Which BW film gives best results when scanned

[dcypher]

I was wondering if any of you notice differences in scan quality between different films types? I'm planning of scanning 4x5 negs in an Epson 4870. Do some films give better results than others, maybe due to neg mask colour or thickness of the sheets?
G.

[Bruce Watson]

Less graininess nearly always scans better. With sheet film though it's usually a moot point unless you are looking to make 8x enlargements or more.

But assuming you are, think about going for films that give less graininess. This can mean lower speed conventional films, or T-grained films. Then, think about using a solvent developer to decrease graininess a bit. Finally, if you are *never* going to print the film in the darkroom, you might want to optimize your processing a bit to create somewhat thinner negatives, because graininess varies directly with density -- the thinner negs will be somewhat less grainy.

I drum scan my 5x4 TMY-2. I process in XTOL 1:3, but I "pull" about a stop to make a thinner negative that's optimized for my particular scanner. My film scans just beautifully even at 12x enlargement. Clearly, YMMV.

[venchka]

Bruce is right about thin negatives scanning better. In fact, I have seen beautiful scans from what appeared to be unexposed film. It's hard to have a negative that is too thin for scanning. Put another way: scanners dig out more information than you can see with your eyes.

[dcypher]

Thx for the replies.
This is interesting and makes sence. The 35 mm films I developed for printing are to dense for proper scanning. Back then I used a diffuse enlarger but loved grain so I pushed the negs. When I try to scan those negs now, the grain is just to much...

If you pull the development don't you risk loosing information? Do you overexpose the film just a little? Or doesn't it effect the neg at all when you only scan? I'm not planning of printing (in the darkroom), just scan...

[venchka]

I ultra thin to the point of blank film negatives that I saw were the result of severe underdevelopment caused by depleted developer, Diafine in this case.

I would like to hear Bruce's methods as well.

[Bruce Watson]

If you pull the development don't you risk loosing information?

Not unless you carry it to extremes. When you pull the development time a bit, you are just decreasing the film's gamma (contrast index) and by extension it's Dmax. You don't loose any visual information, but you do compress it a bit if you want to think of it like that.

If it makes you feel any better I've got a couple of sheets of film where my one degree spot meter told me that the subject brightness range (SBR) was only about one stop. I'm talking *very* flat light. I'd link to an example but my website is down (sister website got slashdotted this morning and they are still rebuilding that server).

When I scanned that very thin film I let the scanner expand the tonality and ended up with a full range image. Found all kinds of things in that image that I hadn't seen at exposure time!

Do you overexpose the film just a little?

Not me. I expose it for the shadows just like always. I learned that much from the Zone System anyway

Or doesn't it effect the neg at all when you only scan? I'm not planning of printing (in the darkroom), just scan...

I don't understand that question. The effect of decreasing development time is of course to make a thinner negative. In Zone System terms, I develop to what a darkroom printer would call N-1. I target a Zone VIII density of about 1.0. This would make a negative that's a PITA to print in the darkroom, but which scans nicely.

I find this optimum for my scanner. Every scanner is somewhat different; you'll probably want to experiment a little to find out what works best for your scanner and your workflow. That comes under the heading of "why guess when you can know?"

[Peter De Smidt]

I'm with Bruce on this one.

[Joanna Carter]

I use Acros 100 and get stunning results. I expose at ISO 100 but have found I can extend the Zone system for scannng purposes. I will happily place, what most people would reckon to be discernible shadow detail in zone 1 rather than zone 3. Highlights with detail can be placed as high as zone 10; anything above that is subject to N- development. For each stop over zone 10, I add 1/2 stop to the exposure and develop for N- the number of stops. See this image where the exposure range was around 12 stops between darkest shadow detail on the fire surround and highlights like the gas mantle in the desk lamp and the sky outside. There is more shadow and highlight detail on the print that didn't survive the compression necessary to create a small jpeg file.

[Bruce Watson]

I use Acros 100 and get stunning results. I expose at ISO 100 but have found I can extend the Zone system for scanning purposes. I will happily place, what most people would reckon to be discernible shadow detail in zone 1 rather than zone 3.

Exactly. I should have pointed that out. Scanning will let you get away with pushing detail into lower zones than you'd normally think would be possible. And as you say, you can normally exceed by a couple of zones normal Zone System highlight placement too.

Really, you can "expose for the shadows and let the highlights fall where they may." I do this routinely. This workflow would crush my soul if I were trying to print in the darkroom, but it works just fine when scanning. And it's one less thing to have to think about in the field, so it's one less distraction from the art.

BTW, nice image Ms. Carter. Good get.

[Cesar Barreto]

I've mixed feelings about that matter, because soft negatives may easily show a lot of graininess if the corrective curve imposed by scanner software is too harsh. Not so different from what happens when printing soft negatives with grade 4 or higher filters. Of course, Tmax and Acros 100 are less prone to such effects, but I can't say the same about other current and ancient films.
On the other hand, I also feel confortable when scanning long ranged negatives and I would even say that scanners actually prefer them that way. But not all scanners, of course, because I've already had great trouble with some really dense negatives, wich made me think that for some scanners density built on silver ins't the same as one built with dye clouds. But that's just a wild guess and I didn't had the means or the nerves to go into such a dark forest.