What do I need to make large, hi rez prints

[djb85]

I know almost nothing about scanning. I want to make very high-rez, large prints--say, 40x50 or larger--from 4x5 negatives or transparencies (my first question is perhaps which). I really beautiful prints.

What do I need in terms of technical specifications? I suspect this may involve equipment that I cannot afford. What digital services out there do it?

I will also need some simpler and more afforable scanner, so I can get can get a look at the files before I get higher quality scans. What would you recommend?

Thanks, Don

[Daniel_Buck]

a drum scan would most likely provide the highest quality results in digital form.

[vinny]

drum scans, west coast imaging, calypso
there have been many threads on this subject. try a search.

[Joanna Carter]

It all depends on how fussy you are about the sharpness of the final prints.

I use an Epson V700 scanner with the BetterScanning film holder and, at 2400dpi, I can get an image that is very acceptably sharp at 40"x50".

As to the printing side, unles you are prepared to buy your own 50" lightjet printer, you would be far beter off sending the image as a 300dpi tiff file to a lab for printing.

[Bruce Watson]

I know almost nothing about scanning.

But you know where you are headed, which is a good thing and makes the journey easier. After all, if you can't define a problem you'll play hell in solving it.


I want to make very high-rez, large prints--say, 40x50 or larger--from 4x5 negatives or transparencies (my first question is perhaps which). I really beautiful prints.

Assuming color, negatives and trannies are two different animals. I personally like negatives for their increased dynamic range. With negatives you can shoot in nearly all lighting conditions and still get good shadow detail and good highlight detail. Getting the same shadow and highlight detail with trannies requires a limited subject brightness range (SBR).

Personally I like the ability to capture the larger SBRs that I can capture with negatives. And negatives drum scan easily if you know what you are doing. I've drum scanned hundreds of sheets of 160PortraVC now without a problem.


What do I need in terms of technical specifications? I suspect this may involve equipment that I cannot afford. What digital services out there do it?

It depends mostly on what you want, and nobody can tell you what that is but you. A lot depends on how much enlargement you intend to make. The rules of thumb for scanning seem to be something like this. For enlargements of 4x or lower you can get by with a consumer flatbed like the Epson scanners. For 7x or lower you can get good results from a professional flatbed like a Screen or a Creo. For 8x and up, a drum scan from something with a minimum aperture of around 6 microns or less (if you need sharpness) is still the champ.

What many people do is use a consumer flatbed for smaller prints and for proofing for larger prints.

Many of the services out there have Heidelberg Tango drum scanners. I don't recommend them for fine art photography for a couple of reasons. First, their minimum aperture is 11 microns IIRC. This limits their optical resolution (optical as opposed to interpolated -- every scanner out there can interpolate (way) more pixels than it can generate optically). That, and the linocolor/newcolor software that drives the Heidelbergs is highly optimized for trannies which makes scanning negatives more difficult. So most services that run Tangos vigorously discourage your use of negative films. Not because it's the wrong tool for you, but because it's more difficult for them. Which is a bad attitude as far as I am concerned.


I will also need some simpler and more affordable scanner, so I can get can get a look at the files before I get higher quality scans. What would you recommend?

As above, one of the Epsons should do that work for you.

Here's the thing. Making really large (more than 10x) enlargements of 5x4 film isn't easy. It requires a lot from you as the photographer and from your equipment.

5x4 film contains a huge amount of information. When you optically enlarge in the darkroom, all that information is in play. You project light through the film, focus it with a lens (with the attendant optical losses) and make your print. No matter what level of enlargement, all the information on the film is used.

A digital workflow doesn't work that way. With scanning, you have to decide in advance how much of that information you want to use. You use that decision to tell the scanner what scanning resolution to scan with. And this begs the question: how much is enough? It's often a hard question to answer because there are tradeoffs. Really big files are hard to deal with and expensive to obtain. So you get down to the question of what's it worth to you? And again, only you can answer that. One way to answer that question is to have the same film scanned at a few different resolutions, then make prints (for example, say a 30 x 30 cm (12 x 12 inch) section from what would be a 125 x 100 cm (50 x 40 inch) print) from each of the scans and compare the prints side by side. Look at the detail, look at the tonal transitions. Use this to decide where the tradeoffs work for you.

From a photographer skill point of view, know that a 10x enlargement is going to magnify any flaws in your image by 10x also. So if your focus is a little off, you might not see it in a smaller print, but a big print will make it obvious. That leaf in the lower left corner that's way out of focus will suddenly be a huge flaw. That coke can you didn't think anyone would notice suddenly becomes a focus point. A little camera motion because you shifted your weight during a long exposure shows up just fine thank you. That little bit of motion blur from the breeze can look awful at 10x. I've made all these mistakes myself and many more besides. I'm just saying that it's a special piece of film that can take this level of enlargement.

But when you get that special piece of film, a big print can really sing. And that's an amazing thing all by itself. The goal may be lofty, but it's well worth pursuing.

[bob carnie]

Very good post Bruce.. lots of good advice.