Marking film/great tip.

Pity. I thought I could say I was unique on APUG( nice to be unique occasionally even if it's for ignorance) in not knowing what a sharpie was but AgX beat me to it. So in keeping with AndyK's excellent point about the importance of country of origin, can any of the UK based posters let me know what are suitable makes and ink colours of sharpies in the U.K. Good job I read on. For a while I was convinced that it was simply a sharp pointed metal object like a large needle that you could score and remove the emulsion of the film at the leader's end so that the writing showed up on marking as clear both then and when developed.

Thanks

pentaxuser

I just googled "Sharpie Pens" and found out they are just starting to be sold in GR.Br. Try Woolsworth or Staples.

Mike

What would one use to mark directly the negative?

I use these selfsame Sharpies manufactured by a company called "Sanford" to mark directly on the negative. They also make an "industrial" version which works on more surfaces and seems to be more water resistant--good for plastic things that go in the freezer, glass in the refrigerator, and such.

To remove Sharpie ink, if need be, I recommend naphtha.

Good Evening,

Sharpies are great, as others have indicated above.

Even Sharpies, however, don't work very well for writing information on negatives--IF you want the written material to be easily readable on a contact sheet. The Sharpie ink, even the black ink, is apparently not quite opaque; I find that india ink is much more satisfactory for marking negatives. In addition, even the finest-point Sharpies are too blunt to use effectively on the limited clear space of 4 x 5 negatives, especially, again, if you want the any data to be clear on the contact sheet. Otherwise, Sharpies are terrific.

Konical

Staedtler do manufacture a very nice product for permanent marking, actually they make a few, but their Lumocolor Permanent marker stands out from almost all others.

It doesn't dry up if left uncapped!

Only because we have a fair few house guests in our place, did I learn of the existence of a "Sharpie" pen. I heard of them on APUG last year, but didn't know what they were, so I asked a house guest, she promptly pulled one out of her backpack to show me.

Mick.