Possible to fix overexposed negs while scanning?

O

ognistik

Newbie
Local time
9:27 AM
Joined
Apr 23, 2010
Messages
3
View My Gallery
So. Lately I am really into shooting film. I got an old Leica III that works great, but I have no light meter... so I mess up quite often. It is not so much of a problem shooting in daylight, but indoors frequently and unintentionally I overexpose my negatives. It hasn't been much of a trouble, though. Most of the times I can fix this while printing in the darkroom, I just expose the photo paper for a while more and voila! fixed. However, recently I am thinking about getting a scanner, probably an Epson v500. Not as good as a nikon dedicated film scanner, but I've seen good stuff with this Epson.

What I do not know at all is if there is a way to adjust or fix problems of exposure while scanning, just as in printing a negative in the darkroom. I know there are RAW files while shooting digital, maybe I can get similar from a scanner, but even this type of files can't be dramatically fixed. I guess it must be something to do with the process or software of scanning.

Anyone can tell me from experience?
Thanks!
 
I use levels and the burn in tool in photoshop. If you have areas which are blown out, but also regions that look good you can isolate the blown out areas then use the lightness control or levels to tone down the overexposed area.

Of course it depends on how much the film is overexposed.
 
You don't specify if you're shooting BW or Color. If you're shooting BW, I'd try using the channel mixer in photoshop. Scan your file at 48 bit color, then when in photoshop your first step should be to add a channel mixer adjustment layer. Click the 'monochrome' box, and fiddle with the settings till you get a decent image. After that, work the photograph as you see fit.

If you're scanning color negs, try and grab as much of the highlight detail as you can. Bring the levels back down in photoshop.
 
thanks, yeah, I meant BW 35mm film. And I know how to make the dark parts darker in Photoshop, add more contrast, etc. What I am concerned is in the blown up parts. In the darkroom, working with an enlarger, blown up parts of a photo are "fixable" because the information is still in the negative. In photoshop, though, when there is white, there is white and nothing else.
 
ognistik said:
thanks, yeah, I meant BW 35mm film. And I know how to make the dark parts darker in Photoshop, add more contrast, etc. What I am concerned is in the blown up parts. In the darkroom, working with an enlarger, blown up parts of a photo are "fixable" because the information is still in the negative. In photoshop, though, when there is white, there is white and nothing else.
Click to expand...

4691268591_7b34827058.jpg
4710915140_73c342d784.jpg



OK, see the white flowers. They looked terribly blown out and I could not fix it with global use of levels. The photo on the right is a scan from the drug store and my scanner produced a similar looking file.

I selected the white flowers, by using a selection tool in PS elements, made that a layer, then chose either levels or brightness to tone down the brightness of the flowers while leaving the rest of the photo alone.

Unlike straight digital, there seemed to be detail in those blown out white flowers.
 
Last edited:
ognistik said:
In the darkroom, working with an enlarger, blown up parts of a photo are "fixable" because the information is still in the negative. In photoshop, though, when there is white, there is white and nothing else.
Click to expand...

If there is detail to recover in the darkroom, then you can recover that same detail while scanning.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom