Quebec Family History Society
	Research » Scanning Negatives

For several years I had a stack of 200-plus black-and-white negatives that my mother had given to me. As anyone that has tried knows, it is almost impossible to have these developed into prints. Not having the financial means to purchase a new scanner that has the negative mask, and not being sure it would work on black and white negatives, I tried several times through the years to scan and print these using my scanner.

I had at one time managed a one-hour photo lab. I started to think about how we handled the negatives in order to get a print. Suddenly, this great big light bulb came on, and I had the solution.

First I took some scraps of picture framing mat board and made mask to hold the negatives. I had to make several sizes since old black-and-white negatives are not all 35mm size. Then I found a white plastic lid that had no writing or ridges, it has to be flat. I set the negative, that is now in the mask, on the scanner bed and placed the white plastic lid over it. The lid acts as a diffuser.

Next I took my desk lamp, the clip-on type that draftsmen use, and held it above the negative. If the negative was very dark, I held the light four to six inches above the negative. If it was light, I would hold the light eight to 12 inches above the negative.

I previewed scanned the negative. With the negative scanned in preview mode I could set my scanner to only scan that area where the negative was. Then I would again scan the negative the second time. I would save this to my hard drive. Then I would go to the next step.

After the negatives were scanned and saved, I would go to my photo editing program. This program must have a negative setting. This setting allows you to turn a positive into a negative and a negative into a positive. I would then change the negative to a positive and print the picture.

True this isn't the sharpest image, but it isn't a bad image and you have now saved all those family photos and can see what Great-uncle George looked like holding his two-week-old son.

This does not work with colored negatives, or at least, I haven't gotten this to work with color negatives - yet. This is a no-cost way, but it is a bit time consuming.

Update
by Ann Wideman:

Tips for obtaining prints from old black and white negatives:
-- Some online and local photo shops will make negatives and prints from old prints.
-- In the USA, Wal-Mart (and other places) will scan and put them on CD.
-- Someone with a darkroom and the know-how can make contact prints.
-- You can purchase "Printing-Out Paper" from Chicago Albumen Works -- http://www.albumenworks.com/ which allows you to make a "contact" print. Paper is a bit expensive.
-- Of course, we know there are scanners that have the negative scanning mask, but I needed a method that did not require me to purchase a new scanner.

Answers to questions about my method:

1. I used a 60-watt bulb in my lamp. One person said they had 5x7" size negatives and I would suggest if that is your case to go to 100-watt bulb so the light will be more even across the entire negative.

2. The "mask" is simply for holding the negative flat. It is similar to the pasteboard that holds a slide. By leaving an opening on one side of the mask, you can slide your negative in and out so that you will only need to make one for each size of negative you have.

3. The light source is not close enough to the negative to burn it. Also the white cover helps protect it.

4. The white lid I used came from a margarine container. Someone else used a lid from a coffee can. The white lid diffuses the light so that it is more even across the negative and does not leave a "hot" spot in the center. The light goes through these lids much the same way a light will go through milk glass.

5. There is a right side and a wrong side to the negative. It has been a while since I did mine so I cannot remember if the shiny side had to be against the scanner bed or the dull side. If you have any words on a negative you will soon find out because if you lay it wrong, the words will be backwards.

6. A scanner cannot pick up an image from the negative without the light source because the scanner light will not penetrate the negative. The light source penetrates the negative allowing the scanner to pick up the image. It works on the same principle as the old 8mm movie films. The light was behind the film, which would cause the image to be projected unto your screen. In this case the light is the movie projector lamp, the negative is the film and the scanner is the screen.(I hope this makes that more understandable).

7. I scanned the negative in preview mode the first time because my scanner would then allow me to set the area that it scanned just to the area of the negative for the second scan. This helped to make a clearer image and saved a lot of cropping when I was editing the negative in my photo program.

The disk has software on it. When you get home, use the software to reverse each negative and then burn a new disk. Now you have all of your negatives in an archive, and you can get the prints as you need them. You can also e-mail them easily from the disk.

So many people gave away their only copy of a picture and never bothered to go back and have reprints made. Now I can make prints from a stack of over 100 negatives from World War II-era of Fort Lewis, Washington, and preserve a part of history, plus post them so others may find them interesting or even find a relative.

What is best about this is that I do not have to leave my cherished one-of-a-kind negatives at some photo shop that will send them out to be lost.

Like Ann's it's not the best, but I can now see it and one-of-a-kind photos can be seen by others in the family. I use a HP 4-in-1 printer and the software that came with it for photo editing.

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