Judging Negatives

[Mainecoonmaniac]

+1

The best way to see if a negative is any good is to print it.

Very true. I remember working with some old dogs that printed on graded paper and made negs that printed on grade 2 regularly. I'm not at that level yet.

 

[MattKing]

I may have linked to the following site for you already, but just in case: http://www.ephotozine.com/article/assessing-negatives-4682

That site isn't perfect, at least partially because it is hard to accurately portray the information through the internet, when everyone's computer screen is different, but like the site linked to in Bruce Robbins' post, it should give you an idea how best to approach the question.

One thing I would emphasize, however, is that underexposure can be terrible, whereas underdevelopment can often be compensated for.

Over-exposure and over-development make it more difficult to get good results, but unless the errors are very large, they too can be mostly compensated for.

Do you have good prints from your "professionally" developed negatives? If so, that will tell you something about them.

 

[Simon R Galley]

Dear Rattymouse,

As always lots of good advise...

My understanding is that like most photography and processing and printing disciplines it comes with experience and practice.

When I was taught I was always told to under and over, could'nt be simpler... meter, set as meter then two more images one stop under and one stop over...

The more cynical of you would say thats a great way to chew up lots of film....and what does Simon do......make film !

Seriously I know photography is not a cheap passion...but there is no substitute for a good neg, never has been, never will be, and when you are starting out this gives you a much better chance to get a good neg and not to become frustrated.

and I still occasionaly under and over.

Simon ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited

 

[Xmas]

My Epson 600 scanner has a densitometer where you can examine different parts of the scanned film. (both chromes and negatives)

!. How would you use that if your printing chemically?

2. How would you use that if you are printing digitally?

I do a digital print from a scan, rescan and write the density value on the dprint before doing test strips - for wet print, I encapsulate the digital print in a laminating pouch so I can erase any bad burn and dodge timings etc, saves a lots of wet print material. I scan the marked up dprint and index on the computer...

 

[RattyMouse]

Dear Rattymouse,

As always lots of good advise...

My understanding is that like most photography and processing and printing disciplines it comes with experience and practice.

When I was taught I was always told to under and over, could'nt be simpler... meter, set as meter then two more images one stop under and one stop over...

The more cynical of you would say thats a great way to chew up lots of film....and what does Simon do......make film !

Seriously I know photography is not a cheap passion...but there is no substitute for a good neg, never has been, never will be, and when you are starting out this gives you a much better chance to get a good neg and not to become frustrated.

and I still occasionaly under and over.

Simon ILFORD Photo / HARMAN technology Limited

Thanks Simon. Your advice is well accepted, even if you do sell film! I will take some multiple shots for images that I think are worthy of this. So far I have not done so. That will change.

I just sent off 2 rolls of Delta 3200 to the lab today! I dont feel confident doing those myself, nor so I have any DDX on hand. The lab can do better than me and has probably a lifetime supply of DDX compared to what I would ever need.