Magnifier for touching up negatives

[logan2z]

(I wasn't quite sure where to post this so hopefully the moderators will move it to someplace more appropriate if there is one)

I recently had a couple of rolls of film in which small clear areas were created on the negatives by dust particles inside the camera. I want to print a few of the negatives from these rolls but want to touch up the negatives before I do. I have an 8x Peak loupe that I use to inspect negatives but it is just barely strong enough to resolve the spot and it must be in contact with the negative in order to achieve focus so that won't work. I was looking to purchase a headband magnifier like the ones from Optivisor but their max magnification is 3.5x which won't be sufficient.

Can anyone suggest an appropriate magnifier that I can use for this job? Whatever I choose will need a working distance sufficient to allow me to work on the negative.

 

[dasBlute]

I use an optivisor for spotting prints, spotting negatives is -I think- way harder, the scale/precision required is a bit much. Even a 0.4mm pen seems cumbersome when spotting negatives. Perhaps others have better luck or skills, I was unable to make a success of it. Also, surface tension makes ink not want to leave a single strand of hair to adhere to the negative.

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

I have a pair of +4 glasses I found at the dollar store. They work great for negative and print spotting.

 

[wiltw]

What format negatives? Back 4 decades ago, generally speaking retouching of negatives was only done by commercial labs with medium format negs and not with 135 format

 

[logan2z]

What format negatives? Back 4 decades ago, generally speaking retouching of negatives was only done by commercial labs with medium format negs and not with 135 format

Sorry, I forgot to mention that it is 120 film.

 

[kevs]

Unless you have experience of negative retouching, it might be a good plan to either print the negatives as well as possible and/or scan them at high resolution before you attempt to retouch them. If the negs are important to you, you then have a backup plan if the retouching goes wrong.

For retouching prints, i use a 50mm standard lens from a 35mm SLR, which is easy to hold in my hand and gives good magnification. A 50mm may not be strong enough for working on negatives though; perhaps a 35mm lens would be better if you have one handy.