Negative storage question

[Norman]

First time I've ventured in this forum, I'm all digital - scarey!!!

My problem is this.

I have a load of 35mm negs from my pre-digital days that are currently stored in paper (translucent) pages in loose leaf binders. I no longer have a darkroom and cannot produce contact sheets. I have a film scanner but have difficulty finding the negative. I would like to be able to produce contact sheets by scanning the loose leaf page but these are paper and not fully transparent. Also they are in strips of 6 which means the pages would be too large to fit on an A4 flatbed scanner.

I could buy pages like the Jessops transparent versions but I would still have the size problem. Jessops also do a page for negs cut into 4s here.

Does anyone use these? Are they suitable for A4 scanning? It would mean cutting my negs into 4s and would then mean filing 2 X 2 neg strips into some of the pockets. Can the negs be loaded into the pockets from both ends?

Any other solutions come to mind?

So many questions.

[LargeFormat]

Caveat, that I haven't misunderstood.

Every time I mention using a multicoated optical glass filter to protect my lens people jump up and down about degading image quality. I'm afraid I'm going to do the same with the idea of scanning film inside film sleeves.

For what it's worth I am in the midst of a similar process. Unscanned film is in transluscent paper. After scanning the bare film they are transferred to archival quality pockets made by Secol. If I wanted a "contact sheet" I could use Epson PhotoQuick which automatically assembles any number, say 36, of files onto an A4 sheet. If you have an Epson printer you probably have the utility. Alternatively other makes may have the same utilty but I see no reason why PhotoQuick shouldn't work with any printer.

[Norman]

Thanks.

That solution requires that I already have all the images on my disk system, I don't, and there are too many to scan every neg to produce 'contact sheets' within PS. I need a system that I can browse through the 'contact sheets' (a whole film scanned in one) find the image I want and then put the neg in the film scanner.

I could take all the negs out of their existing pockets and arrange them on the scanner glass, I suppose, but that sounds like it would be very time consuming. The problem of scanning through plastic shouldn't be too much of a problem as all I need is the ability to identify the neg I'm looking for.

[beejaybee]

I produce "contact sheets" using an application that came with my first (Epson) scanner - the software lets me make a page with 40 thumbnail sized images on a single A4 sheet - I just scan the slides (I'm using a Minolta scanner now) store them in a folder point the program at the folder & it does the rest. No reason why you shouldn't do that with negs.

[Benchista]

I could take all the negs out of their existing pockets and arrange them on the scanner glass, I suppose, but that sounds like it would be very time consuming.

In what way is that any worse than taking them out of existing pages, putting them in new pages, and then scanning them?

Just get 'em out, scan 'em, and put 'em back - it won't take you any longer, and will cost you less.

[Norman]

That's precisely what I want to do but my question was more to do with whether the neg filing sheets would be OK for the purpose. The scan would be ONE image rather than a set of thumbnails combined into a contact sheet. I really don't relish doing 36 individual scans if I can get away with one. The image would be printed and stored next to the negs in the filing system.

[Norman]

In what way is that any worse than taking them out of existing pages, putting them in new pages, and then scanning them?

Just get 'em out, scan 'em, and put 'em back - it won't take you any longer, and will cost you less.

Agreed, except that the current pages store 6 X 6 to page and I would have to re-arrange the layout on the platen to 4 X 10 to fit onto A4. The image wouldn't match the filing but maybe I can live with that.

I was thinking about new pages because some of the paper ones are 50 years old and are pretty fragile.

[Benchista]

Ah, fair enough, then. In that case, I would go with the plastic plan, personally.

[Mojo_66]

I could take all the negs out of their existing pockets and arrange them on the scanner glass,

Are you sure you could do this? A lot of flatbed scanners need the film holder to scan film. I know I've tried scanning without the holder before and the scanner couldn't "find" the negs.

[Norman]

I think you may be right. I have started experimenting and have found that, with the right settings, Vuescan and my Canon FS4000 film scanner can automate the scanning of a 6 negative strip in a couple of minutes. Obviously not at a high enough resolution for use but certainly enough to add to the Lightroom catalogue.

I can then print a 'contact sheet' from within Lightroom for filing with the negs. Maybe not quite as quick as my initial thoughts but gives the added bonus of having the pics on-line within Lightroom for keywording etc. If I then need a high res version it's easy to find and produce.

[topoxforddoc]

Try these from 7 day shop

I've been using the Clearfile filing sheets for years. I print my contacts straight from the sheets (A4 paper as a wetprint or an A4 scan). They're excellent quality and archival.

Charlie