Digitising Negatives & Processing in Photoshop
Being a keen photographer for 60+ years I have thousands of negatives which I keep having a go at digitising.
I started with a flatbed scanner which came with a set of holders to allow strips of negs to be scanned. Something happened to that which ended its usefulness, maybe some support or drivers weren’t updated. Anyway, it was dead slow and only got used as required for the odd neg or two if a print was needed.
I then got a Veho neg scanner and that wasn’t bad but the quality was mediocre at best, but at least I could get a positive images and filed them away which made identification reasonable easy.
This was followed by developing a method of photographing the negs with a camera which speeded up the process (sort of!) but not as good as I would like.
Then, for Christmas I bought a gadget called the Essential Film Holder which is exactly what it is and I have made really good progress with it. Even so, it still required some work to be able to hold the negs in the correct position time after time. This I have done, I can now feed the strips of negs through the device, and with my Olympus Stylus Tough set on the Microscope feature photograph them really quick. The quality is now superb and a quick run through Photoshop to invert the image and get the orientation right I think I’ve got there!
However I have to do the Photoshop individually so that’s now the ‘weak link’. Ideally I’d like to automate this into an action, but haven’t a clue what to do. The icing on the cake would be a way to ‘batch process’ them. Can anyone suggest any ways of doing this?
I started with a flatbed scanner which came with a set of holders to allow strips of negs to be scanned. Something happened to that which ended its usefulness, maybe some support or drivers weren’t updated. Anyway, it was dead slow and only got used as required for the odd neg or two if a print was needed.
I then got a Veho neg scanner and that wasn’t bad but the quality was mediocre at best, but at least I could get a positive images and filed them away which made identification reasonable easy.
This was followed by developing a method of photographing the negs with a camera which speeded up the process (sort of!) but not as good as I would like.
Then, for Christmas I bought a gadget called the Essential Film Holder which is exactly what it is and I have made really good progress with it. Even so, it still required some work to be able to hold the negs in the correct position time after time. This I have done, I can now feed the strips of negs through the device, and with my Olympus Stylus Tough set on the Microscope feature photograph them really quick. The quality is now superb and a quick run through Photoshop to invert the image and get the orientation right I think I’ve got there!
However I have to do the Photoshop individually so that’s now the ‘weak link’. Ideally I’d like to automate this into an action, but haven’t a clue what to do. The icing on the cake would be a way to ‘batch process’ them. Can anyone suggest any ways of doing this?
Quote:
However I have to do the Photoshop individually so that’s now the ‘weak link’. Ideally I’d like to automate this into an action, but haven’t a clue what to do. The icing on the cake would be a way to ‘batch process’ them. Can anyone suggest any ways of doing this?
If I'm reading this correctly, what you're asking is actually very simple.
If you already know how to create actions, then apologies for teaching you how to suck eggs; otherwise, it's very simple!
For 'batch processing,' look under 'File>automate>batch.'
That'll open a dialogue box; select your action from the drop down menu and the folder containing you images from another one and press OK.
And that's it.
Here's a link which explains in fairly simple terms, exactly what (I think) you're looking for.
It's one of those things that's easier to understand, particularly when you've done it a couple of times, than it is to explain it.
jestertheclown, that seems to be exactly what I have been looking for, and in a format that I can print and refer to as I go along!
I have tried a few items on YouTube but generally I get 'lost' and/or 'confused' since the narrators trip on on details or go too fast, I try backtracking and pausing etc. etc. till in the end I've wasted quite a bit of time and got nowhere, maybe that's an age related thing!
I'll have a trial run tomorrow, Thank You
I have tried a few items on YouTube but generally I get 'lost' and/or 'confused' since the narrators trip on on details or go too fast, I try backtracking and pausing etc. etc. till in the end I've wasted quite a bit of time and got nowhere, maybe that's an age related thing!
I'll have a trial run tomorrow, Thank You
Glad to have ben able to help.
Like yourself, I'm not keen on YouTube videos for those very reasons. The only exception being the 'PiXimperfect' ones (and there are loads of them) which, if I'm careful, I find very useful.
