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Thread: Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

  1. #1
    Tin Can's Avatar
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    Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

    I ask this, as I once read that 'Pros back in the day' didn't shoot for 100% usage of sheet film.

    Meaning they left room for edge effects and cropped as necessary to perfect a print.

    It seems full sheet usage including rebate areas is a modern affectation?

    Often used in contact prints and scans.

    I have LF portraits of grandparents that are purposely vignetted. Almost certainly from 1920 or before.

    I look at them everyday!

  2. #2

    Re: Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

    I contact print and use 99.99% of the entire sheet of film on 8x10 and ULF. Yes, it is regularly a PITA to get the image properly framed to exacting proportions as well as properly process the film and dry it without any defects and/or dust, but those are the cards I choose to play. I know others that enlarge regularly get away with "close enough" knowing they can crop the image later but IMHO it comes at a price and as long as that price is acceptable in the final print I say go for it.

  3. #3

    Re: Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

    I crop.
    I allow for edge damage.
    I crop 8 x 10 contact prints when I cut the mats.
    A negative is just part of the process of getting to a final print of the makers liking.
    Plus you can not always get the camera in a position where you can fill the negative with the image you are after.

    Where as when I work on Dags I use the whole frame.
    Richard T Ritter
    www.lg4mat.net

  4. #4

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    Re: Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

    I crop, if necessary, but try to fill the entire image area with meaningful information. However, I don't like black borders around my images so I will trim off the rebate area (applies mostly to 8x10 contact print.) As a matter of fact, I've been known to compose so tightly that when framing an image with an overmat, things on the edge of the frame get lost and/or don't work for me. If that is the case, nowadays I will scan it, add a bit more canvas to the edges, print, then frame the result. If I'm dead set on it being a silver print, I'll just drymount and move on.

  5. #5
    Vaughn's Avatar
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    Re: Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

    Platinum prints I show 100+%, Carbon prints I mat to the image area.

    Plus you can not always get the camera in a position where you can fill the negative with the image you are after.
    If I can not, I do not make the image. Plenty of images (an infinite amount) out there, so moving on is not an issue with me.
    "Landscapes exist in the material world yet soar in the realms of the spirit..." Tsung Ping, 5th Century China

  6. #6
    Corran's Avatar
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    Re: Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

    I try to yes, always on contact prints. Enlargements only get about 97% because of the limitations of holding the film in place.
    Bryan | Blog | YouTube | Instagram | Portfolio
    All comments and thoughtful critique welcome

  7. #7

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    Re: Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

    Generally, yes. But I’m not opposed to cropping when required to get the best image.

    I also don’t consider rebate as part of a “full negative”. But for anyone who does, then my answer changes to, “almost never use 100%”

  8. #8
    Drew Wiley
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    Re: Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

    I don't follow any rote unthinking rule. It all depends. I tend to compose using the entire visible groundglass; but that doesn't mean I never crop when printing. But logistically, sometimes it helps to factor in a bit of buffer zone around the very perimeter of an image for sake of higher fbf from development near the edges of some films, as well as to allow a bit of extra punch hole room if a registered masking system might be involved; and I use a register punch even when contact printing.

  9. #9

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    Re: Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

    I crop.
    *************************
    Eric Rose
    www.ericrose.com


    I don't play the piano, I don't have a beard and I listen to AC/DC in the darkroom. I have no hope as a photographer.

  10. #10

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    Re: Do you use 100% of a LF negative?

    I use 100% for all my alternative prints. Sometimes I will mask with a mat to hide some minor distraction.

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