank Paris [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumList?u=62684 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Rob Geraghty Sent: Sunday, January 21, 2001 3:41 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: Provia 400F (Was filmscanners: orange mask) Frank wrote: [I want a good] explanation for why Provia 400 even exists, the grain is so bad. Maybe because some people WANT grain, for effect. I didn't find the grain of 400F so bad at all. It seems to have the same amorphous nature as 100F grain, so it doesn't look anywhere near as ugly as the grain in (say) Kodak Gold 100. Rob Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wordweb.com
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
This matter of excess blue in a landscape image goes all the way back to early BW photography in the 19th Century when the films and glass plates would respond only to blue light, hence the always "white" skies in old photos. The sky was virtually all blue light and would overexpose the negative in that area. The fact that an image was recorded, and often extremely well, illustrates how pervasive blue light is in a landscape scene but not so pervasive that the subjects on the ground were overexposed. I trick I learned years ago, when using medium format cameras in BW, came from the late Ansel Adams. His favorite BW filter was a no. 12 "Minus Blue" which filtered out *only* visible blue light to a large degree. This often was a starting point for determining exposure (he used large view cameras) and depending upon what you had visualized, you could use an orange or even a red filter; or you could go the other way using green, light yellow or even (rarely!) a blue filter. Or none at all. In the Colorado Rockies, I often used a green filter -- it would still darken the sky and increase contrast slightly but would lighten the foliage (of evergreen trees particularly) sufficiently so the trees would not print black in the final image. Foliage usually has blue light scattered all through it, particularly at altitude -- I very often was at altitudes between 10,000 and 14,000 feet. Blue light has the shortest wave length of all visible light and therefore "scatters" throughout a scene much more readily than the longer wave lengths at the red end of the spectrum. Wave lengths shorter than blue start getting into the invisible ultra violet range and much longer than the red end of the spectrum gets into infra reds, also invisible to the eye except through special films. The judicious use (by the photographer's subjective judgement) of filters carries over into the world of color. I have found a lot of blue in the Sierra Nevada mountains here in California; in the high desert region east of those mountains [it may be desert but it's still 6,000 to 8,000 feet above sea level, hence there's a lot of blue light scattering around]; in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado and Canada; and in Norway [particularly as one gets further north -- the light at North Cape, the "top of Europe" can be very hard to deal with] in the land of the midnight sun. If you're shooting in early morning or late afternoon light, either different filtering or no filtering is called for but that depends on the latitude you're in and the time of year. The San Francisco Bay Area, where I live, is located at about the same latitude as Gibraltar; Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, is located at about at the same latitude as Paris. I usually do my photography in places such as those mentioned above and have found that an 81A filter on the camera helps a lot in dealing with a lot of excessive blue light. Occasionally, I use a stronger 81B but not often. I feel it's better to deal right at the camera with the light falling on a landscape before retiring to a darkroom or digital treatment to produce a print. The light in Greece was a different story, for the most part, particularly in landscapes in the Greek Islands. Greece was almost always slightly hazy for the 7 weeks I was there in '97, so judicious polarizing was called for. It's a nice trick to clear the haze without introducing a lot of blue tint where you don't want it. Hawaii is another difficult place for landscape lighting; Ansel Adams used to say he never did master it. A friend of mine, who was an assistant to Adams and who lives 4,000 feet up on the side of Mauna Kea volcano at a place called (naturally) Volcano, Hawaii, has mastered the light but he has lived there for many years. Often, in all of these locations and depending upon the subject matter, no filter at all was called for. I usually shoot transparencies, not color neg film, and I've been told that color neg film reacts differently to color filters such as an 81A than reversal film does. Anyone who uses filtering in any way (color -- reversal or neg -- or BW) should do at least some empirical testing to see what filter causes what changes to one's choice of film and one's choice of method for creating the final print. BTW, I made my first photo (BW) in 1946. Kodachrome was ASA 10 and Ektachrome didn't exist, to my knowledge. Hart Corbett -- From: "Frank Paris" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: orange mask Date: Wed, Jan 17, 2001, 9:25 PM The experience I've had with Provia 100F in the U.S. Pacific Northwest, where it is overcast 9 months out of the year, is that it is actually best when overcast. If I take pictures of a forested scene that is hundreds of feet away (e.g. a waterfalls with surrounding moss-covered cliffs) with a blue sky (but no direct sunlight), there is a discouraging blue cast to the wh
Re: filmscanners: orange mask/Low contrast tranny
One suggested method to reduce contrast on chromes is to pre-flash them at, I believe, 1/10th their proper exposure. This creates a "fog" which reduces the contrast. Art Michael Wilkinson wrote: Tony, Despite protestations from others on the list concerning only processing at industry standards it is easy to reduce contrast on tranny film. You do need to experiment but basically you need to overexpose and underdevelop. For a long time we used this technique to make duplicate transparencies until we were able to purchase duplicating film for the job. We used Ektachrome tungsten,overexposed by 2 stops and reduced the fist dev time from 7 minutes to 5 minutes. To stop anyone shouting what about the cross curves we used a different filter pack to compensate. this is a simple technique which works exceedingly well but you must experiment.
Re: Provia 400F was Re: filmscanners: orange mask
I scanned several rolls of this film that I shot under different lighting conditions. The results were disappointing. The grain and lack of sharpness were clearly visible on a slide table with the naked eye (no loupe), and the scans were even worse. I don't know how it can be claimed in reviews that this is a sharp, fine-grained film. The 100F, on the other hand, is beautiful both in terms of its super-fine grain and color, and it scans even more beautifully. It's the best I've found. Gaspar - Original Message - From: "Frank Paris" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2001 7:19 PM Subject: RE: Provia 400F was Re: filmscanners: orange mask The grain in the two rolls I scanned were horrible. Colors looked okay. Frank Paris [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumList?u=62684 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Rob Geraghty Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2001 5:50 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Provia 400F was Re: filmscanners: orange mask John wrote: Has anyone seen Provia 400F for sale? It was announced a while ago but I haven't seen it. I have just finished a roll of it, so it's available in Australia. I haven't processed it yet to find out how it compares with 100F for scanning purposes. Rob Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wordweb.com
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
At 09:44 17/01/2001 -0600, you wrote:
Roman,
I am reading this and laughing; but not at you. I am laughing because for
the life of me I cannot figure out what we are really arguing about in that
we are in agreement on most of the points. I agree that currently digital
photography at its present stage of development leaves much to be desired
especially the low and medium ends) and that it is in most cases inferior
at present to AgX systems. I am not a fortune teller so I do not know if it
will remain this way in the near, intermediate or long range future.
Obviously much of this will depend on economics as well as technical
engineering. I also have agreed with you in our earlier posts and agree
with you now that it is not out of necessity for technical reasons that a
dedicated exclusive scanning film has not been developed and marketed but
mainly for practical economic reasons. While this tends to be the case
historically that things will not be produced and marketed if the market is
to small and specialized to make it profitable as a mass production item, it
has not always in every case been such. Your infrared example illustrates
that specialty films are produced and marketed even if their is a relatively
small market as long as that market is found to be willing to pay the
premium price or the company is trying to get a leg up on the competition in
PR terms.
Laurie,
I love to agree with you. As for IR films, they are off-shots of military
applications, so the market is much larger that you expected.
With all due respect, I am not protesting the situation or the actions of
the manufacturers at all; nor am I blaming you for anything substantive.
What I am taking you to task for are three things. First, I am taking you
to task for responding as if I were engaging in making demands for a
dedicated scanner film and in protesting the lack of such a film, which I am
not nor have I. Second, I am taking you to task for portraying and reacting
to my posts as if I were blaming you for anything - especially for the fact
that a dedicated scanner film is not being actually produced and distributed
now. And thirdly, I am taking you to task for what I often see as an
unwillingness on your part to assume and understand the viewpoint of those
who are seeking the production and distribution of a dedicated scanner film
for use in the immediate to near future when responding to them.
I must be the most misunderstood person. I accept your desire to own a
special, scanner dedicated film. It is your right. I am not that demanding,
I can cope with the current crop of films. As Ed already said, the mask is
not a problem for the scanners. I bought LS30 to restore images on my old
films that deteriorate quickly in sunny and smoggy Sydney. I will continue
to print them, I do not envisage myself as an owner of digital camera.
unless I start a real estate business. Scanners supplement my photo hobby
sufficiently. The new films last longer, have enormous information
capacity, why would I like to change? What benefit for me would be to use
scanner dedicated film? If you feel otherwise, go ahead, make your day.
Namely, rather than discussing the feasibility from a technical perspective
of producing a dedicated scanner film ( you have pointed out the viability
of doing so from an economic perspective) you seem to want to beg the
question by telling them that they need to get the scanner manufacturers to
produce scanners that comply with the requirements of the existing film. I
would respectfully submit that this is less than a satisfactory answer to
their complaints, demands, or questions.
to get your film you need to talk to technical people, but the companies
are run by managers listening to the marketing dept. only. How you solve
it, I don't know.
However, I have something for you. talk to Kodak and ask them for say, one
million rolls of dedicated film. you'll distribute them and make a lot of
money. The technology is here, just specify, what you want. If they can
make films designed to record images from the screen (various phosphors),
why not the scanner film? Send me 10% for that good idea. :-{)
However, returning to the beginning, I still think that we are not
fundamentally in disagreement on the points that you have made as much as in
your approach to the questions.
Having said this, I think that we probably have pushed this bear as far as
it will go and probably should either drop the topic or take it off list.