Like yourself, I'm not keen on YouTube videos for those very reasons. The only exception being the 'PiXimperfect' ones (and there are loads of them) which, if I'm careful, I find very useful.
Last year I photographed my slides using a converted slide projector (diadigifix conversion set) and my Nikon D7200 with a macro lens.
I tried several tools to denoise my photos. Regarding the noise I got good results with several tools but Topaz Denoise AI - in the Low Light mode - was the only tool that could handle film grain in a convincing manner too. You can use it in batch mode.
I tried several tools to denoise my photos. Regarding the noise I got good results with several tools but Topaz Denoise AI - in the Low Light mode - was the only tool that could handle film grain in a convincing manner too. You can use it in batch mode.
jestertheclown
Excellent, I have learnt a lot and obviously speeded up the task no end.
However is it possible to ‘automate’ the steps where it waits for inputs?
Typically, when I have completed the inversion of the image in Curves it stops until ok is clicked and similarly when the save part is reached?
The aim would be to have a folder of negative images, typically a films worth 36ish.
Open the Action, click run and it would churn out the whole folder’s worth of images as positive images.
Excellent, I have learnt a lot and obviously speeded up the task no end.
However is it possible to ‘automate’ the steps where it waits for inputs?
Typically, when I have completed the inversion of the image in Curves it stops until ok is clicked and similarly when the save part is reached?
The aim would be to have a folder of negative images, typically a films worth 36ish.
Open the Action, click run and it would churn out the whole folder’s worth of images as positive images.
When you write the action, include 'save' and 'close' as a part of it. I should have thought to point that out.
That way, once you've pressed 'OK' in the 'Batch' dialogue box, Photoshop will open each image in the selected folder, carry out the action, save and close that image then open and erm, action, the next one.
Unless you say otherwise, they'll replace their unedited originals in the original folder.
That way, once you've pressed 'OK' in the 'Batch' dialogue box, Photoshop will open each image in the selected folder, carry out the action, save and close that image then open and erm, action, the next one.
Unless you say otherwise, they'll replace their unedited originals in the original folder.
I don't think so, although I'll happily be proven wrong.
Whenever I've written an action and got it wrong, which I've done more than once, I've always deleted it and started again.
Whenever I've written an action and got it wrong, which I've done more than once, I've always deleted it and started again.
Thanks to Jester the Clown pointing me in the right direction, I have now got enough knowledge to understand how Actions work, and more importantly how to make best use of them.
Basically I need to digitise a massive collection of film negatives, 35mm and 2¼ square in both colour and black and white. I have streamlined my method of capturing the image on my Olympus Tough camera using the microscope setting. A massive step from my original flatbed scanning method I originally used.
I learned to convert these images from negative into positive using Photoshop, and I’m pretty good at that, but it was so time consuming. I knew about Actions but never quite got to grips with them, but my conversion rate was dismal! Hence the reason I put the call out to this Forum.
So, with a bit of determination I followed the Tutorial and got a decent result, the after getting to understand more about them I was able to add a few more steps to the action. The absolute massive step was to get a grip with batch processing. After a few failures, due to me not fully understanding which options to check at the outset I can now confidently convert hundreds of negatives in an evening.
My thanks again to Jester the Clown!
Basically I need to digitise a massive collection of film negatives, 35mm and 2¼ square in both colour and black and white. I have streamlined my method of capturing the image on my Olympus Tough camera using the microscope setting. A massive step from my original flatbed scanning method I originally used.
I learned to convert these images from negative into positive using Photoshop, and I’m pretty good at that, but it was so time consuming. I knew about Actions but never quite got to grips with them, but my conversion rate was dismal! Hence the reason I put the call out to this Forum.
So, with a bit of determination I followed the Tutorial and got a decent result, the after getting to understand more about them I was able to add a few more steps to the action. The absolute massive step was to get a grip with batch processing. After a few failures, due to me not fully understanding which options to check at the outset I can now confidently convert hundreds of negatives in an evening.
My thanks again to Jester the Clown!
