Will be scanning old glass negatives

RL
Posted By
Richard L Hanlon
Sep 20, 2003
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252
Replies
6
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Closed
I have been scanning/printing old slides for my mother from well before I was born and using PSE to fix them and to print (I love the print packages available). She recently went to visit a cousin of hers and was delighted to learn that he has "a lot" (however many that is) of old glass negatives in a variety of sizes all the way up to 8×10. I have found that the Epson Expression 1680 will scan a negative that big. I have purchased one on Ebay and it should be here early next week. I plan to buy some glass negatives (also on Ebay) as practice material. I figure if I mess one of them up, it won’t be as big a loss as screwing up the "only" picture of such and such a relative.

Do any of you have any suggestions on cleaning them? On scanning them? On using this scanner?

I also hope to get an Epson 2000P printer (its large format and archival ink is quite appealing). I plan to print many of these old slides on this new printer. Any suggestions/cautions there?

Thanks
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KW
Ken Wolin
Sep 20, 2003
As far as scanning any solid, three-dimensional object, I’d be extremely careful placing it on the glass of your flat-bed scanner. You might try placing a piece of clear acetate down first.
KW
Kyle White
Sep 20, 2003
I don’t know if you can still get them, but a box of lint free cotton gloves wouldn’t be out of place either. A photo shop that still deals in enlargers and film development should have them.

My Mom just finished a project for the local Royal Canadian Legion that involved large scale negatives, but I don’t know if she had any plates to deal with. I’ll ask and get back to this thread.

As always, the emulsion side is the most vulnerable, and I suspect you’ll want to place them emulsion down for the best scans.

If there’s a museum handy, you may want to ask a conservator there for handling and cleaning advice.

I used a Google search on photographic plate conservation to find this: <http://www.resource.gov.uk/information/advice/conserv10.asp>

Sounds like you’ve got a cool project ahead of you! Have fun!

HTH

Kyle
LK
Leen Koper
Sep 20, 2003
I had to produce prints from glass plates for our regional archives. The easiest way I could think of was placing each of them on a light box and shooting with my digital camera. This worked fine; one image has been printed at 100×100 cm and this print is really breathtaking.

Leen
KW
Kyle White
Sep 22, 2003
Ref my 20030919/1056PDT above.

Mom didn’t have to deal with glass plates, just 2-1/4 by 2-1/4 negs. They scanned well on her Umax Astra 2200 with the transparency lid.

Kyle
MM
Martin Morley
Sep 24, 2003
As you can imagine, glass plates are fragile. If one breaks it can easily damage others, so get some archival quality plastic sleeves to store them in.
If your scanner has a ‘film’ carrier’ (as my 2450 does) then you might need to make some new ones for some of the plate sizes, or experiment with spacers to hold the plates in the right plane.
If you think you want to try cleaning any old film or plates – copy them first! That way if you should have a disaster, at least you have one copy.
Cotton gloves should be available from any good camera store, professional dealer or archival products dealer.
RL
Richard L Hanlon
Sep 28, 2003
At someone’s suggestion, I bought some glass negatives on ebay to play with. That way, if screw one up, I’m not destroying a part of MY family history. (BTW, they were cheap, I got a set of 6 for around $12).

Some of them though are producing a new problem that I’ve not seen. I don’t have the new Epson 1680 scanner yet, but wanted to see what was there. I am using an Epson 2400 PHOTO scanner. It has the 35mm film strip and works well. But when I scanned one of the glass negatives, there were very big, bold black lines from top to bottom. I first thought it was dirt, but scanned other things without it. I also scanned others of the glass and didn’t get them, so it is something in one negative imparticular. But when I look at the negative, I can see nothing. Nothing in the reflections, nothing in the glass, not even when I put it on a light box and pull out my good 8x loupe.

Any ideas?

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