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
"Tony Sleep" [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Don't get me wrong, Provia is wonderful stuff if you live somewhere sunny or use a studio. I just shot a roll of 100F this morning in wonderful, sunny Queensland Australia. :) But the main feature of 100F that I love is the lack of apparent grain when scanned on my LS30!! Rob
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
"Tony Sleep" [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: but these are proper contact sheet size and include the film rebate - or reasonable facsimile as they show no frame numbers or mfr info. Oh! That *would* be useless due to the limitations of the digital printing process. Rob
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Guaranteed refurbished large Monitors are available from www.morgancomputers.co.uk. regards Michael Wilkinson. 106 Holyhead Road,Ketley, Telford.Shropshire TF 15 DJ [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.infocus-photography.co.uk For Trannies and Negs from Digital Files ~~~ - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, January 18, 2001 1:13 AM Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask : i need to buy a 20 inch pc monitor to to be used with photoshop. i do not : want to spend too much money and need recogmendations. i want to get rob : sheppard's instructional video on photoshop. does anyone know the name and : where to get it. thanks, joanna
Re: filmscanners: orange mask/Low contrast tranny
Ive used this technique with negative material with a degree of success but its a hit and miss affair until you have experimented with it. The secret is to pre expose the film just enough to overcome the films natural inertia,or in otherwords the films resistance to actually start reacting to the light falling on it. It used to be quite common when Hand printing B+W before Resin Coated multigrade paper was available to pre flash paper to reduce contrast. this was easy to control as the results were there to see after 3 minutes. All in the "good old days" of course. Michael Wilkinson. 106 Holyhead Road,Ketley, Telford.Shropshire TF 15 DJ [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.infocus-photography.co.uk For Trannies and Negs from Digital Files ~ - Original Message - From: "Jon" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, January 18, 2001 5:17 AM Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask/Low contrast tranny : How about pre-fogging trans. film? Does anybody really do that to : reduce contrast? : : Jon : : __ : Do You Yahoo!? : Get email at your own domain with Yahoo! Mail. : http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
I thought it was something like this. There is a whole book written on this kind of brain pre-processing. It is *Information Visualization* by Colin Ware. This is actually a very technical subject that this book brings down to earth, although it is still quite a challenging read. Frank Paris [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumList?u=62684 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Ray McGuinness Sent: Thursday, January 18, 2001 6:55 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: orange mask The experience I've had with Provia 100F in the U.S. Pacific Northwest, where it is overcast 9 months out of the year, is that it is actually best when overcast. If I take pictures of a forested scene that is hundreds of feet away (e.g. a waterfalls with surrounding moss-covered cliffs) with a blue sky (but no direct sunlight), there is a discouraging blue cast to the whole scene. (I can fix most of this in the scanning process.) The colors are much more realistic if the same scene is taken with an overcast sky. Also, for closeups deep within the forest, even with a blue sky, colors are great with no blue overcast. Does anyone have an explanation for this behavior? Frank Paris Frank: The blue sky illuminates the shadow areas with a blue color. We don't notice this when looking at the scene(In real time) because of the pre-processing done before the image data from the eye reaches the brain. So the film records what is actually there and when looking at the print there are no clues to trigger the minds pre-processing. With the overcast there is no blue illumination for the film to record. In the forest case the trees are blocking the blue sky. For interesting speculations about the minds operation check out "The Feeling Of What Happens" by Antonio Damasio. Ray
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 22:38 16/01/2001 +1000, you wrote: BTW speaking of supply and demand, I believe some of the latest minilabs are actually scanning the film to print it onto photographic paper rather than using a more traditional optical printing method. That would seem to be a ready-made boost to having films optimised for scanning. Rob true, Kodak and Fuji. But they are not very common. I must investigate the pricing. "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
At 11:56 16/01/2001 -0600, you wrote: Ok, Thanks for the corrective clarification. Given this, I would concur that my earlier speculation on how it might be possible to cross-process E-6 to obtain a negative without the color mask would not work. There are obvious differences between E-6 and C-41 processing apart from merely the reversal stage which would prevent cross-processing of E-6 using the traditional black and white processing that one can use to process C-41 film and get a black and white negative out of it. Laurie, it is possible to cross e6 in c41. you gain approx. 2 stops in speed, but you lose color rendition, you gain a hell of contrast. otherwise, just standard c41 (time/temp/agitation). you can process e6 film in BW chemistry (developer, fixer), but you gain nothing. The only application - if you find 30 years old color film that was neglected at the bottom of a family cupboard. Color processing won't work, but you can salvage the images by processing as BW. Don't expect terrible quality, though.
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 08:35 16/01/2001 -0700, you wrote: Mike, going back to your question regarding cross processing. The only useful case I had, was when we needed to copy architect's drawing. Plain color neg was too soft, while e6 film in c41 gave us good contrast. colors were distinctly different (particularly greens and browns), but it was good enough.
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 23:21 16/01/2001 +, you wrote: On Tue, 16 Jan 2001 12:14:09 + Richard ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: I've heard Fuji ProviaF was specifically designed for scanning. It certainly wasn't designed for photography. At least not in the UK between November and May. Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons ?? speed? When I started photography, 15-18 DIN (25-50 ASA) films were standard, and DIN 27/ASA 400 were terribly high speed! BTW, it was in continental Europe (same problem with seasons and light). "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
At 23:21 16/01/2001 +, you wrote: On Mon, 15 Jan 2001 14:09:27 -0600 Henry Richardson ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: Along these same lines, would it be possible to produce a positive film that has characteristics better suited to scanning, e.g., lower contrast and maybe less density in the shadows? Must admit, I've often wondered why nobody makes a low contrast tranny film, capable of more of the brightness range on sunny days. I suspect because they are designed to recreate original scene brightness ratios when projected, and a low-contrast film might capture more range but would look impossibly flat and dull. Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons Tony, duplicating films have lower contrast (around 1), but the speed is low too. They are designed for an artificial light, and usually require some filtration. Old Agfachrome 50S could be processed in a modified first developer to mimic a duplicating film (low gamma), but they are gone. "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 23:21 16/01/2001 +, you wrote: On Tue, 16 Jan 2001 21:19:49 +1100 Roman =?iso-8859-1?Q?Kielich=AE?= ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: does anyone know, which feature of Kodak Supra makes it scanner friendly? CYNIC The marketing dept's engineering of the box it comes in? Don't forget, this is the same company who TV-advertises 'film specially made for zoom cameras'. /CYNIC it was my feeling too. that's why I asked.
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Laurie, digital photography in its current implementation is inferior to
AgX systems. And will be much longer. I have nothing against a special film
tuned to scanners. However, the world is dollar/yen/pound/mark driven.
Unless they can make enough profit, they will not introduce it. Technically
it is possible right now, but there is no sufficient number of customers,
ie. profit. You can protest to United nations or the Pope with as much
result. Don't blame me for that, I am just an observer.
At 00:27 17/01/2001 -0600, you wrote:
Roman,
I do not see this as an appropriate answer; actually I think it begs the
question, except if one assumes that priority is to be given to the
traditional methods of printing as you seem to want to do. I do not
criticize you for assigning priority as you have (it is legitimate).
However, others on this list and elsewhere (I am not necessarily among them)
think that the priorities are or should be changing with the priority being
placed on developing a film dedicated to scanning and not traditional
printing methods. This places the emphasis on changing the film emulsions
and properties to fit the demands of scanners and CCD sensors rather than
photographic paper emulsions and color filter packs. Thus they are calling
for such things as the elimination of orange masks and the like.
That, practically speaking, this will not happen in the sense of film
manufacturers introducing films dedicated exclusively to scanning in the
immediate future is something that a previous post indicates we agree on.
We also agree on the reasons why this will not happen soon given the nature
of the existing market make-up. However, this is not to deny that those who
are into scanning of films rather than projection printing of films have a
legitimate right to desire and want films that are more suited and even
dedicated to scanning as well as to complain about the fact that this is not
happening.
-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Roman Kielich
Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2001 6:00 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 08:14 15/01/2001 -0800, you wrote:
What you say is true, however, in terms of digital scanning, what matters
is not how color photographic paper emulsion responds to the masking, but
how the masking might alter the translation of the scan with a digital
scanner using an CCD and software. The scanner might respond quite
differently from paper emulsions.
Art
change scanner :-{)
"Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow
in Australia".
"Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow
in Australia".
