How do you cut your negatives?

ChrisPlatt

ChrisPlatt

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Even when my vision was better using the "good" scissors I have had mishaps, i.e. cutting in the negative area rather than between frames.
Years ago I could use an X-acto knife, steel ruler and a scrap glass mirror, but today my coordination is not good enough to juggle all that.

Most of the cutters sold for film photographers today have a fixed-blade guillotine-type cutter.
There's a JJC model that has user replaceable blades, but it looks like those will require change often.
Perhaps a small (<12") paper cutter with replaceable rotary blades would be an alternative to explore?

For those of you who cut your developed negatives into shorter strips - what do you use to cut them apart?

TIA,
Chris
 
Scissors.

In the photo lab, ages ago, it was a very nice backlit, guillotine blade cutter with auto advancing film sleeve. Was great but even it got old after a few hundred rolls....
 
Scissors. When I go into the dark I stick the scissors in my back pocket, so I don't lose them. That little trick I learned from TomA. (y)
 
I found this challenging as well until I started using long, thin scissors, like for hair trimming, and cutting in several small snips. That works really well for me.

John
 
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I found a Polaroid Slide Mounter a few years ago, place a lighttable beneath it (LEd panel) and it becomes easy
 
Always used scissors when I cut film into strips, just nice thin ones that were long enough to cut in one motion.

I no longer cut my film into strips ... I scan it, coil it loosely, and put it into plastic bags that are dated and annotated with camera info, film info, and sometimes even subject metadata. I don't know why I do this since I've never once pulled a film out and re-scanned it... The scanned originals are my masters and what I work with now.

G
 
Scissors and a backlight. I can nail it most of the time, but occasionally mis-cut. And always wearing my reading glasses.

Best,
-Tim
 
Scissors: the tiny scissors from Swiss Army Card. It has only one finger loop but a good steel spring seems to help me keep straight and in the middle of the gap. Psychologically I feel I can do less harm and I have a better view during the cut.
 
I have a guillotine film cutter with an alloy frame and a grooved track to guide the film straight across a back illuminated ground glass panel. Very nice.
 
I have a kind of guillotine ( yes I'm french) that makes it easier. Could have a backlit, but it makes things easier.

No image as I'm not home but I could post 'me mater.

The 'film killer' from Adox could be a nice fixture
 
Many years ago I purchased a cheap Matin guillotine type film cutter, I must have run more than 500 films through it without any problems. I recently saw the Film Killer for sale at 25% discount, so I went for it. It's made by Optik Oldschool GMBH in Germany, and there are several dealers who supply it. I find the guillotine cutters to be the best solution, especially for films that come out of some old cameras that has less than one mm spacing between frames. Both my old Matin and the Film Killer has markings for exact positioning of the film so that you do not risk cutting into adjacent frames. I use a LED panel beneath the cutter, makes it much easier to see what you are doing.
Here is a picture of the Film Killer:

FilmKiller.jpg
 
Scissors for most films shot in modern AF SLRs. Space between frames is usually wide enough to use scissors.

With older cameras it can be a different story - my Leica IIc leaves a tiny space between frames, so is my Minolta SR-1 or my Spotmatic. It is more challenging cutting those negatives with scissors.
 
With the Leica 1a (version 1928) it is almost impossible to cut between two exposures, the space is really small, about one millimeter. The idea of Leitz was to store the negatives rolled up in a small cylindrical film can. Usually I cut the film from an early Leica through worthless exposures.
 
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Older Leicas are really interesting when it comes to frame spacing.
The M3 is almost overlapping frames with the super wide Heliar but is perfectly fine with a 50. The wider the lens, the smaller the frame spAcing.
 
Long bladed scissors (which I find easier to align, and can cut right across with one motion) with a LED backlight. Narrow frame spacing is a bit of a challenge.
 
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