Got my negatives back today - that old folding Kinax camera still works !!!

[Dazz1]

I am so chuffed that the old camera still works. A couple of these will look familiar as I took digital colour versions the same day. They all turned out, to some extent, and probably display my lack of skill at guessing exposures.

These are just quick scans of the negatives on a cheap scanner, then inverted in Gimp and cleaned up a little bit. I will experiment with photographing the negatives, as discussed previously, later.

http://ubuntuone.com/1PMANitVum66cGcnPvDWwC

http://ubuntuone.com/2KBXEDNM8grBcf8GFnNOts

http://ubuntuone.com/2yapVsprxHsPuXXP0umQaE

[ameerat42]

Good to hear, and see! How did you copy them?
Am.

[Dazz1]

Good to hear, and see! How did you copy them?
Am.

For now, I just scanned them on a cheap Epson flatbed scanner. Tomorrow I will set up a shoebox with the negative at one end, and my camera at the other, and get the best quality copy I can.

[ameerat42]

Yes, but prints, or negs?

[arthurking83]

Good to see and hear WP.

- - - Updated - - -


Yes, but prints, or negs?


LOL! Am ....



......

These are just quick scans of the negatives on a cheap scanner, then inverted in Gimp and cleaned up a little bit. .....

he did say inverted(highlighted by me)! :p

[ameerat42]

S:(rry!
Haist makes waist.
Cr:(nge.

(PS: It might pay to SIT and read the screen better.)

[arthurking83]

S:(rry!
Haist makes waist.
Cr:(nge.

(PS: It might pay to SIT and read the screen better.)

OK then.

Now as punishment, I want you to make your next reply via Office2000BC .. that is via hammer and chisel on a granite slab .. and in point form(hopefully only 10 points tho).

ps. in my case haist doesn't make waist! Chips, chocolate .. and pizza for dinner(again) .. they all make waist.

Waist not, want not ... waist not wanted .. yada, yada ... etc, etc.

[Dazz1]

:lol2: Ha, I go out for a curry, and look wot you guys get up to!


For the record, yes, just scanned the negatives, so dpi on the scanning was real low (600 dpi). Will be interesting to see how they look when photographed at 4000x3000 pixels.

[Mark L]

And don't worry about blurring that blokes face in #1. It takes my attention away from the point of the photo.:confused013

[Dazz1]

And don't worry about blurring that blokes face in #1. It takes my attention away from the point of the photo.:confused013

Wasn't sure of the etiquette there. No need to blur? OK.

[Dazz1]

I have to say I have not done well in photographing the negatives yet.

It boils down to not having a diffuse source of light. When the negatives are lit by backlight from the room, or outside the window, the camera tried to focus on the external scene. I tried putting a sheet of printer paper behind them, but the paper fibres showed through. I also tried an android tablet and computer screen as a backlight, but the pixels were obvious.

I think I need a thin sheet of translucent plastic of some sort.

[ricktas]

Wasn't sure of the etiquette there. No need to blur? OK.

Not at all. In Australia if you are in the street, or a public place (public land), or even on private property and visible from the public land (ie you the photographer can stand on public land and take the photo of a person on private land), then you must expect to be photographed. You do not need to get permission from someone to photograph them, UNLESS you are going to use the photo for commercial purposes. This does not mean selling the photo as such, but Commercial purposes is selling it for use in advertising etc.

So for example, you can photograph me walking down the street drinking a can of coke. But you cannot sell that photo to coca-cola for use on a billboard etc, without my permission. But you could enter it in a photography competition**, exhibit, publish it in a book. **Depending on the competion, remember some comps are simply a way for a company to get photos to use for promotion.

For all intents and purposes if someone is on the street, or visible from the street (street being public place), then they have to expect to be photographed.

Note that some public places whilst readily accessible to the public are not considered public. Shopping centres and the carparks around them. Some forecourts of buildings have open spaces with seating and sculptures etc, but the land might actually belong to the building owner. So what is and what is not public space can be hard to determine at times.

[pixy]

Manual,is the way to go use live view on tripod, then you see what you get, or is get what you see.

When I copy I tape neg to window and copy,no shoe box, it has worked for me.

Jack.

[StanW]

Well done. I'm glad to see the results from the old camera. I hope you're going to keep up the work.
See if you can find someone to make a real print from one of your negatives.

[Dazz1]

Manual,is the way to go use live view on tripod, then you see what you get, or is get what you see.

When I copy I tape neg to window and copy,no shoe box, it has worked for me.

Jack.

What I see, even when I lock the focus to the negative, is the blurred changing light intensity from whatever is behind it. Doesn't matter if it's a window or a shoebox. I need a diffuse even light behind it.

Here's the result from using an Android as a backlight. The pixels make a sort of canvas effect - ok, but not what I want :)

http://ubuntuone.com/0dG6dgZUfYFPHzPNRF6q64

[Mark L]

Have you had any of your photos printed to see what they look like?