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Roman, I am reading this and laughing; but not at you. I am laughing because for the life of me I cannot figure out what we are really arguing about in that we are in agreement on most of the points. I agree that currently digital photography at its present stage of development leaves much to be desired especially the low and medium ends) and that it is in most cases inferior at present to AgX systems. I am not a fortune teller so I do not know if it will remain this way in the near, intermediate or long range future. Obviously much of this will depend on economics as well as technical engineering. I also have agreed with you in our earlier posts and agree with you now that it is not out of necessity for technical reasons that a dedicated exclusive scanning film has not been developed and marketed but mainly for practical economic reasons. While this tends to be the case historically that things will not be produced and marketed if the market is to small and specialized to make it profitable as a mass production item, it has not always in every case been such. Your infrared example illustrates that specialty films are produced and marketed even if their is a relatively small market as long as that market is found to be willing to pay the premium price or the company is trying to get a leg up on the competition in PR terms. With all due respect, I am not protesting the situation or the actions of the manufacturers at all; nor am I blaming you for anything substantive. What I am taking you to task for are three things. First, I am taking you to task for responding as if I were engaging in making demands for a dedicated scanner film and in protesting the lack of such a film, which I am not nor have I. Second, I am taking you to task for portraying and reacting to my posts as if I were blaming you for anything - especially for the fact that a dedicated scanner film is not being actually produced and distributed now. And thirdly, I am taking you to task for what I often see as an unwillingness on your part to assume and understand the viewpoint of those who are seeking the production and distribution of a dedicated scanner film for use in the immediate to near future when responding to them. Namely, rather than discussing the feasibility from a technical perspective of producing a dedicated scanner film ( you have pointed out the viability of doing so from an economic perspective) you seem to want to beg the question by telling them that they need to get the scanner manufacturers to produce scanners that comply with the requirements of the existing film. I would respectfully submit that this is less than a satisfactory answer to their complaints, demands, or questions. As noted above, it seems to be agreed that it is not technically impossible to develop such a film; but if it were impossible to do so , this would be a satisfactory response. The economic response does say why it is not done even if it is currently possible technically to do so. Thus it is a satisfactory response to some of the points that the scanner people raise. While developing better work-arounds is a legitimate partial response, it also begs the fundamental questions being asked; but shifting the onus totally onto the software developers and scanner manufactures is not really acceptable as a adequate or legitimate response to otherwise legitimate questions. If you are saying that the reasonable answer or response to the scanner people's points is that both the film manufactures and the scanner manufactures and the software developers need to all get together and develop their products so that they are not only compatible but capable of producing high quality easily accomplishable results in a profitable way, this would be a response that I think would be satisfactory and legitimate as well as one that does not beg the fundamental questions. However, returning to the beginning, I still think that we are not fundamentally in disagreement on the points that you have made as much as in your approach to the questions. Having said this, I think that we probably have pushed this bear as far as it will go and probably should either drop the topic or take it off list. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Roman Kielich Sent: Wednesday, January 17, 2001 5:00 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: orange mask Laurie, digital photography in its current implementation is inferior to AgX systems. And will be much longer. I have nothing against a special film tuned to scanners. However, the world is dollar/yen/pound/mark driven. Unless they can make enough profit, they will not introduce it. Technically it is possible right now, but there is no sufficient number of customers, ie. profit. You can protest to United nations or the Pope with as much result. Don't blame me for that, I am just an observer. At 00:27 17/01/2001 -0600, you wrote: Roman, I do not see
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Roman, you will get your scanner dedicated film as soon as there is market for it. there still may be a few years before we see something like that. I doubt that you will get it - by then digital cameras will be so good that there would be no market for such film! Brian Rumary, England http://freespace.virgin.net/brian.rumary/homepage.htm
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
I agree with Roman. I think you are being a little over optimistic. While technology is moving fast and the day will come, I do not think that time will be in the immediate future. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of B.Rumary Sent: Wednesday, January 17, 2001 5:37 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask Roman, you will get your scanner dedicated film as soon as there is market for it. there still may be a few years before we see something like that. I doubt that you will get it - by then digital cameras will be so good that there would be no market for such film! Brian Rumary, England http://freespace.virgin.net/brian.rumary/homepage.htm
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
i need to buy a 20 inch pc monitor to to be used with photoshop. i do not want to spend too much money and need recogmendations. i want to get rob sheppard's instructional video on photoshop. does anyone know the name and where to get it. thanks, joanna
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Yes they do. Like many things Kodak has attempted, their effort to finish off Kodachrome was not a success. So they can use all the help they can get from whom ever will give it. :-) -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Arthur Entlich Sent: Wednesday, January 17, 2001 6:37 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask chuck phelps wrote: On Tue, 16 Jan 2001 12:14:09 + Richard [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: digital photography is too young for any real standard, you want a film designed for scanning? I've heard Fuji ProviaF was specifically designed for scanning. Fuji ProviaF was designed to finish off Kodachrome. Chuck Phelps Film Service Inc. Actually, Kodak has been trying to "finish off" Kodachrome for years, they don't need Fuji's help. ProviaF seems to have a grain pattern (or lack thereof) which is very friendly to scanners. Art
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
i do not want to spend too much money and need recogmendations. How much are you willing to spend and what level of quality will you settle for? Good 20" monitors that have high quality outputs are not cheap compared to the consumer quality 19" than have been showing up. I just bought a Hitachi 20" CM815plus online from Onvia for $970. It is priced at about $1050 and up elsewhere. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 17, 2001 7:14 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask i need to buy a 20 inch pc monitor to to be used with photoshop. i do not want to spend too much money and need recogmendations. i want to get rob sheppard's instructional video on photoshop. does anyone know the name and where to get it. thanks, joanna
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
On Wed, 17 Jan 2001 12:29:01 +1000 Rob Geraghty ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: Except as an index print which it sounds like you were talking about. :) Well yes and no. They used to do index prints which were about half the neg size, but these are proper contact sheet size and include the film rebate - or reasonable facsimile as they show no frame numbers or mfr info. They otherwise look like contact sheets, but are so soft they aren't helpful for image evaluation. I believe some of the newer minilabs are actually doing the 6x4's from scaning the film. Yes. Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
On Wed, 17 Jan 2001 21:20:28 +1100 Roman =?iso-8859-1?Q?Kielich=AE?= ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: ?? speed? When I started photography, 15-18 DIN (25-50 ASA) films were standard, and DIN 27/ASA 400 were terribly high speed! BTW, it was in continental Europe (same problem with seasons and light). No, not speed, Provia's vile and somewhat erratic insistence on heavy blue casts and magenta-blue shadows if shown murky, cold colour temps. Even an 81a or 81b don't seem to help. Although they warm things up, colour is poor. Fuji kept RDP in production specifically because of the howls of protest from UK snappers, but then decided they could fob us off with Astia, which is slightly more even-tempered than Provia in such conditions. An awful lot of people switched to Ektachrome 100SW as a result. An excellent film for UK murk, but it dislikes direct sunlight and goes over-warm. Don't get me wrong, Provia is wonderful stuff if you live somewhere sunny or use a studio. It just malfunctions severely in what passes for weather in UK for much of the year. The newer 'F' version is better, as the not entirely unrelated Astia was, but neither come close to RDP for even-temperedness. Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
"Roman Kielich" [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: suspect, kodak may have done similar. let me know teh results of your experiment before February (I am heading to Coffs in two weeks). On a related topic, here's two jpegs I scanned off the roll of Provia 400F. The photo was scanned at 2700dpi using an LS30 and Vuescan 6.4.10. One jpeg shows the full image frame and the other is a crop of one flower head at 1:1. The grain is a bit lost in the jpeg artifacts - if anyone really wants an artifact free version of the crop, I could make a PNG version - email me directly. Yes, the grain is noticeable but I wouldn't say it's horrible. It seems OK for a 400ASA slide film and better than any colour neg I've tried. A roll of Supra 100 is being processed right now. I'll try scanning it later. Rob provia_400_crop.jpg provia_400_full.jpg
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
The experience I've had with Provia 100F in the U.S. Pacific Northwest, where it is overcast 9 months out of the year, is that it is actually best when overcast. If I take pictures of a forested scene that is hundreds of feet away (e.g. a waterfalls with surrounding moss-covered cliffs) with a blue sky (but no direct sunlight), there is a discouraging blue cast to the whole scene. (I can fix most of this in the scanning process.) The colors are much more realistic if the same scene is taken with an overcast sky. Also, for closeups deep within the forest, even with a blue sky, colors are great with no blue overcast. Does anyone have an explanation for this behavior? Frank Paris [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumList?u=62684 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Tony Sleep Sent: Wednesday, January 17, 2001 8:06 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask On Wed, 17 Jan 2001 21:20:28 +1100 Roman =?iso-8859-1?Q?Kielich=AE?= ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: ?? speed? When I started photography, 15-18 DIN (25-50 ASA) films were standard, and DIN 27/ASA 400 were terribly high speed! BTW, it was in continental Europe (same problem with seasons and light). No, not speed, Provia's vile and somewhat erratic insistence on heavy blue casts and magenta-blue shadows if shown murky, cold colour temps. Even an 81a or 81b don't seem to help. Although they warm things up, colour is poor. Fuji kept RDP in production specifically because of the howls of protest from UK snappers, but then decided they could fob us off with Astia, which is slightly more even-tempered than Provia in such conditions. An awful lot of people switched to Ektachrome 100SW as a result. An excellent film for UK murk, but it dislikes direct sunlight and goes over-warm. Don't get me wrong, Provia is wonderful stuff if you live somewhere sunny or use a studio. It just malfunctions severely in what passes for weather in UK for much of the year. The newer 'F' version is better, as the not entirely unrelated Astia was, but neither come close to RDP for even-temperedness. Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons
Re: filmscanners: orange mask/Low contrast tranny
How about pre-fogging trans. film? Does anybody really do that to reduce contrast? Jon __ Do You Yahoo!? Get email at your own domain with Yahoo! Mail. http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/
Re: filmscanners: orange mask, rather off topic
At 17:59 15/01/2001 +, you wrote: Im always interested in other users views on materials and equipment which I use. Im surprised to see Roman Kielich" [EMAIL PROTECTED] say that XP1 Dev was not compatible with C41 film because as I stated earlier I used it for ALL my C41 work with a consistency that was unchallenged by C41 developers at that time . XP1 developer had approx. half CD4 in comparison to C41, XP1 developer had higher pH and smaller amount of bromides. XP1 (BW) recommended time was 5 min. vs. 3.25 min in C41. However, color negs have different requirements. For that reason it was not compatible. C41 film processed in XP1 would have crossed curves. You can check it if you expose C41 film in a sensitometer, process, then measure Status M values and plot them to obtain characteristic curves. I can assure you that at 54 years of age and having been a working photographer since I was 16,processing all my own film from b+w through E3 to current C41 etc I am in my "right mind" well, not enough for me. I am only 53, but I started my photo experiments when I was 11. Since then I got my degree, I worked for almost all aspects of photo industry, I used to lecture on technology of photographic processing (post grad in technical and scientific photography), for 26 years contributing editor in one of European photo magazines. Just because you were pleased with your results doesn't make them optimal. Secondly, if you run business, you do not process customers' films in not kosher soups. Otherwise you may be sued for negligence. with all the required respect to your experience, I am just chemist and photographer interested in technical side of it, My artistic achievements are not for display, but I made good living out of my expertise in photo technology. If you want to convince me, give me facts not assurances. How did you monitor your process? How did you verified that you get right results? How did it compare with C41? Facts - test results, curves, ??? You can indeed play with Colour neg ,in fact its been my experience that by experimenting with various processes and film combinations including extended process times and mixing up developers from raw ingredients that one can produce not only satisfying results,but also have the background knowledge to extract ones self from a very deep hole when something has gone wrong somewhere along the line. Well, my friend, it is my field of expertise. I did all that, and I had all the info from manufacturers, I have original formulae for processes, I ran chemical testing of processing solutions, we had each component researched. And after so many experiments my advice is - stick to standard, do it as recommended. You may fine tune processing for one emulsion batch, but it is not viable proposition for mini-lab, nor professional lab. It is only good for enthusiasts with deep pocket and plenty of time, plus lot of knowledge and access to a senstitometer and a densitometer. Whilst I most certainly accept that film chemistry engineering is of a high standard but I recall Agfa supplying me with new processing trays for my Agfa print processor that were Teflon coated and asking me to use Champion chemistry rather than their newly introduced paper processing chemistry. They did this as they had got it wrong !! their new chemistry was softening the Plastic on the Agfa processor I was using. They reformulated the developer and contacted me to let me know it was then safe to use. there is no difference in composition of processing solutions, they are exchangeable. I don't know, what kind of bull.. you were told, but NONE of the components of chemical solutions would have detrimental effect to Teflon. It is one of the most resistant materials known. you can boil aqua regia in it, no common solvent will soften it. I am sorry, what you are saying doesn't make sense. Manufacturers are often making mistakes on "Engineering",just witness recalls on motorcycles,cars,aeroplanes etc.Bug fixes for software, and Ive returned film to manufacturers for faults such as a colour layer missing ,or clear spots all over the emulsion . Manufacturers get it right most of the time thank goodness,but be prepared for the unexpected.If you use enough material it will most certainly happen to you mistakes are made by people that do not follow instructions, don't blame design. software is not very good example, it's the only product that doesn't have warranty. It is shame, it is rip off. I have very little regard to software developers, particularly Microsoft and alike. But I have very high regard to researchers behind modern photographic materials A modern film has up to twenty layers, usually around 1 micrometer thick. The layers are extruded onto a film base at high speed in total darkness, the tolerances are very tight. They do not stop coating, even if the fault is spotted. It is cheaper to scrap rather than stop the production line. as any
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 14:17 15/01/2001 -0500, you wrote: If I am not mistaken, there seems to be a drift on the part of manufacturers to provide film stock that will be usable for both digital and paper processing. Kodak Supra has been portrayed as such a film. does anyone know, which feature of Kodak Supra makes it scanner friendly?
