Possibly you’ll be able to relate to this. You’ve gotten submitting cupboards filled with negatives and transparencies you shot again within the movie days which have remained untouched for many years now. What do you do with them? I’ve tried varied scanners over time, and none have given me the outcomes I need. So I finished bothering and continued to allow them to sit of their darkish tombs, unloved and forgotten.
Just a few years in the past, I purchased a Nikon Z9, with extra megapixels than I want. In the future, it occurred to me that if I used my 100mm macro lens with it, I ought to have the ability to flip a 35mm damaging into a really excessive decision digital file. So I put some on a lightbox, arrange the digital camera simply inches from the field floor, and tried to seize one thing. However negatives aren’t flat. I couldn’t get a frame-wide focus, the outcomes had been horrible, and I gave up. I ought to add, there was—nonetheless is—a very good “professional” resolution: get a drum scan made at a professional lab. The one downside is that that is costly. Relying on the decision, you’ll be able to simply pay $30–$60 every. I’ve carried out this for consumer work, however for private pictures, I can’t justify it.
Earlier this yr, I heard from a person in England named Michael Swift. He’s a semi-retired IT skilled with a love of analog pictures. He instructed me he “all the time liked the interesting tones and natural grain construction in movie pictures.” I can relate, and he had the identical dilemma as me. However he did one thing about it.
Mike designed a movie holder so he may have a flat damaging or transparency as a way to obtain a superbly centered digital picture from edge to edge. He makes use of a Pentax Ok-3 with a 100mm macro or 50mm macro, relying on the movie measurement and format. He has a Raleno PLV-S192 LED mild, putting the Myriad movie holder on prime.
Myriad by Cutasunda
The Myriad was designed and made fueled by a ardour for pictures and a want to create one thing made fully within the UK with premium supplies. What’s Cutasunda? That’s his model identify. Mike is from Sunderland, within the northeast of England. Sunderland is an historical settlement whose identify means “a land reduce asunder.”
The Myriad movie holder consists of three layers. The bottom layer is a diffuser with a finely textured floor to evenly distribute mild. The center layer is an simply adjustable information that may accommodate each movie measurement from 16mm—together with 110, 135, 127, and 120/220. It doesn’t work with a 4×5 measurement. The clear prime panel has laser-etched markers for good alignment, and your complete unit is firmly compressed with nylon thumbscrew fixings.
Mike kindly despatched me the Myriad to attempt. It arrived in a cotton drawstring storage bag with an optical-grade anti-static microfiber cleansing material. It’s a simple-looking product, however as I found, extremely helpful.
I’ve many 35mm damaging and 120 transparency strips. Adjusting the information is straightforward, and I used to be quickly up and working, capturing a body, after which simply pulling the strip alongside to the subsequent body. Simple. However then there’s the problem of “scanning” transparencies that had been individually reduce and mounted in plastic frames. I wanted to take away the thumbscrews and prime part of the Myriad, place the transparency, after which pop the highest again on. A bit of extra effort, however it labored properly. And it was nonetheless much less fiddly than a movie scanner. I can’t consider anything that lets you simply “scan” a single 35mm transparency like this.
My Setup
I don’t have a replica stand, so I used a tripod. I don’t have an LED mild panel, however I discovered a big X-ray lightbox at a thrift retailer that the native hospital had donated. They had been solely asking $30—what a cut price! This works very properly, because it’s massive sufficient for me to put the Myriad, and in addition unfold out and examine negatives and transparencies and line them up. Rubber ft on the movie holder base imply no scratches on my lightbox, and it doesn’t slide round. My Nikon produces a forty five.7 MP file, and my Laowa 100mm macro can fill your complete body with a picture.
I discovered I received one of the best outcomes by turning off all of the lights within the room to keep away from flare and reflections. As soon as I’ve my pictures on the pc, I open them in Photoshop, and within the case of negatives, invert the picture to turn out to be a optimistic. From there I can fine-tune the picture and clone out any stray mud that will have crept in. I’ve discovered the photographs I’ve scanned have maintained good distinction and readability.
Mud is the largest challenge with reproducing pictures. The Myriad is mainly plastic and might entice mud, however with some care and a spotlight it hasn’t been an issue for me. I’ve found by no means to take the highest layer off and place it down on something aside from a microfiber material—or lean it on its edge.
Analog and Digital Expertise Working Collectively
Having the ability to create a excessive decision picture of a movie photograph offers me one of the best of each worlds. I really like that I can now share my analog work on a digital media platform. I’m additionally in a position to put together a file for giant format printing. Printing on movie paper in a darkroom is nice till you may have a picture with excessive dynamic vary and must dodge and burn. I’ve seen the perfect—well-known—photographers try this, however they will hardly ever get it 100% good, and I cringe at a light-weight halo round a face the place they’ve burned it to lighten the publicity.
If we do that digitally, we’ve got full management and the outcomes are significantly better. Printing onto a high quality artwork archival-quality paper can lead to a really natural film-like finish end result that may be repeated time and again.
Cutasunda’s Myriad Movie Holder retails for £99.95. For extra data and to buy, click on right here.
