Do you keep your negatives?

Snapshot · Dec 30, 2007

I find the concept of destroying negatives a little.... disturbing. I guess it's that 'pack rat' mentality that I honed so well.

wheelygirl · Dec 30, 2007

Hello to one and all!
The only set of negs I've deliberately threw out, recently, was my very 1st roll of b&w film, that I developed, in-class. Oh, good God!! My 1st ever attempt at rolling film onto those metal reels!!!! UGH! Than You, God for plastic reels! That 1st contact sheet was a mass of blobs, where the film had been evenly 'loaded' onto the reel; needless to say the set of negs has been unceremoniously "dumped". All my other negs are not to be wasted.
There are a number of photos I had shot, years back, that I've since lost the negs to, unfortunately.

removed account4 · Dec 30, 2007

SNIP

Christopher Walrath said:
Yeah, I keep about 90% of them. The crap goes in the bin.

my problem is that the negatives i thought were bad when i took and looked at them
turn out to be ones i like a few years later

john

Black Dog · Dec 30, 2007

Some of mine are like that too-usually keep a handful just in case though.

Kino · Dec 30, 2007

I keep all of my negatives too, but certainly not for the usual reasons. Its my way of surreptitiously hoarding precious metals...

The subject matter is designed to off-put the suspicious.

Thomas Bertilsson · Dec 31, 2007

Yesterday I tossed about five rolls from way back when. They were duds in all kinds upthinkable. Unevenly developed, spots, blemishes. I didn't even want to think about the amount of work involved in restoring them - and for what? They were crap.
I think I keep any negative that has some form of artistic merit, one way or another. A lot of the negs are from testing new cameras / lenses / films / developers, and I could keep them for reference, but I'm not going to. I'd say in total I keep about 80% of what I shoot. Happily I'm becoming less trigger happy so it's becoming less of a problem.
- Thomas

Les McLean · Dec 31, 2007

Like most who have posted I keep most of mine destroying only those that are damaged, badly exposed or processed.

However, when the time comes and I have "popped my clogs" all my negatives will come with me in the pine box into the fiery furnace. I will also have my first medium format camera an old Minolta Autocord along with 10 rolls of FP4 120 film, two boxes of Ilford Warmtone Fibre paper, some film and paper dev and fix just in case I make any exposures on my final journey. I still have'nt figured out how to get my enlarger in there with me. Any ideas?

Thomas Bertilsson · Dec 31, 2007

What a great idea, Les! I think I'll follow your example, although I'm sure my film will be outdated...

- Thomas

Doubrovsky · Jan 15, 2008

I don't sort my negatives, don't throw anything away. Just put them in various boxes and binders. Some in my studio, some in laundry, in the basement, between the pages of favorit books. Some day my heirs will find them and make lots of money.

colrehogan · Jan 15, 2008

Les McLean said:
Like most who have posted I keep most of mine destroying only those that are damaged, badly exposed or processed.

However, when the time comes and I have "popped my clogs" all my negatives will come with me in the pine box into the fiery furnace. I will also have my first medium format camera an old Minolta Autocord along with 10 rolls of FP4 120 film, two boxes of Ilford Warmtone Fibre paper, some film and paper dev and fix just in case I make any exposures on my final journey. I still have'nt figured out how to get my enlarger in there with me. Any ideas?

I have some Delta 3200 negatives that one of my cats decided she wanted to chew on (i.e. she touched them and they moved). The problem is that the images are fairly good. I have contact prints of them, but haven't thrown them out yet.

Yes, my cat chewed on my negatives.

rcoda · Jan 15, 2008

Kept this one in a box for 2 days shy of 20 years... it's from Sept. 13, 1981.

Akki14 · Jan 15, 2008

colrehogan said:
Yes, my cat chewed on my negatives.

I lucked out. My hamster chewed some negative SLEEVES that were on top of his cage... luckily it was only the sleeves and he didn't actually eat any of the plastic, it was just nicely scattered around his cage. My hamster is a my little darkroom companion on the dryside of things

Cheryl Jacobs · Jan 16, 2008

I can sympathize with you two. My golden retriever Asa ate an entire roll of freshly exposed 220 Tri-X a few years back. And I do mean he ATE it. Ingested the whole thing, reel and all. I was looking al over the house for it when I noticed a little flick of yellow paper in his mouth. Upon further investigation, I discovered his blue tongue.

He was unhurt, but shortly after that, he went to live with a nice family on a ranch. I still maintain that the two events were unrelated.

- CJ

Akki14 · Jan 18, 2008

Cheryl Jacobs said:
My golden retriever Asa

Is your next dog going to be called Iso?

Cheryl Jacobs · Jan 18, 2008

Actually, I considered Iso. Problem was that it sounds a lot like Eyesore, which is a sad burden to put on a pretty dog.

When we got our current dog, my oldest son suggested we name her Fixer. I liked his way of thinking, but given the destructive nature of puppies I thought it didn't fit well.

- CJ

pauliej · Jan 18, 2008

My family has some really old photos going back into the late 1800's, some we know who it is, some we dont, dang it. When I was home for the holidays, I was checking out some old tintypes, I think, where the photo emulsion is on a metal plate. Some of these were "mom with baby" shots - wish I knew who was who, and how to make a copy from these. My grandmother had a Kodak 2A (?) in high school and developed/printed her own pics at home, which really surprised me when I found out. I was going thru some stuff here recently and was shocked & pleasantly surprised to find 4 old envlopes from the drug store down the street (the building doesnt even exist anymore) when I was a kid, with the negatives still in them. Nothing important here, just family photos, some taken at school with friends, but it sure takes me back to 1959-1962 (dates on the envelopes). Sort of like a trip into the Way-Back machine (showing my age there). If I cant find a photo shop that can make some prints for me, I just might get me some chemicals and trays and paper and see if I can at least make some contact sheets. These are 620 Kodak Safety Film images, 6x6cm. If grandma can do it, I think maybe I can too.

Any suggestions how I can make a paper copy from the tintypes? Thanks for any help. And remember to keep them for the next generation.

Paul

Andy K · Jan 18, 2008

I think tintypes, by their nature, are 'one-offs'. You might try photographing them and making prints from those negs.

Akki14 · Jan 18, 2008

620 film is just medium format film (120) rolled onto a different spool. Not an issue when you're printing from them and 6x6cm negs are commonplace in medium format.
You might want to ask how to photograph the tintypes over in the alternative process section of APUG as I know there are some people who work in that medium and do post their images onto the Gallery.

Robert Hall · Jan 18, 2008

I have well over 100 years of negatives from four generations of photographers in my family. I would no more throw a negative away than cut off my shutter finger!

I seem to now be the repository for such from my family, fine art, documentary, family snaps or otherwise. Hey, I have the resources to store them, why not?

eddym · Jan 18, 2008

Akki14 said:
Is your next dog going to be called Iso?

We used to have a cat named f-stop. We called her Effie for short.

I've heard that Ansel Adams had a three-legged dog named Tripod.

Nikkorray · Jan 24, 2008

I'm in the process of scanning 10+ years worth of negatives. I just finished scanning my slides & maybe finished scanning about 5% of the negatives. I threw away a box full of slides from my earlier work (they were horrible). The box was about 16 inches tall by about 12 inches wide & it was full. I plan on throwing away the negatives that doesn't carry any memory with it. The bad thing is I do not want to cut them so I have to keep some of the bad ones with the good ones. If I had a choice, I would throw the bad ones away.

Do you keep your negatives?

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