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
There is a direct relationship between the color mask characteristics and processing. The dye masks are directly related to how the color development of the film occurs, since both the actual color negative image and the visible dye layers are related inversely. Indeed, errors in processing of negative film can cause all sorts of problems in the accuracy of color and the red and yellow mask layers which make the orange film base color. Cross color contamination can occur with processing deviation. Since, as with many subjects that appear here, this one is having a return engagement (in a somewhat skewed manner). I dug up a little essay regarding the visible dye layers in negative films based upon some research I did the last time this issue came up. Hopefully, it will be of some value to repeat it for newcomers, so I quote it below: Art It's been a while since I had to look over my photographic books about color masking, but I decided it might be a useful exercise in understanding how the color masks on negative films operate and what that means to us in terms of digital scanning. I think I now have a handle on this, although I have to admit Kodak's academic writing style makes for less than the easiest reading. Visible color couplers (as exist in color negative film) apparently would actually help to create more accurate color print reproduction from all color films. The problem is that they would be rather intrusive to reversal film, since they are indeed... visible. That is why chromes use transparent color couplers rather that the colored ones we see in most color negative film stocks. The purpose of the visible couplers is to provide a method to correct for the inaccurate manner in which the dye layers respond to light transmitted through them. In a perfect world, each of the three color negative layers (cyan, magenta, yellow) would perfectly respond to light by only absorbing the corresponding complementary light color, without absorption of other light colors. So, cyan dye would only absorb red light, magenta dye would absorb just green light, and yellow dye would only absorb blue light. Unfortunately, color films do not do so. The lowermost layer of the film which creates a cyan image, should only absorb red light when white light shines through it, being transparent to both green and blue light . The middle film layer, which creates a magenta image, should only absorb green and be transparent to blue and red light, but it too is not a perfect dye. The topmost layer, which creates a yellow image should only absorb blue but it does absorb some green and red, but this is the least offensive, since the yellow image is fairly transparent to begin with, and is therefore left uncorrected. The cyan negative layer (made from the red sensitive emulsion layer) contains a color coupler which is red. When this layer of the film is exposed to red light, a cyan negative image is created. However, the red colored coupler is left behind in differing amounts depending upon how much red light hits the film. So, if no red light hits that layer, the coupler remains intact, and a red layer remains. The more red light hitting that layer, the less of this red colored coupler remains, and it is replaced with the cyan image. In effect, you have a cyan negative masked by a weaker red positive on this layer. The magenta negative layer contains a coupler which is yellow. When this layer of film is exposed to green light, a magenta negative image is created. However, the yellow colored coupler is left behind in differing amounts depending upon how much green light hits the film. So, if no green light hit that layer, the coupler remains intact, and a weak yellow layer remains. The more green light hitting that layer, the less of this yellow coupler remains, and it is replaced by the magenta image. In effect, you have a magenta negative masked by a weak yellow positive on this layer. On the yellow negative layer, the color couplers used to create this yellow negative image are transparent clear, and do not create a dye coupler positive image. This is because the yellow negative absorbs the least amount of colors other than blue during the printing process. The brilliance of this system is that very simply, the dye coupler is used up in creating the negative image, so it is one mechanism at work. The stronger the negative image is (by exposure to the correct color spectrum) the less colored dye coupler remains, so there is an inverse relationship between the colored negative image and the the colored positive mask. OK, now if I haven't yet lost everyone, how does all this relate to scanning negatives? Since the purpose of the positive colored dye coupler masks are to correct for a degree of error caused by the absorption of wrong colors in the negative dye, they therefore vary within the image. This might
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Roman Kielich wrote: you sound like a first class US lawyer. Indeed, the negative films were, are and will be designed primarily to be copied onto a positive medium, to wit a photographic paper. The reason for the orange mask is an unwanted absorption of a cyan and a magenta dye in the negative film. It was introduced some 40-50 years ago, and still provides improved results. Negs are optimised for copying not watching, not even scanning. Investigate metameric colors, recommend reading "Digital Color Management" by Giorganni and Madden. From your response I gather, you are new to principles of modern color photography. Gee, for someone accusing another of "sounding like a US Lawyer", I believe you are the first person I've encountered on the internet who feels the need to protect their name with a registered trademark. Further, since this is a filmscanner group, it doesn't strike me as odd at all that people discuss film (negative or positive) in terms of how it relates to film scanners rather than photographic paper emulsions. Art At 09:42 14/01/2001 -0600, you wrote: Bear in mind that it is not important, how does the mask look to your eye, but how the paper emulsion sees it. and for the paper the differences may be negligible. So would one be wrong to interpret what you are saying here in a fashion as to infer that it might be generally said that these films with their orange masks, whatever the differences, are optimized for traditional photographic printing on photographic papers and emulsions using chemical processes where the mask has little bearing on the outcome except maybe to add some time to the processing and some contrast to the outcome and may not be optimized for digital scanning and processing where the mask may come into more play as a factor in effecting the final printed outcome? Or put another way, the differences under the traditional chemical methods are intended to be negligible; but not so under digital methods where the scanner can be assumed to be like your eye and not like a paper emulsion?
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Laurie Solomon wrote: Bear in mind that it is not important, how does the mask look to your eye, but how the paper emulsion sees it. and for the paper the differences may be negligible. So would one be wrong to interpret what you are saying here in a fashion as to infer that it might be generally said that these films with their orange masks, whatever the differences, are optimized for traditional photographic printing on photographic papers and emulsions using chemical processes where the mask has little bearing on the outcome except maybe to add some time to the processing and some contrast to the outcome and may not be optimized for digital scanning and processing where the mask may come into more play as a factor in effecting the final printed outcome? Or put another way, the differences under the traditional chemical methods are intended to be negligible; but not so under digital methods where the scanner can be assumed to be like your eye and not like a paper emulsion? -Original Message- The whole point of the visible dye layers is to correct for light absorption errors in the negative film dye layers. Basically, the dyes are not pure, and do not respond exactly to the spectrum they should. These positive dye masks, in turn, are used in reversing the negative image into a positive print. The relationship between the negative dye image on the film and the positive dye image (mask) on the film determines the accuracy of the film color rendering. Although paper emulsions are indeed designed to "not respond" to the positive dye masks as they would the negative image (their spectral sensitivity is adjusted so you don't get a true negative of the negative, since it would be all the wrong colors due to that orange positive color mask) the relationship between the negative image and positive color mask do determine how the paper emulsion responds. As mentioned earlier even within the same film type or lot, factors such as film age, storage, and processing can all alter the relationship between the positive dye mask and negative dye layers. Art
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
At 14:09 15/01/2001 -0600, you wrote: Along these same lines, would it be possible to produce a positive film that has characteristics better suited to scanning, e.g., lower contrast and maybe less density in the shadows? the whole beauty of scanning standard films is ability to have advantages of BOTH systems. you can use them when appropriate, either scan or print, but you'll lose it, if you use scanner dedicated film. Roman "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 15:07 15/01/2001 -0700, you wrote: Perhaps a silly question, but then again, the only silly or stupid question is the one you don't ask This group seems to be fairly proficient in the technical sides of both film scanning and film processing... The question.. would it not be possible to use an E-6 process film as a neg film without the orange mask... It has been many years since I processed transparency film, but if I recall, there are two developers, one to develop the latent image, the other to effect the reversal... so why not take it to the first developer stage... or maybe C-41 would work... I don't know and don't have the tech books anymore to look it up... just a thought Mike Moore Mike, if you cross process E6 film, you get a very contrasty neg without mask and with crossed curves. Possible to correct, but PIA even with Photoshop.
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
At 12:10 15/01/2001 -0600, you wrote:
I am not a U.S. lawyer; I am a professional commercial photographer by
occupation.
I am neither new to the principles modern color photography nor ignorant of
the history and purposes of the orange mask. I was merely trying to point
out in as inoffensive and rhetorical a way as possible that the set of color
negative films commonly used in contemporary photography are not optimized
for digital uses but for traditional uses.
that an understatement :-{)
By using a film that is
developed for one usage and optimized to that use for an entirely different
use for which it is not optimized often leads to unintended consequences.
which we are aware of, and we use work arounds. another possibility is to
make a scanner as close in spectral properties as possible to a paper.
