The Analog/Digital Hybrid Workflow

Recently I decided to further integrate my analog/digital hybrid photography workflow.

Shooting film is a complete different experience than shooting digital. It takes lot more time, awareness, and slowing down the entire creative process.

After having shot the images on film, I am still getting them developed by a commercial laboratory. - However, I am already in the planning process of setting up and learning my own film development chemistry process.

The developed film - negatives or positive slides - is then digitised on a scanner.

I recently invested into an Epson perfection V800 Photo scanner which allows me to scan my own photographs at resolutions as high as 9600 dpi.

It is indeed a very time consuming process. But, it is also a good feeling to have more control over my entire development workflow.

While using the scanner for my recent Hasselblad 500 c/m medium format photography work, I also started to scan old self-developed 35 mm negatives from my early days of photography back in 1993.

The results are pretty amazing.
...I will soon be sharing some results here...

Scanning Negatives and Slides

Scanning film is a crucial step in nowadays hybride digital-analogue process applied in film photography.

Going through this many-steps process of shooting on film, developing the film, scanning the film, and post processing in digital allows to get the maximum out of any photograph. The maximum by means of resolution, by means of detail, by means of detail sharpness, by means of color tonality, by means of contrast, and dynamic range.

Using a flatbed scanner for digitising film allows to go to image resolution for a medium format photograph of more than 200 megapixels.  This is especially used when producing large prints with a high requirement to detail and sharpness.

There are many options for film scanning such as standard flatbed scanners or specialised film scanners. For a great overview have a look at the buying guide from B&H Photo: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/explora/photography/buying-guide/film-scanners

Tutorial on scanning negatives by Ted Forbes, The Art of Photography:


Tutorial by Tim Heubeck on using an Epson v800 color scanner for 120 film scanning:

My start into photography

My start intro photography was approximately 27 years ago during a photography class on Saturday afternoons hold by our schoolmaster. In class we learned a lot on photographic techniques around image composition and all about the black and white manual laboratory process.
The course provided free access to analog SLR cameras and lenses, black and white film, a laboratory, and chemicals. This was a paradise for a young and passionate photographer.

The following image gallery shows a selection of scanned negatives from my more than 25 years old self-developed black and white portfolio. All the negatives produced during that period remain still in my archive. And the quality is still good. Sometimes I wonder if my current images stored in digital image archives will be accessible in 25 years time.

Thinking back to that time - I was just between 12 to 15 years old - I am missing the handcraft, the work with the medium film and chemicals, the pace of the process from composing, shooting towards the finally developed and enlarged photograph on paper. 
The step into digital age was not only a change in technology but a complete change in handcraft with respect to the creative process.