[Dazz1]

Have you had any of your photos printed to see what they look like?

Nah, just got the negatives developed - wasn't very sure the camera would work or not.

[Dazz1]

Not at all. In Australia if you are in the street, or a public place (public land), or even on private property and visible from the public land (ie you the photographer can stand on public land and take the photo of a person on private land), then you must expect to be photographed. You do not need to get permission from someone to photograph them, UNLESS you are going to use the photo for commercial purposes. This does not mean selling the photo as such, but Commercial purposes is selling it for use in advertising etc.

So for example, you can photograph me walking down the street drinking a can of coke. But you cannot sell that photo to coca-cola for use on a billboard etc, without my permission. But you could enter it in a photography competition**, exhibit, publish it in a book. **Depending on the competion, remember some comps are simply a way for a company to get photos to use for promotion.

For all intents and purposes if someone is on the street, or visible from the street (street being public place), then they have to expect to be photographed.

Note that some public places whilst readily accessible to the public are not considered public. Shopping centres and the carparks around them. Some forecourts of buildings have open spaces with seating and sculptures etc, but the land might actually belong to the building owner. So what is and what is not public space can be hard to determine at times.

Really appreciate you explaining that. Thanks Rick.

[Dazz1]

Final results. Found a piece of white translucent plastic, and got reasonable photos.

http://ubuntuone.com/3cUNM4rssoBh4o0hk5TLhe

http://ubuntuone.com/1b5z8r9jYZRqeuWI5GC7R7

http://ubuntuone.com/0PaWQUv7bsiyQs80NRPQJj

http://ubuntuone.com/51ogXZU3QMtJd60ZKMqxar

[arthurking83]

Good to see some progress WP. :th3:

This may be an ongoing project to keep you occupied on those rainy days with nothing to do .. so some point to consider.

Not knowing what processing you have done to the digital files from the camera, try a few experimental edits to see if you can maximise the detail you can get from the negs.

But things to watch for: if you have done any post processing of the jpg file(as an example in #1) try to increase the exposure of the jpg file to see if you can reduce the exposure of the negative.
Note that this is probably best done on the negative version of the jpg before you invert(this way your not processing a processed step!)

May sound weird to increase exposure, but because it's a negative, you have to work 'in opposites' on the negative .. that is to decrease exposure on the final image, you need to boost the brightness of the untouched file. To increase contrast, decrease contrast in your edit step ... and so on.

Also, what camera settings did you use in camera? There looks to be a fair amount of colour noise in the images .. and they've taken on a slight magenta cast on the whole too(well except for #2).
The magenta cast may be due to this noise issue.

Of course your ability to post process will be limited due to the nature of the jpg captures, son only push to the point where it doesn't degrade the quality of the final image.
But once you get yourself a raw capable camera, the raw file's ability to push processing a bit further will become a bonus .. so it may be a worthwhile effort to document the steps you have done so far.

My method of documentation was to insert metadata into the image's IPTC(keywords/tags) area. Each software has different ability on how to achieve this.
The notes I added were quite simple, but they were for effects not easily deduced just by reading the exif info .. for example if I used any dodge/burn technique, or if I varied the angle of the light source. Both of those variables have an impact on how well the negative can be exposed in the camera's image but can't be seen in the exif data. So it's a note embedded within the image file itself .. and then easily seen in almost all software as a reference point later on.

It's been over a year since I played with this, but actually nearly 3 years since I first started playing with it all ... one day I'll get off my behind and get back into it with my latest gear acquisition, to see if I can better what I've already (halfassed)done to date.

[Dazz1]

Interesting thought, to change the negative version first. I inverted it back to positive as a first step, my reasoning being that the inverting process should be a simple mathematical process, not prone to degrading the information. I could be very wrong there though. You also mention colour noise and a magenta cast. I didn't think to do a white balance, and going further back, I could have also set the camera to black and white, but didn't. Don't know if that would make it better or worse.

Keeping notes would be a good idea, as it is easy to get lost. Also, if you come back to it later, after years for example, it will be almost essential.

Whatever else happens, I got to try some film in a very old camera, and the project has turned out to be a success inmy estimation. Thanks for being interested and helping.

[arthurking83]

The only reason I suggested trying to maximise the amount of processing on the negative version, is that processing a jpg can be a 'destructive' process. Dunno too much about it tho, as I hardly ever do it personally.

B&W on the camera may be a good idea too tho .. actually makes sense. No need to be accurate with Wb setting I guess(as it's black and white).

I suppose your the person with the finger on the red button, so you will see more closely the ability of every edit step you produce.

With raw file editing, the order of your process steps can make a difference to the final image.

With my slide copying, I used raw, and I found that doing as much on the negative(in terms of exposure contrast and suchlike) made a slight difference to the overall final image, than if I added my subsequent tweaks after I inverted the neg. I could never get exactly the same look on the two different version of editing, although both could come out looking quite OK, if I captured the negative well to begin with.