Thus, if you plan to use those films from which to do digital scanning, then
it is important how the mask looks to your eye or the scanner's CCDs and
that the differences are negligible for paper emulsions is irrelevant and
unimportant.
the negative films were,
are and will be designed primarily to be copied onto a positive medium, to
wit a photographic paper.
A bit of an overstatement here. That they were and are designed to be
printed on photographic paper is true enough; but that they have to be in
the future ("will be designed primarily to be copied onto a positive
medium") is not necessarily true. There is no reason why said negative
films could not be designed to be optimized for digital uses only (to wit,
dedicated to scanning) in which case such masks might be unnecessary and
replace by profiles that would digitally account for and correct the
unwanted of a cyan and a magenta dye in the negative film in the same way
that color filter packs are utilized today. As far as I know, there is no
good reason why a film similar to transparency film without any orange masks
could not be produced which would display a negative image rather than a
positive image and would be more appropriate for direct scanning and digital
reversing. Now such a thing may very well be impractical but it is not
impossible or illogical.
possible,but impractical (expensive) at the moment. it may be technically
possible, but it is not profitable enough as yet. orange mask does color
correction as well as improves structure of an image (grain, sharpness). to
have film dedicated to scanning only has less merit that film for a
fashion, as opposite to landscape, technical, etc. photography. Infrared
Ektachrome is 3 times more expensive than a plain slide film. doesn't it
tell you anything? How many people would buy it? How many rolls? how much
can we (KOdak, Agfa, Fuji) make on it? what is return on investment? Big
companies answer to shareholders, not to whims of some photo-digi-fanatics.
Unless they can make a mozza out of it. if I remember correctly, it's
called capitalism or a free market economy.
Roman
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
At 16:09 15/01/2001 -0600, you wrote: What you say is more or less the case. I do not think it is possible to OPTIMIZE any given film emulsion so as to meet the necessary criteria and needs of both digital and traditional. What is being done now is an attempt to reach a compromise in the areas of grain structure, dye cloud structure, contrast range, and shadow denisties so that the films like Supra will be usable and acceptible to both classes of users. I personally do not think that such compromises at this stage involve changing the orange masking in any way. If this does take place, it will be when the digital scanning market is large enough to support a dedicated scanner film optimized exclusively for digital scanning with no conern for traditional chemical printing; only then will we see films for scanning and films for traditional printing IMO. that's exactly the case. "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Laurie, E6 goes like that - first developer - BW negative (silver based) stop/reversal - stops the first developer and makes the remaining unexposed silver salts "eligible" for color dev color dev - reduces the remaining AgX and forms a positive color image (at the end of this stage, whole silver is in metallic form) conditioner - prepares metallic silver for quicker bleach bleach - transforms metallic silver into a salt soluble in a fixer fixer - removes all silver stabilizer - wetting agent plus formaline to react with remainder of unreacted color coupler (longer life) Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
Re: filmscanners: orange mask E6
Roger wrote: [snip] So, unfortunately, you won't have a negative colour image after the second (Colour) developer. Doesn't this stuff relate to cross-processing somehow? Or is it only possible to cross process from a neg film to E6 not the other way around? Rob
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
"Roman Kielich" [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: tell you anything? How many people would buy it? How many rolls? how much can we (KOdak, Agfa, Fuji) make on it? what is return on investment? Big companies answer to shareholders, not to whims of some photo-digi-fanatics. BTW speaking of supply and demand, I believe some of the latest minilabs are actually scanning the film to print it onto photographic paper rather than using a more traditional optical printing method. That would seem to be a ready-made boost to having films optimised for scanning. Rob
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
"Roman Kielich" [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: does anyone know, which feature of Kodak Supra makes it scanner friendly? I just bought 5 rolls and will try it out this week - so I don't know the answer to your question for sure yet. I *believe* it's a different grain structure which produces less aliasing. Rob
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 09:14 15/01/2001 -0800, you wrote:
Gee, for someone accusing another of "sounding like a US Lawyer", I
believe you are the first person I've encountered on the internet who
feels the need to protect their name with a registered trademark.
Further, since this is a filmscanner group, it doesn't strike me as odd at
all that people discuss film (negative or positive) in terms of how it
relates to film scanners rather than photographic paper emulsions.
Art
Art, it's partly joke, partly protection against spammers.
we share our hobby between good old photography and the new digital form.
lateral thinking is not prohibited yet :-{)
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
In a message dated 1/16/2001 7:37:29 AM EST, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I just bought 5 rolls and will try it out this week - so I don't know the answer to your question for sure yet. I *believe* it's a different grain structure which produces less aliasing. Supra appears to use the same emulsions as other Kodak products, but with different coatings to reduce the potential for scratching. The following films have the same color characteristics and sensitometric curves as Supra 100: EKTAPRESS GOLD II 100 Prof EKTAPRESS PJ100 EKTAPRESS PLUS 100 Prof PJA-1 EKTAR 100 Gen 3 CX EKTAR 100 Gen 3 SY Pro 100 PRN Prof Color Neg100 ROYAL GOLD 100 ROYAL GOLD 100 Gen 2 VERICOLOR HC 100 Prof VHC-2 The following film has the same color characteristics and sensitometric curves as Supra 400: KODACOLOR VR 100 Gen 2 The following films have the same color characteristics and sensitometric curves as Supra 800: MAX ZOOM 800-3 PORTRA800 ULTRA Zoom800-3 Regards, Ed Hamrick
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Roman... Thank you for the to the point reply...It is obvious to me that you know WTH you are talking about and understand the realities of the real world photographic industry I agree that modern color films are miracle products... It seems to me that the best thing that can happen is for the film and/orscanner manufacturers to recognize that user scanning is a growing trend (especially among pro photogs) and maybe supply us with some MUCH better software (tip of the hat to Ed H.), as well as individual film profiles... Fact is, I make my living off my shooting time, not my time spent fiddling with a scanner... I bought a scanner to see if I can't improve the product I am able to hand my clients. Mike Moore Roman Kielich wrote: At 15:07 15/01/2001 -0700, you wrote: Perhaps a silly question, but then again, the only silly or stupid question is the one you don't ask This group seems to be fairly proficient in the technical sides of both film scanning and film processing... The question.. would it not be possible to use an E-6 process film as a neg film without the orange mask... It has been many years since I processed transparency film, but if I recall, there are two developers, one to develop the latent image, the other to effect the reversal... so why not take it to the first developer stage... or maybe C-41 would work... I don't know and don't have the tech books anymore to look it up... just a thought Mike Moore Mike, if you cross process E6 film, you get a very contrasty neg without mask and with crossed curves. Possible to correct, but PIA even with Photoshop.
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Ok, Thanks for the corrective clarification. Given this, I would concur that my earlier speculation on how it might be possible to cross-process E-6 to obtain a negative without the color mask would not work. There are obvious differences between E-6 and C-41 processing apart from merely the reversal stage which would prevent cross-processing of E-6 using the traditional black and white processing that one can use to process C-41 film and get a black and white negative out of it. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Roman Kielich Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2001 4:38 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: orange mask Laurie, E6 goes like that - first developer - BW negative (silver based) stop/reversal - stops the first developer and makes the remaining unexposed silver salts "eligible" for color dev color dev - reduces the remaining AgX and forms a positive color image (at the end of this stage, whole silver is in metallic form) conditioner - prepares metallic silver for quicker bleach bleach - transforms metallic silver into a salt soluble in a fixer fixer - removes all silver stabilizer - wetting agent plus formaline to react with remainder of unreacted color coupler (longer life) Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
On Mon, 15 Jan 2001 08:14:59 -0800 Arthur Entlich ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: The scanner might respond quite differently from paper emulsions. CCD's are a lot more linear in their response than photographic emulsions used on paper. There is a mismatch here: film has a more or less S-shaped densitometric curve which matches with the curve of paper, the two are engineered to more or less complement each other. Classically, film exhibits a straight-line response only through the midtones, whilst shadow response is extended and compressed and highlights ditto. Unfortunately, scanners have poor discrimination at the shadow end of their response due to CCD noise and sampling precision is also worst here. The compression exhibited by the film (low ODR) can result in weak and noisy shadows, and posterisation. Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
On Tue, 16 Jan 2001 12:14:09 + Richard ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: I've heard Fuji ProviaF was specifically designed for scanning. It certainly wasn't designed for photography. At least not in the UK between November and May. Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Forget it unless what you are after is highly visible grain. If you don't want absolutely appalling grain but want the speed, it is better to push Provia F100 to 400 than to work with straight Provia F400. Frank Paris [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumList?u=62684 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of John Matturri Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2001 3:02 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask Has anyone seen Provia 400F for sale? It was announced a while ago but I haven't seen it. John M. Rob Geraghty wrote: Richard wrote: I've heard Fuji ProviaF was specifically designed for scanning. Whether or not that's true, Provia 100F is the best film I've found for scanning on my LS30. Rob Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wordweb.com
Provia 400F was Re: filmscanners: orange mask
John wrote: Has anyone seen Provia 400F for sale? It was announced a while ago but I haven't seen it. I have just finished a roll of it, so it's available in Australia. I haven't processed it yet to find out how it compares with 100F for scanning purposes. Rob Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wordweb.com
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Tony wrote: frame number so clients no longer get 24a mixed up with 18a. Regrettably they are fuzzy as hell thanks to low scanning res and a load of interpolation. Hopeless for judging image sharpness so fairly pointless. Except as an index print which it sounds like you were talking about. :) I believe some of the newer minilabs are actually doing the 6x4's from scaning the film. Some of the local labs are (presumably in a separate process to printing) scanning the films an dmaking Kodak Picture CDs. Rob Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wordweb.com
RE: Provia 400F was Re: filmscanners: orange mask
The grain in the two rolls I scanned were horrible. Colors looked okay. Frank Paris [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumList?u=62684 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Rob Geraghty Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2001 5:50 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Provia 400F was Re: filmscanners: orange mask John wrote: Has anyone seen Provia 400F for sale? It was announced a while ago but I haven't seen it. I have just finished a roll of it, so it's available in Australia. I haven't processed it yet to find out how it compares with 100F for scanning purposes. Rob Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wordweb.com
400F again was RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Frank wrote: Forget it unless what you are after is highly visible grain. If you don't want absolutely appalling grain but want the speed, it is better to push Provia F100 to 400 than to work with straight Provia F400. I wondered about this, but it seemed silly that a 100ASA film pushed to 400ASA would still have finer grain than a purpose made 400ASA film. Apparently the increase in grain in 100F isn't that bad. In which case why did Fuji bother making 400F? Rob Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wordweb.com
Re: 400F again was RE: filmscanners: orange mask
on 16/1/01 11:28 pm, Rob Geraghty at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Forget it unless what you are after is highly visible grain. If you don't want absolutely appalling grain but want the speed, it is better to push Provia F100 to 400 than to work with straight Provia F400. I wondered about this, but it seemed silly that a 100ASA film pushed to 400ASA would still have finer grain than a purpose made 400ASA film. Apparently the increase in grain in 100F isn't that bad. In which case why did Fuji bother making 400F? shadow detail. A 400 film has two stops more of it than 100 film pushed to 400, whatever the grain looks like. a classic example of newton's third law of thermodynamics restated... however hard you shake it the last drop always runs down your leg. -- Johnny Deadman http://www.pinkheadedbug.com
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Roman,
I do not see this as an appropriate answer; actually I think it begs the
question, except if one assumes that priority is to be given to the
traditional methods of printing as you seem to want to do. I do not
criticize you for assigning priority as you have (it is legitimate).
