How do you make an new negative?

[mjs1973]

Not sure it this should go here or the digital imaging forum... I was reading a website, for a local pro photog, and he does some photo restoration. From what I gathered from his site, he scans the print, restores it digitally, and makes a new negative for the customer. My question is, how do you get a film negative, from digital image?

Here is a link to the site if you're interested.

[Photo-John]

Good question!

To get a piece of film from a digital file you use a piece of equipment called a film recorder. It's a very specialized piece of equipment and I've only seen them at photo labs and service bureaus. We had one at the lab I used to work at and before we had a LightJet, we'd output 4x5 or 8x10 film to make large prints from digital files. The LightJet, or a large inkjet, is better now, though.

It's nice that he gives his customer a new negative. But I think that's more a marketing decision. It says more about his customers than it does about quality. The best thing would be to deliver either a digital file or just a high-quality print. It depends on how you want to do business. But either the file or a direct digital print via LightJet or ink jet should be better quality than a print from digitally output film.

[another view]

I'm with John - why would you want a negative? It's very unusual to find places that do darkroom prints anymore, so what someone would end up with would be something like this:

1. Customer brings in damaged negative.
2. Negative is scanned and restored.
3. Restored digital file is printed on film recorder.
4. Customer brings new negative to one-hour lab.
5. New negative is scanned for printing.

Not only is it redundant, but there will be a loss of quality. This really wouldn't be much different than scanning a print instead of a negative**. That negative isn't an original - the digital file itself is the original. Like John says though, sometimes it's easier to give people what they want than explain why it's not the best option.

**One thing about this - I guess it's an accepted way to scan hand-enlarged B&W prints, rather than the negative and then re-create all of the effects done in the darkroom in Photoshop.

Funny story about film recorders - at Nikon school, one of the teachers was a consultant to a magazine (I think) about photography. They were totally sold on film because digital didn't give them the look they were looking for. This guy worked with the production team on digital and got everything to look right, but they still weren't happy. Then he had the same files output on film recorders and showed them these "new" transparencies. Suddenly they loved the work because they thought they were looking at original film...

[mjs1973]

Thanks for the great info guys! I don't see much use for having a "new" negative, made from a scan of an old print myself. I was just checking out this guys website, and was curious as to how you would end up with a negative from a print. Ya learn something new every day!