Scanning negatives

[srobarts]

SWiMBO has decided that she wants our photos from the pre-digital era to be digitised. We elected to go with a Canoscan 8800F which got good reviews. First pass we have some very useable scans without the need for much tweaking. One problem is that the sky in some photos has blotches on it. Not sure where they are coming from and how I can easily solve them. One example below. Any ideas or tips would be much appreciated:

[Saab Dastard]

I don't think it is just the sky - in the photo you have posted, I'm pretty sure that the blotches are right throughout the picture, it's just that they are much more obvious on the sky.

I have to say that I think it is the negative or slide itself - especially as you say that it is not apparent with all pictures.

It may be that the neg / slide can be cleaned up, but this depends on the substrate - acetate (up to end of '70s) or polyester (from early 1980's).

If they are acetate, then that "bubbling" is a common sign of deterioration. Is there a "vinegar" smell?

I suggest a google around the subject of deteriorating negatives and cleaning negatives.

SD

[srobarts]

Thanks SD
No smell of vinegar.
I started with the newest film (2003) to learn the tricks of scanning, hoping the negs would still be OK.
Reading the cleaning process in some webs takes me back to my school days developing my old B&W films!
Think I might regret the: "I am sure it is not to big a task to scan them all"!
Ah well.

[Saab Dastard]

I have to admit that it's a looooong time since I've done anything with film - I used to process my own B&W stuff, from early 80's up to early '90s.

Handling negatives during the development stage was critical, down to rinsing and drying properly to avoid water marks, and then for storing them to avoid dust and scratches I used A4 sheets with 5 or 6 slots for strips of negs.

All my cameras & lenses were stolen in 1991, and I was so devastated I jacked in photography. I did get something back on insurance, which I put into a high-end hifi system (which is still going strong), but I digress.

SD

[green granite]

Have a read of: filmclean

[Rossian]

Blotchy fillum

I had a similar problem with colour transparencies from as far back as the late '60s. I took them to a "man who knew" who diagnosed it as a form of fungus which grows like those piccies you see of bacteria growing in a Petri dish (if you note they are almost all circular). Just be very careful using any form of cleaner. If your slide is of particular sentimental value why not just accept it as it is and, maybe, try to use some of the tweaks and tecniques in Photoshop or something of that ilk to remove them. That way you still retain the original.
The Ancient Mariner

[Coconutty]

Apologies for "borrowing" your pic - but depending how much time you want to spend with a program like Paint Shop Pro or Adobe Photoshop, can you can fix most problems ..... This took a couple of minutes :

[daved123]

impressive result

To put it into perspective, steps taken please, to arrive at this end result.
(couple of minutes taken puts my efforts in the shade, time-wise)

[srobarts]

coconutty
that is superb, I can feel the heat and hear the sounds of the beach..
as daved123 says the steps taken would be helpful for us novices at digital touch ups!
The scanner came with Arcsoft PhotoStudio 5.5 and I have PaintShopPro 9.0
thanks for your time and effort

[Coconutty]

Sorry for the delay - have been heavily involved with my own Birthday celebrations, secretly arranged parties on my behalf and family & friends BBQ's over this weekend ( hic )

Using Paint Shop Pro Version 7.00 I opened the Image file then used the "Freehand Selection tool" ( Looks like a lassoo on the toolbar left of screen ) to select all of the sky area. Once selected, from the top Menu bar, use the "Effects / Blur / Blur more" tool. ( If you take a bit more time you could drag around the mast of that little yacht that I chopped off and leave it untouched ! )

Then, from the "Edit / Repeat Blur More" menu, repeat the action until the spots have disappeared - it took about 12 repeats of the operation until I was happy with it.

To correct a few of the spots visible on the beach, you can use the "Clone Brush" tool - On the left of the screen it's the button with 2 paint brushes.

I love this tool - Hold down the Shift key on your keyboard and click on part of the image you want to clone ( copy ). The using the mouse move to the part of the image you want to copy over and click / drag the mouse - this will copy the part of the image you "Shift clicked" on before.

So to erase a spot on the beach just Shift and click on another part of the beach that looks the same but without any blemishses, then click on the spot and drag around that area to "clone" it from the unblemished part of the image !

The size of the area selected to be cloned, and other options including Shape, Size, hardness, Opacity, density etc. can be set in the Tool Options palette ( Top Menu - View / Toolbars / Tool Options Palette ). You need to play around with these to see the effects.

The following took only a few seconds to do !

Original pic :


Cloned pic :


Great tool for touching up portrait photo's too - gets rid of zit's far quicker than Clearasil

Lesson over for now