However, others on this list and elsewhere (I am not necessarily among them)
think that the priorities are or should be changing with the priority being
placed on developing a film dedicated to scanning and not traditional
printing methods. This places the emphasis on changing the film emulsions
and properties to fit the demands of scanners and CCD sensors rather than
photographic paper emulsions and color filter packs. Thus they are calling
for such things as the elimination of orange masks and the like.
That, practically speaking, this will not happen in the sense of film
manufacturers introducing films dedicated exclusively to scanning in the
immediate future is something that a previous post indicates we agree on.
We also agree on the reasons why this will not happen soon given the nature
of the existing market make-up. However, this is not to deny that those who
are into scanning of films rather than projection printing of films have a
legitimate right to desire and want films that are more suited and even
dedicated to scanning as well as to complain about the fact that this is not
happening.
-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Roman Kielich
Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2001 6:00 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 08:14 15/01/2001 -0800, you wrote:
What you say is true, however, in terms of digital scanning, what matters
is not how color photographic paper emulsion responds to the masking, but
how the masking might alter the translation of the scan with a digital
scanner using an CCD and software. The scanner might respond quite
differently from paper emulsions.
Art
change scanner :-{)
"Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow
in Australia".
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Roman, I think that what exists is in fact a compromise; and one which will satisfy neither side of the issue. I do not think that traditional photographers who optically print negatives or digital photographers who want to scan their negatives see the compromise as being beautiful or an advantage. I am afraid that it is only the film manufacturers who would look on the compromise as a beauty or advantageous since it enables them to sell the same film to both types of users. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Roman Kielich Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2001 4:24 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: orange mask At 14:09 15/01/2001 -0600, you wrote: Along these same lines, would it be possible to produce a positive film that has characteristics better suited to scanning, e.g., lower contrast and maybe less density in the shadows? the whole beauty of scanning standard films is ability to have advantages of BOTH systems. you can use them when appropriate, either scan or print, but you'll lose it, if you use scanner dedicated film. Roman "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
While you may very well be right about the only difference being in the addition of new film emulsion hardeners to prevent scratching, Kodak claims to have done more than this to the film so as to make it more appropriate for scanning. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2001 8:05 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask In a message dated 1/16/2001 7:37:29 AM EST, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I just bought 5 rolls and will try it out this week - so I don't know the answer to your question for sure yet. I *believe* it's a different grain structure which produces less aliasing. Supra appears to use the same emulsions as other Kodak products, but with different coatings to reduce the potential for scratching. The following films have the same color characteristics and sensitometric curves as Supra 100: EKTAPRESS GOLD II 100 Prof EKTAPRESS PJ100 EKTAPRESS PLUS 100 Prof PJA-1 EKTAR 100 Gen 3 CX EKTAR 100 Gen 3 SY Pro 100 PRN Prof Color Neg100 ROYAL GOLD 100 ROYAL GOLD 100 Gen 2 VERICOLOR HC 100 Prof VHC-2 The following film has the same color characteristics and sensitometric curves as Supra 400: KODACOLOR VR 100 Gen 2 The following films have the same color characteristics and sensitometric curves as Supra 800: MAX ZOOM 800-3 PORTRA800 ULTRA Zoom800-3 Regards, Ed Hamrick
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Pete, Do you reckon this method will work even when, as on the Scanwit, the exposure given by the scanner for each raw scan will vary from frame to frame? If I want to try this method, should I work on each of the R,G,B histograms separately, and set the B W points to the same value, or what? Any suggestions welcome! Alan T. - Original Message - From: photoscientia [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, January 14, 2001 8:41 PM Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask The technique of starting from a raw scan, and applying a generic correction over multiple frames is the only way to get even colour and density across multi-frame panoramas. Rather than use curves, it's easier to use the levels tool, and align both ends of the red, green, and blue histograms, IMHO. Regards, Pete.
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 17:31 14/01/2001 +, you wrote: Roman, Ilford XP1 developer had different composition to plain C41. The newer XP2 requires C41. You _could_ use C41 with XP1, but Ilford recommended their own special XP1 developer for best results. They now seem to have stopped selling special developer for XP films and say you should use ordinary C41. Brian Rumary, England http://freespace.virgin.net/brian.rumary/homepage.htm I know that. Ilford has changed the XP emulsion and tuned it to C41 for commercial reasons. "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
you sound like a first class US lawyer. Indeed, the negative films were, are and will be designed primarily to be copied onto a positive medium, to wit a photographic paper. The reason for the orange mask is an unwanted absorption of a cyan and a magenta dye in the negative film. It was introduced some 40-50 years ago, and still provides improved results. Negs are optimised for copying not watching, not even scanning. Investigate metameric colors, recommend reading "Digital Color Management" by Giorganni and Madden. From your response I gather, you are new to principles of modern color photography. At 09:42 14/01/2001 -0600, you wrote: Bear in mind that it is not important, how does the mask look to your eye, but how the paper emulsion sees it. and for the paper the differences may be negligible. So would one be wrong to interpret what you are saying here in a fashion as to infer that it might be generally said that these films with their orange masks, whatever the differences, are optimized for traditional photographic printing on photographic papers and emulsions using chemical processes where the mask has little bearing on the outcome except maybe to add some time to the processing and some contrast to the outcome and may not be optimized for digital scanning and processing where the mask may come into more play as a factor in effecting the final printed outcome? Or put another way, the differences under the traditional chemical methods are intended to be negligible; but not so under digital methods where the scanner can be assumed to be like your eye and not like a paper emulsion?
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 16:33 14/01/2001 -0800, you wrote: I clicked on the URL in your message and it opened OK. Having tried it, I really don't recommend the procedure in the site though. well, it does work today, but it was not yesterday. Must be weekend. "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
- Original Message - From: "Roman Kielich" [EMAIL PROTECTED] : : : I know that. Ilford has changed the XP emulsion and tuned it to C41 for : commercial reasons. ~~ The reason appears to be that they were not selling enough XP dev to make it worth making it. XP1 was also being sold as a film which could be developed in C41 dev as an alternative. As a commercial user of both C41 and Xp dev my money was on Xp every time. the Mini labs and the Pro labs however could not have their minds changed and the additional one and three quarter minutes dev time was viewed as a retrograde step. bottom line is that profit beat quality.
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 10:33 15/01/2001 +, you wrote: The reason appears to be that they were not selling enough XP dev to make it worth making it. XP1 developer was not compatible with C41 films, although the opposite was possible. cost has nothing to do with it. XP1 was also being sold as a film which could be developed in C41 dev as an alternative. As a commercial user of both C41 and Xp dev my money was on Xp every time. sorry, no-one with his right mind would use incompatible developer suited for a minuscule number of films, while the recommended c41 would process both c41 and xp1 the Mini labs and the Pro labs however could not have their minds changed and the additional one and three quarter minutes dev time was viewed as a retrograde step. you cannot ignore laws of physics and economics. BTW, c41 film developed in xp1 developer is not developed to its optimal quality. You can play with BW films, but not with color negs. bottom line is that profit beat quality. it's called engineering. the films was designed to be processed in c41 developer with replenishment. you cannot run commercially viable minilab if you stuff processing. it is quality, not dollars. xp1 worked well only with xp1 films. "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
On Mon, 15 Jan 2001 10:33:14 - Michael Wilkinson ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: XP1 was also being sold as a film which could be developed in C41 dev as an alternative. As a commercial user of both C41 and Xp dev my money was on Xp every time. My experience too. XPI in C41 was not as nice. XP2 is fine, though personally I prefer TMax400CN these days. Which has very little base tint BTW, and also scans very well indeed. Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
On Mon, 15 Jan 2001, Roman [iso-8859-1] Kielich® wrote: Indeed, the negative films were, are and will be designed primarily to be copied onto a positive medium, to wit a photographic paper. The reason for the orange mask is an unwanted absorption of a cyan and a magenta dye in the negative film. It was introduced some 40-50 years ago, and still provides improved results. Negs are optimised for copying not watching, not even scanning. Investigate metameric colors, recommend somebody else wrote: to infer that it might be generally said that these films with their orange masks, whatever the differences, are optimized for traditional photographic printing on photographic papers and emulsions using chemical processes where the mask has little bearing on the outcome except maybe to add some time to the processing and some contrast to the outcome and may not be optimized for digital scanning and processing where the mask may come into more play as a factor in effecting the final printed outcome? Or put another way, the differences under the traditional chemical methods are intended to be negligible; but not so under digital methods where the scanner can be assumed to be like your eye and not like a paper emulsion? This brought up a thought: If a film were designed for scanning without considerations for conventional printing, what characteristics would it include? Could there be a negative film (with its broad exposure latitude), but with no orange mask? What else?
