Post processing a scanned negative

Playing with film is easy - take pictures, develop the film, make scans and process them digitally. This hybrid method means you don't need a darkroom or an enlarger until you want to go all-in. I have a simple overview of the entire workflow available here.

In this post, I'll elaborate on how I treat black and white images after they are scanned.

Post-scanning workflow

Once a set of black and white negatives is developed and scanned, the digital files can be processed like any other digital image. My scanning is done with a tethered DSLR on a tripod over a light table. Here are the processing steps I usually take:

Importing

• I import the images from the tethered image folder (move rather than copy) with a preset that inverts them into positives and decreases saturation to zero. The preset also adds metadata tags including film type and camera type.

  • For the inversion I use curves - it is the only way to do it as there is no 'invert image' function like with Photoshop. Move the left-hand node from the bottom to the top, and the right-hand node from the top to the bottom (see the screengrabs below).

Processing

Update May 2022: I have a youtube video covering a lot of this information in detail

• Because each frame is scanned in the exact same location on the light-table, I can use a 'sync' in the Develop module to crop all the images at once. I usually leave the film border on the image and crop it out of those I intend to print.

  • Why leave on the film borders? Because they have frame numbers in case they are needed in the future to match with the physical negatives. They are a visual aid to determining which images are truly film vs digital black and white when scanning through Lightroom. They often look great when left as original borders on an image.

• If no import preset was used, invert the image with the curves, and decrease saturation to zero.

• For each image, I shift the exposure to centralize the tones on the histogram.

• Black and white points are adjusted, usually to the extremes. The frame border should really be pure black and the text (like Ilford HP5, or Kodak TriX, or a frame number) should be pure white. This is a good starting point, but adjust for the photograph.

• If the black point still doesn't clip (remember this is altered by the 'whites' slider after the inversion), I'll use the curves to clip them slightly. This generally takes the image from foggy to clear.

• Luminance can help with a grainy picture, depending on what is desired.

• Some post-crop vignette can help divert attention from the edges of an image.

Exporting

• I export using a custom export preset: The files are resized to 1250 pixels on the long edge at 150 dpi and 77% quality for a Jpeg.

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Film Scan On Import

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Film Scan After Processing

Presets

Presets are essentially a one-click macro that automatically applies a series of tweaks all at once. Other than the ones I use on import/export, general developing presets can be tricky to use if they were developed for regular digital images. I’ve found that if any presets used the tone curve, they reset the image back into a negative. Another side effect is that any colour corrections are inverted, too. So any sun or warming brushes turn into cold blue tones on my inverted negatives.

It seems there is a gap in the market for those using Lightroom presets for images originating on negative film. If there is the demand, I can make my simple import and export presets available.

Lightroom pitfalls

• Lightroom has no 'invert image' function. The inversion must be achieved with curves.

• A number of sliders are reversed once the negative is made positive with curves. Exposure is back to front, as are the blacks and whites sliders.

• I still haven't figured out how to deal with the highlight and shadow sliders on an inverted image. They can be unpredictable, especially the highlights.

• The adjustment brush auto-mask function doesn't seem to work well with my images - maybe because of the grain, or because they have been inverted. Auto-mask usually works fine on my conventional digital images.

• Because I leave the film borders on each image, it can confuse the auto-transform function when trying to correct for perspective. I have to rely on manual corections.

• The negative origin of the image seems to confuse the spot heal tool, too. It seems to pick sample areas that are not at all similar to the heal area.

• Lightroom won't do face recognition on an image inverted from a negative.

Using negatives as a final image

When scanning black and white negatives, the moment when the negative image is inverted into a positive is captivating. No matter how much I study the negatives, they always seem blurry and difficult to interpret. The positives suddenly seem sharp and the scene presents itself clearly.

But sometimes a negative stands out on its own. It seems ethereal, or occasionally more real than when converted to positive. Some subjects work better than others - a human face often looks demonic in negative form as the eyes turn black with white pupils. But natural scenes and architecture seems to have their own charm as negatives.

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Stalk Houston Buffalo Bayou negative

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Stalk Houston Buffalo Bayou positive

As most photographs are subjected to some sort of post-production (whether in the darkroom or Lightroom), it seems that a conscious decision to not invert the negative is also a creative possibility.

Hybrid film processing (no darkroom needed)

Most people don't try film photography because they fear film processing lab costs or think they need a full-on darkroom to get the job done. I shoot black and white film which is easily developed at home for very little cost and without a dark room, but it takes a little time (the money-time compromise). I scan the images so they can be manipulated digitally and printed. I'll describe the entire process here.

NOTE: If you are in Houston and looking for overnight developing and scanning of your black and white film, you might be interested in my developing service.

Film

I use purchased 120 rolls for medium format and sheet film for 4x5. I use bulk film for 35mm and load it into reusable canisters using a Lloyd daylight loader. Getting film from its box to the loader requires a dark-bag.

developing the Negatives

This can be done in a kitchen or bathroom using a dark-bag. The only time darkness is required is getting the film from the roll/film holder into a light-tight developing tank. This even works for 4x5 sheets using the 'mod54' insert.

Four liquids are used in specific dilutions: developer, stop-bath, fixer and a rinsing agent. They are mixed in  plastic measuring jugs and brought down or up to temperature in a water bath (kitchen sink) using a thermometer. The stop-bath and fixer can be reused to save on cost and waste. 

Developing times and temperatures are determined based on the developer and film combinations used. See the massive development chart for suggestions. I use my smartphone as a developing timer.

After rinsing, film needs to be hanged to dry (i use wooden clothes pegs) and they are cut to length with a film cutter to fit into dedicated plastic binder sleeves. 

Scanning

Darkroom printing requires a lot of extra equipment and a dark room. As much as I'd like to do this for fun someday, I currently use a hybrid method of shooting and developing film, but then scanning it and processing on a computer. A dedicated scanner can be used, but as I already have a digital camera, tripod and a macro lens, I simply place my film on a light box and take digital pictures of each frame. To make this process easier, I use the Canon's tethering software to use live view and remote shooting through my laptop. The images are high resolution RAW captures, and the resolution can be increased by stitching multiple images of different parts of the same negative.

Digital manipulation

Negative images can be inverted to positives using Lightroom or Photoshop (but not Adobe Camera Raw, the Photoshop Elements Organizer or Canon Digital Photo Professional, annoyingly).

A note on inverting photographs: I used to use Photoshop Elements for this task, but that means opening each image separately, inverting to a positive image, and saving the file (fortunately, saving can be done as a batch process). I have since started using Lightroom, and created a preset to invert a set of images automatically. This saves so much time it might be worth getting Lightroom for this reason alone.

With this hybrid approach, many digital techniques are now available: HDR, panoramas, spot/dust removal,dodging and burning, smoothing and sharpening, colour mapping, the list goes on.

The digital scans are effectively a backup of the physical negatives, which are stored in a folder and can be re-scanned with future technology at any time.

An image doesn't exist until it is printed, and I can easily send my scans to a print service or create a photo book.

In conclusion

There's a lot to think about when using film and developing at home, but it is not all that difficult and the process itself is part of the attraction of film photography. 

 Want to find out more? Here's another great resource on film photography to read on Pixpa.