New trick for curing curled negatives

[Xia_Ke]

Not sure if anyone else has problems with their 35mm negatives curling but, for the life of me I always get negative curl, no matter how slow I dry them. I found a good cure for it though. I store my negatives in archival binder pages that hold 7 strips of 6 frames each. After you get your film put into the storage sleeves, roll up the whole page and stick it into the end of a paper towel roll. After an hour, presto, flat negatives :idea:

[photophorous]

Aaron, is this method for straightening film that is curling length wise? I always have a problem with it curling across the width of the film. I put mine in a negative sleeve too, but then I lay them on something flat and put a few books on top of them. I usually just wait until the next day and they're good.

[Xia_Ke]

Oops, should have clarified. Yes, this is for curling across the width of the film.

[reverberation]

Thanks so much for sharing that tip. I have some negatives that are curled so bad I can't scan them. I think the archival sleeves pressed under a few books is the way I will go. Thanks!

[Asylum Steve]

Not sure if anyone else has problems with their 35mm negatives curling...

Love the enthusiasm, but you HAVE to realize that nothing with film is NEW...

We were doing what you describe, oh say...twenty-five years ago???... :thumbsup:

[Xia_Ke]

I'm sure it is nothing new by any means...LOL When I first started asking around about how to correct the curling though, everyone told me to either stick some books on it or to dry my negatives slower, both of which took a long time. This was something I stumbled across (NASA here I come ) and found it worked real well in a pinch. Plus with a couple other people experimenting with film here now, thought it wouldn't hurt to post a trick that helped me. A lot of the stuff in this forum is going to be old news but, there is a whole new generation of us learning the joys of film. You should stop by here more often Steve and help keep us on the right course :thumbsup:

Happy Shooting,
Aaron

[Asylum Steve]

A lot of the stuff in this forum is going to be old news but, there is a whole new generation of us learning the joys of film. You should stop by here more often Steve and help keep us on the right course...

Yeah, I was being semi-funny, but I agree. Much of art is rediscovery...

I wish I had more time to spend here. Good thing is, it's pretty easy to answer a question quickly, so I'll try to poke my nose in as much as I can.

BTW, if any of you have trouble sliding the negative strips into those plastic pages (the square edges often get caught on the front of the row sleeves), a couple quick snips of the corners of the film strip will allow it to slide in much more easily...

[Xia_Ke]

...BTW, if any of you have trouble sliding the negative strips into those plastic pages (the square edges often get caught on the front of the row sleeves), a couple quick snips of the corners of the film strip will allow it to slide in much more easily...

Thanks for the tip Luckily the only problem I have had with that so far was with I think my second roll, where there was a spot that wasn't 100% dry. I had mixed the hypo wrong and there was like a sticky spot of it on one of the negatives :mad2:

[another view]

BTW, if any of you have trouble sliding the negative strips into those plastic pages (the square edges often get caught on the front of the row sleeves), a couple quick snips of the corners of the film strip will allow it to slide in much more easily...

Occam's Razor... Never thought of that.

Also - rolling the negatives is probably a better idea than ironing them. :yikes:
Yeah, it's been a long day...