Re: filmscanners: orange mask, rather off topic
Im always interested in other users views on materials and equipment which I use. Im surprised to see Roman Kielich" [EMAIL PROTECTED] say that XP1 Dev was not compatible with C41 film because as I stated earlier I used it for ALL my C41 work with a consistency that was unchallenged by C41 developers at that time . I can assure you that at 54 years of age and having been a working photographer since I was 16,processing all my own film from b+w through E3 to current C41 etc I am in my "right mind" You can indeed play with Colour neg ,in fact its been my experience that by experimenting with various processes and film combinations including extended process times and mixing up developers from raw ingredients that one can produce not only satisfying results,but also have the background knowledge to extract ones self from a very deep hole when something has gone wrong somewhere along the line. Whilst I most certainly accept that film chemistry engineering is of a high standard but I recall Agfa supplying me with new processing trays for my Agfa print processor that were Teflon coated and asking me to use Champion chemistry rather than their newly introduced paper processing chemistry. They did this as they had got it wrong !! their new chemistry was softening the Plastic on the Agfa processor I was using. They reformulated the developer and contacted me to let me know it was then safe to use. Manufacturers are often making mistakes on "Engineering",just witness recalls on motorcycles,cars,aeroplanes etc.Bug fixes for software, and Ive returned film to manufacturers for faults such as a colour layer missing ,or clear spots all over the emulsion . Manufacturers get it right most of the time thank goodness,but be prepared for the unexpected.If you use enough material it will most certainly happen to you Keep making images Michael Wilkinson. 106 Holyhead Road,Ketley, Telford.Shropshire TF 15 DJ [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.infocus-photography.co.uk For Trannies and Negs from Digital Files
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
If I am not mistaken, there seems to be a drift on the part of manufacturers to provide film stock that will be usable for both digital and paper processing. Kodak Supra has been portrayed as such a film. Considering the capabilities of digital technology, it seems to me that the primary adjustments will be to minimize grain size and the ability of a scanner to neutralize the orange masks required for paper processes. As long as there is a film market, it seems that the prudent move for a manufacturer would be to optimize their films for both the film and digital markets for economic purposes (theirs and ours). Most of us have had to burn and dodge, adjust exposure time, and mess with color balance to achieve the results we wanted when developing prints. Unless we take the perfect photo that needs no tweaking or croping, we will have to adjust scans in the same ways. Maybe the scanner industry has to put more time and effort into optimizing the ability to scan film stock rather than expecting the film industry to adjust to the scanners. Gordon Laurie Solomon wrote: There is no reason why said negative films could not be designed to be optimized for digital uses only ... Now such a thing may very well be impractical but it is not impossible or illogical.
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
From: "Laurie Solomon" [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: orange mask Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2001 12:10:01 -0600 There is no reason why said negative films could not be designed to be optimized for digital uses only (to wit, dedicated to scanning) in which case such masks might be unnecessary and replace by profiles that would digitally account for and correct the unwanted of a cyan and a magenta dye in the negative film in the same way that color filter packs are utilized today. As far as I know, there is no good reason why a film similar to transparency film without any orange masks could not be produced which would display a negative image rather than a positive image and would be more appropriate for direct scanning and digital reversing. Now such a thing may very well be impractical but it is not impossible or illogical. Along these same lines, would it be possible to produce a positive film that has characteristics better suited to scanning, e.g., lower contrast and maybe less density in the shadows? _ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Perhaps a silly question, but then again, the only silly or stupid question is the one you don't ask This group seems to be fairly proficient in the technical sides of both film scanning and film processing... The question.. would it not be possible to use an E-6 process film as a neg film without the orange mask... It has been many years since I processed transparency film, but if I recall, there are two developers, one to develop the latent image, the other to effect the reversal... so why not take it to the first developer stage... or maybe C-41 would work... I don't know and don't have the tech books anymore to look it up... just a thought Mike Moore Gordon Tassi wrote: If I am not mistaken, there seems to be a drift on the part of manufacturers to provide film stock that will be usable for both digital and paper processing. Kodak Supra has been portrayed as such a film. Considering the capabilities of digital technology, it seems to me that the primary adjustments will be to minimize grain size and the ability of a scanner to neutralize the orange masks required for paper processes. As long as there is a film market, it seems that the prudent move for a manufacturer would be to optimize their films for both the film and digital markets for economic purposes (theirs and ours). Most of us have had to burn and dodge, adjust exposure time, and mess with color balance to achieve the results we wanted when developing prints. Unless we take the perfect photo that needs no tweaking or croping, we will have to adjust scans in the same ways. Maybe the scanner industry has to put more time and effort into optimizing the ability to scan film stock rather than expecting the film industry to adjust to the scanners. Gordon Laurie Solomon wrote: There is no reason why said negative films could not be designed to be optimized for digital uses only ... Now such a thing may very well be impractical but it is not impossible or illogical.
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
What you say is more or less the case. I do not think it is possible to OPTIMIZE any given film emulsion so as to meet the necessary criteria and needs of both digital and traditional. What is being done now is an attempt to reach a compromise in the areas of grain structure, dye cloud structure, contrast range, and shadow denisties so that the films like Supra will be usable and acceptible to both classes of users. I personally do not think that such compromises at this stage involve changing the orange masking in any way. If this does take place, it will be when the digital scanning market is large enough to support a dedicated scanner film optimized exclusively for digital scanning with no conern for traditional chemical printing; only then will we see films for scanning and films for traditional printing IMO. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Gordon Tassi Sent: Monday, January 15, 2001 1:18 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask If I am not mistaken, there seems to be a drift on the part of manufacturers to provide film stock that will be usable for both digital and paper processing. Kodak Supra has been portrayed as such a film. Considering the capabilities of digital technology, it seems to me that the primary adjustments will be to minimize grain size and the ability of a scanner to neutralize the orange masks required for paper processes. As long as there is a film market, it seems that the prudent move for a manufacturer would be to optimize their films for both the film and digital markets for economic purposes (theirs and ours). Most of us have had to burn and dodge, adjust exposure time, and mess with color balance to achieve the results we wanted when developing prints. Unless we take the perfect photo that needs no tweaking or croping, we will have to adjust scans in the same ways. Maybe the scanner industry has to put more time and effort into optimizing the ability to scan film stock rather than expecting the film industry to adjust to the scanners. Gordon Laurie Solomon wrote: There is no reason why said negative films could not be designed to be optimized for digital uses only ... Now such a thing may very well be impractical but it is not impossible or illogical.
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
In a message dated 1/15/2001 5:11:47 PM EST, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: My understanding is that those sorts of properties are what the film manufacturers currently are trying to control and adjust in their new film emulsions such as Supra. But so far they have not taken the step of eliminating the orange mask; Removing the orange mask wouldn't make scanning any easier. This is by far the least difficult step in scanning negative film. The four hardest parts of scanning negative film are, from most difficult to least difficult: 1) White balance 2) Compressing negative film intensity range 3) Color correction for CCD and film dyes 4) Sensitometric curves for film dyes When printing film on paper, steps 34 are done automatically by the characteristics of the paper and the filters used, and steps 12 are done slightly differently by each minilab manufacturer. Whether the film has an orange mask or not doesn't make any of these four things any easier or harder. Regards, Ed Hamrick
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Ed, with the deepest of respect, since you cite a quote from me, I feel some compulsion to respond. I do not believe that I stated or implied that removal of the orange mask was difficult to do or would make scanning easier. Others with whom I was corresponding seemed to feel that the orange mask presented a problem for scanning ( especially the variation in the nature of the mask densities and color); I did not weigh in on that topic myself. I did say that there was no logical reason why said mask could not be removed from color negative films resulting in a color negative without such a mask. I also noted that such a removal of the orange mask would quite possibly result in a film that was truly dedicated exclusively to scanning since its removal would result in the film not being able to be used for traditional photographic printing processes which as I understand it require the use of a mask. By "dedicated," I did not mean to imply that it would make scanning easier or better- or even that it would be necessary to quality scanning; I simply meant that such a film would be usable only by persons who would scan it and would not be utilizable by those who rely on the traditional photographic processing practices. I did say that the film manufacturers have not taken the step of removing the mask for their special scanner films yet for purely practical economic reasons and not because it was difficult to do. I further suggested that the steps that they have taken so far are compromises related to film emulsion properties the would not result in excluding one class or another of the user base. If I have misunderstood you arguments, I do apologize and would request clarification. If I am in error on my part with respect to my understandings and facts, I also apologize and would appreciate correction. While informative, I do think your points are better addressed to others involved in the discussion rather than me. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, January 15, 2001 5:10 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask In a message dated 1/15/2001 5:11:47 PM EST, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: My understanding is that those sorts of properties are what the film manufacturers currently are trying to control and adjust in their new film emulsions such as Supra. But so far they have not taken the step of eliminating the orange mask; Removing the orange mask wouldn't make scanning any easier. This is by far the least difficult step in scanning negative film. The four hardest parts of scanning negative film are, from most difficult to least difficult: 1) White balance 2) Compressing negative film intensity range 3) Color correction for CCD and film dyes 4) Sensitometric curves for film dyes When printing film on paper, steps 34 are done automatically by the characteristics of the paper and the filters used, and steps 12 are done slightly differently by each minilab manufacturer. Whether the film has an orange mask or not doesn't make any of these four things any easier or harder. Regards, Ed Hamrick
RE: filmscanners: orange mask E6
