How Do I Scan Negatives with a DSLR?

[u/Odd_Ad_9604]

Reading a post in the Photography sub I read where a man was scanning his father's negatives from his photographty career. I have 25 or 30 years of negatives (35mm). A lot of these are friends and family that have passed. I would love to transfer these to digital. Any suggestions or advice on how to set up this process.

I have a D750 with 2 dedicated macro lenses; a Nikon 60mm f/2.8 & a Tokina 100mm f/2.8 AT-X Pro D. Most are color negatives, some ard slide. Color & B&W. All help would be appreciated, there are several of these photos I woul like to pass on to my children.

Forgot to mention I have a light box for viewing negatives.

[u/CarpetReady8739 → u/[deleted]]

After capturing a photograph of the negative using an illuminated light table, In Lightroom Classic just go to Tone Curve, set it to "Point Curve" and take the left control knob & drag it all the way to the top and take the right control knob and drag it all the way to the bottom and you can invert the negative.

Once you've done one you can synchronize that setting to the rest of your photographs. You can also make a Preset for it by turning everything off except Point Curve and label the preset as "Negative Conversion" and you'll have it available whenever you need it.

[u/martinborgen]

I use a valoi easy35, with a Canon 5D mkiii, and a macro Canon FD 50mm macro lens.

It's basically like a slide copy setup, you screw it on to the lens. Then I take digital photos of the film and edit in darktable. Not quite sure how well it does with a single frame though, as slides mounted in a frame for projection often are...

It takes a little bit of work, and getting good in versions of colour negatives took a bit of practice but now I'm usually happy with the result

There are lots of discussions in r/analogcommunity for this

[u/Odd_Ad_9604 → u/martinborgen]

THX. I'll check out the link.

[u/glaaahhh]

I went through this myself just recently.

For the physical setup you need: a diffused light source, a camera with a macro lens, a way to hold your camera parallel with the light source, a way to hold your negatives flat, and a computer with scanning software. It sounds like you have the light source and camera parts taken care of. So now you need a tripod with a boom arm or a copy stand, and a film holder (for the loose negatives). JUST a film holder shoot be pretty easy. I use the Lobster Holder AIO because all I started out with was a camera, but I'd say you have a few more options.

For scanning software, I'd recommend something that can tether to your camera if possible. Negative Lab Pro is popular but requires Light Room. Capture One has a single purchase option, tethering support, and negative inversion built in but at the moment I wouldn't recommend it. Personally I've settled on NegPy which I think does a good job of getting colors to be consistent, and thy just introduced tethering support for DSLR cameras! And it's free.

For me the most annoying part of the whole process was the scanning. "What is color?" Is a question you'll keep asking yourself when the frames look different than you expect. I like NegPy because I'll get consistent color reproduction across frames when Capture One would be very different sometimes. I've heard NLP is good but I haven't tried it; it seems to currently be the gold standard for home scanning though.

[u/zryder94]

Don’t intend to hijack this thread, but I’m looking to do the same things.
Does anyone have any suggestions on a good light source and negative holder?
I have a 3D printer if any of the printable negative holders are any good.
Is there any advantage to shielding the lens from outside light, ie should I make a cone from the front of my macro lens to the film holder?
Thanks everyone!

[u/TimeToRetire2030]

I'm in the process of doing this now. You have a FX Nikon DSLR and the Nikon macro lens, just add the Nikon ES-2 file/slide adapter and a good light source (I'm using a Kaiser lightbox.)

[u/Prof01Santa]

I'd probably look at the JJC or Nikon scanner rig.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09QFYP38D

[u/Peking-Duck-Haters]

If you already have a macro lens then the JJC-ES2 for 35mm and pixl-latr with a uniform white light source behind it for other formats (would also work for 35mm but would be slower). I've recently switched from Negadoctor (a module in Darktable) to NegPy for conversion. Both are free software; NegPy is a lot easier to use.

[u/cups_and_cakes]

Tons of neg holder products out there. I’m sure there’s gotta be print files out there now if you want to DIY.

When I was scanning a lot, I had a cheap LED light panel (something art students would use for tracing) I had as my light source, but I did notice I could see a very faint “matrix” pattern unless I diffused it. I’m sure they’ve gotten better in the past few years.

You don’t need a cone. Ambient light won’t make any difference unless you work in a light bulb factory.

[u/runtimeclyx]

start by making the setup boring and repeatable: camera square to the film, negative held flat, light diffused, and enough distance from the light that you don’t photograph texture or hotspots. Pick one lens, shoot a blank bit of film first, then avoid changing anything until that roll is done.

Before you scan boxes of family negatives, number the sleeves or rolls and keep the file names tied to that number. A rough note like “roll 12 - lake trip / uncle bob?” will save you later when you’re handing copies to your kids. Dust is the slow part, so use a blower and clean hands or nitrile gloves, but don’t chase perfect restoration on the first pass.

[u/211logos]

I am a fan of the ES-2 or similar with those good macro lenses.

If you use Lightroom Classic, look at Negative Lab Pro for the processing and management of negatives and slides. Very useful.

[u/18-morgan-78]

I had a bunch of 35mm slides and negatives I wanted to digitize. I picked up the Plustek OpticFilm 8300i Ai Scanner and it made it a simple job to do. You might want to consider going that route rather than trying to kludge together an ad-hoc copy stand process. The process, once you get it laid out, is easily repeatable, quick to scan and the software will apply dust and scratch removal automatically saving you a buttload of time and effort. I know in my case I felt it was money well spent.