Defects noticed while scanning black and white 35mm negatives on Epson V850

[tnfalk]

hello,

I am working on scanning old work and i noticed a defect appearing in all of my attempts, both with 35mm slides and bw negatives. I have attached a portion of an image to show everyone. I circled the defects.

It appears as jagged,broken up edges in various places. I am using an Epson V850, setting it to scan at 400 dpi and then scaling the output for an 8"x10" image. I am pretty careful to use the negative tray correctly. I am by far not a digital expert, so please bear with me on this subject.

I am usually scanning 4x5 and dont see the problem there, however i havent used the scanner in a few months so i dont know if the problem is with all formats. Any suggestions will be welcome. thanks.

 

[santino]

I don’t know but I guess it could be some sort of scratch/dust removal. Can you turn that off?

 

[snowbear]

I've never seen that before. I'd try scanning a couple prints and pages of text to see if it happens. If not, it might be something in the settings. Also (always) make sure the drivers are up to date.

 

[tnfalk]

thanks; i checked and the only thing that was on was dust removal. i clicked that off but the problem still persists. I am wondering if the film is not being held flat enough. The epson film holders are some of the worst quality photographic equipment i have ever seen, so maybe they just cant do it correctly.

 

[tnfalk]

So... i updated the drivers and cleaned everything, scanner glass and carrier. Here are two more examples of blown up sections with the problem persisting!

 

[cgw]

With respect, is "old" the problem? Film materials don't always age well.

 

[RAZKY]

So... i updated the drivers and cleaned everything, scanner glass and carrier. Here are two more examples of blown up sections with the problem persisting!View attachment 265813View attachment 265814

Perhaps you could post a 1:1 copy of the original negative?

 

[santino]

I don’t think that it is on the negative material, looks like digital artifacts. Have you checked the negatives with a loupe? Is there something wrong?

 

[P.giannakis]

I had a similar issue with the Canonscan 8600F - it updated the drivers automatically and started creating horizontal lines on the scans. The solution was to uninstal the drivers and install the last ones that i had before the updates. I stopped updating the drivers since.

 

[tnfalk]

i agree that "old" might be playing a part in this; they were shot in 1977. I looked closely at the negative and noticed that in some areas of the defect, it corresponds to a dark spot in the negative- not a negative defect, but part of the image. This doesnt explain why it would do it in the first samples i show here with parallel lines from the woodwork on a wall, or why it would happen in a plain area of tone of the surface of quiet water with nothing there but grey tone.
When i tried 2 1/4 film or 4x5 it did NOT show up. Both of these films were much flatter so i am wondering if that is part of it. Being "old" the 35mm is more curved.

 

[cgw]

Any old prints from these negatives laying around? Just asking...

 

[tnfalk]

Any old prints from these negatives laying around? Just asking...

Some i do- that may indeed be the answer! I am experimenting with rewashing a film strip i dont care about and see if that helps- maybe it will impart some humidity to the emulsion and flatten them out more, although they look pretty normal to me.

 

[Rickbb]

Back in the day when I did drum scanning we could get rid of similar artifacts by sealing the neg/slide in mineral oil. Just be careful about trapping air bubbles in it.

We would sandwich the neg in a home made Mylar holder coating both sides of the slide with oil.

 

[tnfalk]

Back in the day when I did drum scanning we could get rid of similar artifacts by sealing the neg/slide in mineral oil. Just be careful about trapping air bubbles in it.

We would sandwich the neg in a home made Mylar holder coating both sides of the slide with oil.

I was thinking of trying to make a holder with two pieces of glass; i have some anti-newton ring glass i could use for one of the sheets. i would try this dry to start though.

 

[Rickbb]

I was thinking of trying to make a holder with two pieces of glass; i have some anti-newton ring glass i could use for one of the sheets. i would try this dry to start though.

Only problem with that may be holding the emulsion too far away creating an out of focus issue.