I stand corrected. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Roger Smith Sent: Monday, January 15, 2001 9:51 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: orange mask E6 At 7:27 PM -0600 1/15/01, Laurie Solomon wrote: If my understandings of the E-6 process are correct, there are two developing processes and a bleaching process followed by a redevelopment process. The first development process develops the latent image on the transparency film as a black and white image; the second development process adds the color. At this stage in the game the film contains a color negative image. It is then bleached and redeveloped which reverses the image and transforms it from a negative color image to a positive color image. To do what you suggest, it would have to take place after the second developer and before the bleaching process. At that point there would need to be some sort of permanent fixing process to fix the negative color image on the film. I do not know if it is possible to insert such a fixing process into that stage of the process or how it would be done. It just might be the case that the existing image at that stage in the game might be too fragile to permanently fix or there may not be appropriate fixers to do it. I do think it is possible to do this after the first developer when the negative image is black and white. Hi Laurie, The E6 process is a bit different from what you remember. The steps, in order, are First Developer, then the Reversal Bath, then the Colour Developer (followed by Pre-Bleach, Bleach and Fixer). So, unfortunately, you won't have a negative colour image after the second (Colour) developer. Now, I wonder what would happen if you left out the reversal bath and went straight to the Colour Developer... I've never bothered to try such a drastic move, but it might be interesting. Regards, Roger Smith
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Ilford XP1 developer had different composition to plain C41. The newer XP2 requires C41. ~~ When XP1 film dev was sold by Ilford it was my first choice in developer for all our colour film. We found that the slightly longer dev time of 5 minutes and the presumably accurate chemistry makeup gave superb consistency. "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
At 07:37 13/01/2001 -0800, you wrote: Improper film storage and handling prior to processing plays a big part in the consistency of color and density characteristics of the orange mask. not exactly. what you call the orange mask is in reality the mask plus an unwanted image. properly stored films precessed in proper manner have correct mask plus very low fog. if you bugger storage and/or processing then you increase the fog. remember the mask is there to compensate for not-so-ideal spectral properties of the formed dyes. if we treat the fog and the image as "positive" density, the mask will be "negative". you deal with two images dependent of themselves and superimposed. Also when referring to the word "lot" are you speaking of same film type but different batch or are you referring to Kodak versus Fuji? Different film types (Kodak, Fuji) will definitely show visual differences in the orange mask. Also different ISO ratings have differences as well. the color of the mask depends on used components, which vary from manufacturer to manufacturer and/or film. it is however possible to have films with identical mask, even from different manufacturers. it depends, what they put into a kettle. Bear in mind that it is not important, how does the mask look to your eye, but how the paper emulsion sees it. and for the paper the differences may be negligible. Paul Problem is that the color characteristics of the orange mask vary -- from one film lot to another, and in particular, as a function of the processing of the film. [rafe b:] I can't say for certain, but my gut (and my eyes) disagree with you. Plus, I have heard this from others. I'd be curious to hear other folks' experiences and thoughts on this. http://okphoto.webjump.com P:250-498-2800 F:250-498-6876 "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
At 11:52 12/01/2001 -0800, you wrote: http://www.zocalo.net/~mgr/DigitalPhoto/derCurveMeister/index.htm 404 - not found "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
Bear in mind that it is not important, how does the mask look to your eye, but how the paper emulsion sees it. and for the paper the differences may be negligible. So would one be wrong to interpret what you are saying here in a fashion as to infer that it might be generally said that these films with their orange masks, whatever the differences, are optimized for traditional photographic printing on photographic papers and emulsions using chemical processes where the mask has little bearing on the outcome except maybe to add some time to the processing and some contrast to the outcome and may not be optimized for digital scanning and processing where the mask may come into more play as a factor in effecting the final printed outcome? Or put another way, the differences under the traditional chemical methods are intended to be negligible; but not so under digital methods where the scanner can be assumed to be like your eye and not like a paper emulsion? -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Roman Kielich Sent: Sunday, January 14, 2001 4:20 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: orange mask At 07:37 13/01/2001 -0800, you wrote: Improper film storage and handling prior to processing plays a big part in the consistency of color and density characteristics of the orange mask. not exactly. what you call the orange mask is in reality the mask plus an unwanted image. properly stored films precessed in proper manner have correct mask plus very low fog. if you bugger storage and/or processing then you increase the fog. remember the mask is there to compensate for not-so-ideal spectral properties of the formed dyes. if we treat the fog and the image as "positive" density, the mask will be "negative". you deal with two images dependent of themselves and superimposed. Also when referring to the word "lot" are you speaking of same film type but different batch or are you referring to Kodak versus Fuji? Different film types (Kodak, Fuji) will definitely show visual differences in the orange mask. Also different ISO ratings have differences as well. the color of the mask depends on used components, which vary from manufacturer to manufacturer and/or film. it is however possible to have films with identical mask, even from different manufacturers. it depends, what they put into a kettle. Bear in mind that it is not important, how does the mask look to your eye, but how the paper emulsion sees it. and for the paper the differences may be negligible. Paul Problem is that the color characteristics of the orange mask vary -- from one film lot to another, and in particular, as a function of the processing of the film. [rafe b:] I can't say for certain, but my gut (and my eyes) disagree with you. Plus, I have heard this from others. I'd be curious to hear other folks' experiences and thoughts on this. http://okphoto.webjump.com P:250-498-2800 F:250-498-6876 "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Roman, Ilford XP1 developer had different composition to plain C41. The newer XP2 requires C41. You _could_ use C41 with XP1, but Ilford recommended their own special XP1 developer for best results. They now seem to have stopped selling special developer for XP films and say you should use ordinary C41. Brian Rumary, England http://freespace.virgin.net/brian.rumary/homepage.htm
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Hi Robert. "Robert E. Wright" wrote: I've always thought the correct curves were dependant on the image content and attempting to write general curves, even for each roll of film, would not be successful. Colour negative film doesn't vary from second to second as most people seem to think. It used to be printed on photographic paper you know, using the same filter pack for an entire roll, or even an entire batch of film! The technique of starting from a raw scan, and applying a generic correction over multiple frames is the only way to get even colour and density across multi-frame panoramas. Rather than use curves, it's easier to use the levels tool, and align both ends of the red, green, and blue histograms, IMHO. Regards, Pete.
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
I clicked on the URL in your message and it opened OK. Having tried it, I really don't recommend the procedure in the site though. - Original Message - From: Roman Kielich [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, January 14, 2001 2:52 AM Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask At 11:52 12/01/2001 -0800, you wrote: http://www.zocalo.net/~mgr/DigitalPhoto/derCurveMeister/index.htm 404 - not found "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It's already tomorrow in Australia".
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
At 01:45 PM 1/12/01 -0800, Eli Bowen wrote: I don't believe the processing of the film has any effect on the orange mask, unless there is something horrendously wrong with the processing. [rafe b:} Problem is that the color characteristics of the orange mask vary -- from one film lot to another, and in particular, as a function of the processing of the film. [rafe b:] I can't say for certain, but my gut (and my eyes) disagree with you. Plus, I have heard this from others. It might be that the processing affects the color balance in some mannner, which I simply attributed to a change in the orange mask. I'd be curious to hear other folks' experiences and thoughts on this. rafe b.
RE: filmscanners: orange mask
I find the mask (film base) on XP2 varies substantially (in both density and tint) depending on who develops it, so I wouldn't be surprised if the orange base does on colour. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of rafeb Sent: 13 January 2001 13:00 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: orange mask At 01:45 PM 1/12/01 -0800, Eli Bowen wrote: I don't believe the processing of the film has any effect on the orange mask, unless there is something horrendously wrong with the processing. [rafe b:} Problem is that the color characteristics of the orange mask vary -- from one film lot to another, and in particular, as a function of the processing of the film. [rafe b:] I can't say for certain, but my gut (and my eyes) disagree with you. Plus, I have heard this from others. It might be that the processing affects the color balance in some mannner, which I simply attributed to a change in the orange mask. I'd be curious to hear other folks' experiences and thoughts on this. rafe b.
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
- Original Message - From: "Mike Finley" [EMAIL PROTECTED] : I find the mask (film base) on XP2 varies substantially (in both density and : tint) depending on who develops it, so I wouldn't be surprised if the orange : base does on colour. ~~ When XP1 film dev was sold by Ilford it was my first choice in developer for all our colour film. We found that the slightly longer dev time of 5 minutes and the presumably accurate chemistry makeup gave superb consistency.We often were able to get Hand made prints spot on fist time through without the constant minute filtration changes that the Kodak and Agfa Developers gave us . We are finding that Fuji 400 scans very well without the harsh granular appearance that some neg film give. The advice given to me by our drum scanner manufacturer was to scan the negs slightly out of focus and then sharpen in Photoshop afterwards,something I have however been reluctant to do.the theory being that the graininess would be less apparent ! regards Michael Wilkinson. 106 Holyhead Road,Ketley, Telford.Shropshire TF 15 DJ [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.infocus-photography.co.uk For Trannies and Negs from Digital Files
filmscanners: orange mask
Do Nikon filmscanners come with special colour profiles for scanning different colour negatives? Somebody told they don't. In that case, how can I automatically remove the orange mask? What about the new Nikon scanners? Regards Tomasz Zakrzewski
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Get Vuescan for $40 (free demo) at http://www.hamrick.com/ Maris - Original Message - From: "fotografia - tomasz zakrzewski" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, January 12, 2001 6:21 AM Subject: filmscanners: orange mask | Do Nikon filmscanners come with special colour profiles for scanning | different colour negatives? Somebody told they don't. In that case, how can | I automatically remove the orange mask? | What about the new Nikon scanners? | | Regards | | Tomasz Zakrzewski |
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
I don't know why all scanners don't handle orange mask by looking at a bit of leader or inter-frame unexposed area and automatically determine the _exact_ mask for each film. Do any of them? It would seem much easier than any other way? Cheers, Julian At 02:50 13/01/01, you wrote: It would be nice if the scanner vendors provided an applet that allowed one to create an orange-mask filter for any particular film. All you really need, I think, is a blank (unexposed) frame. Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
Why not "invert" and do the color correction? - Original Message - From: Julian Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, January 12, 2001 4:57 PM Subject: Re: filmscanners: orange mask I don't know why all scanners don't handle orange mask by looking at a bit of leader or inter-frame unexposed area and automatically determine the _exact_ mask for each film. Do any of them? It would seem much easier than any other way? Cheers, Julian At 02:50 13/01/01, you wrote: It would be nice if the scanner vendors provided an applet that allowed one to create an orange-mask filter for any particular film. All you really need, I think, is a blank (unexposed) frame. Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
