[HOW TO] Digitize film negatives with your u4/3 or DSLR camera

[barbosas]

Hi,

You can find this tutorial on my blog: http://doismeios.pt/2014/04/03/digitize-film-negatives-u43-dslr-camera/

First of all let me give you a disclaimer, this is my method and it uses a lot of different stuff because most of the things I already had them at my house, if you're starting from scratch it makes no sense buying gear from two different systems like the ones I used. You can use this as an inspiration to reuse anything you may have at home.

Secondly let me explain the fundamentals of what you need:

1. A digital camera
2. A lens, the greater the magnification the better to take advantage of your camera sensor size (E)
3. A way to securely hold the film in front of the lens (B/C/D)
4. A good light source (A)

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The rig​

A - Flash Fl-36R (wireless triggered by the camera)
if you don't have a flash you can replace it with a strong light source, i.e. on a bright day, with the camera pointed to the window it's usually ok.

B - Film Holder (got of cheap from eBay)

C - A tube originally designed for scanning slides (it's just a tube, no glass inside, bought cheap from eBay)
In order to fit the film holder onto this tube, I removed the original slide holder and super glued the film holder to the tube.

D - Step down ring 52mm <-> 42mm (lens filter diameter is 52mm, tube diameter is 42mm)

E - Lens, preferably a macro lens because they tend to have a flatter focus plane and greater magnification
I used a Pentax FA50mm f2.8 Macro because that was the best I have available.

F - Extension tubes to increase the magnification (and take the best advantage of the sensor size)
in this case I used a 21mm tube to compensate the distance from the lens to the film, this wouldn't be needed if the distance from the lens to the film was shorter, because the lens used had 1:1 magnification.

G - Adapter m4/3 to Pentax PK

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After everything is setup and in place, my usual work-flow is the following:

1. Set the camera to manual focus and manual exposure
2. Set the lens to F8
3. Clean the dust from the film
4. Put the film on the holder
5. Adjust focus
6. Adjust exposure
7. Shoot
8. Repeat from step 3 until everything is digitized (at this point I usually skip steps 5 and 6)

The digitised film will look something like this:


Feel free to correct any typos and ask any question you may have.

cheers

 

[Ramsey]

thx, i'm very interested in the outcome. Please post an example of the results...

 

[barbosas]

thx, i'm very interested in the outcome. Please post an example of the results...

You can see the final result here:
https://www.mu-43.com/showthread.php?t=62530

In a few days I will explain the PP part.

cheers

 

[christofp]

Making a thread for this is a very good idea. Recently I spent two evenings searching the parts for a cheap&working setup.

I found a similar setup, maybe it is a tad easier:

1. mFT camera (of course)
2. Olympus 60mm/2.8 macro
3. Stepup ring 46mm->52mm
4. "52mm Tele Metal Lens Hood" (ebay 4$)
5. Stepdown ring 58mm->52mm
6. Nikon Nikon ES-1 52mm slide adapter (50$)
7. flash in RC mode (fl600r)

Biggest problem was to wait three weeks until the lens hood arrived from HongKong. But quality was good, especially the 52mm and the 58mm windings had good quality.

The setup looks and works quite good. I use auto focus and f8. I can see sharp film grain in the resulting photo.

Maybe I post a photo if someone is interested.

 

[TheRenaissanceMan]

Making a thread for this is a very good idea. Recently I spent two evenings searching the parts for a cheap&working setup.

I found a similar setup, maybe it is a tad easier:

1. mFT camera (of course)
2. Olympus 60mm/2.8 macro
3. Stepup ring 46mm->52mm
4. "52mm Tele Metal Lens Hood" (ebay 4$)
5. Stepdown ring 58mm->52mm
6. Nikon Nikon ES-1 52mm slide adapter (50$)
7. flash in RC mode (fl600r)

Biggest problem was to wait three weeks until the lens hood arrived from HongKong. But quality was good, especially the 52mm and the 58mm windings had good quality.

The setup looks and works quite good. I use auto focus and f8. I can see sharp film grain in the resulting photo.

Maybe I post a photo if someone is interested.

I am! Looking for the most efficient way to digitize my negatives, so I'm loving this thread.

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Mu-43 mobile app

 

[Harvey Melvin Richards]

I'm also interested in this approach, although most of my images are slides.

 

[christofp]

Making a thread for this is a very good idea. Recently I spent two evenings searching the parts for a cheap&working setup.

I found a similar setup, maybe it is a tad easier:

1. mFT camera (of course)
2. Olympus 60mm/2.8 macro
3. Stepup ring 46mm->52mm
4. "52mm Tele Metal Lens Hood" (ebay 4$)
5. Stepdown ring 58mm->52mm
6. Nikon Nikon ES-1 52mm slide adapter (50$)
7. flash in RC mode (fl600r)

Biggest problem was to wait three weeks until the lens hood arrived from HongKong. But quality was good, especially the 52mm and the 58mm windings had good quality.

The setup looks and works quite good. I use auto focus and f8. I can see sharp film grain in the resulting photo.

Maybe I post a photo if someone is interested.

Hate to quote my own post, but meanwhile I took a photo of my setup and I have to correct the one or other detail.

Here is my actual setup, I have a 58mm LensHood, not a 52mm one. With the lens hood you get the working distance for 1:2 magnification, otherwise the slider would be cropped:

1. mFT camera (of course)
2. Olympus 60mm/2.8 macro
3. Stepup ring 46mm->58mm
4. "58mm Tele Metal Lens Hood" (ebay 4$)
5. Stepdown ring 62mm->52mm
6. Nikon Nikon ES-1 52mm slide adapter (50$)
7. flash in RC mode (fl600r)

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[RichardB]

I have a similar setup for slides, using the Nikon ES-1 adapter, but I haven't tried digitizing negatives because I was afraid the adapter would scratch the film. Have you had trouble with scratches, or do you take any precautions against them?

 

[barbosas]

I have a similar setup for slides, using the Nikon ES-1 adapter, but I haven't tried digitizing negatives because I was afraid the adapter would scratch the film. Have you had trouble with scratches, or do you take any precautions against them?

Hi,

Didn't had any trouble with scratches nor I had any special precautions, I just position the film carefully, no big deal.

Cheers

 

[pellicle]

Or you could use a flatbed scanner like an Epson 4870/4990/700 which will allow you to scan upwards of twenty at a time without sitting there and aligning every one. You will get better results with negatives too as you will be working in 16 bits without needing to convert raw files.

This topic comes up on the internet with regular occurrence. Heck 10 years ago Nikon even sold attachments for digital cameras to do it.

If your issue is the difficulty of coming to grips with a scanner then I have guides on my blog for that:
http://cjeastwd.blogspot.com/search/label/scan tips

 

[barbosas]

I also have an Epson V500 flatbed scanner, it's very time consuming scanning film with it, that's why I tried this alternative method.

The only extra steps I have to do with this method vs flatbed scanner is crop and invert image, which is no big deal.


Cheers

 

[erwine]

Hate to quote my own post, but meanwhile I took a photo of my setup and I have to correct the one or other detail.

Here is my actual setup, I have a 58mm LensHood, not a 52mm one. With the lens hood you get the working distance for 1:2 magnification, otherwise the slider would be cropped:

1. mFT camera (of course)
2. Olympus 60mm/2.8 macro
3. Stepup ring 46mm->58mm
4. "58mm Tele Metal Lens Hood" (ebay 4$)
5. Stepdown ring 62mm->52mm
6. Nikon Nikon ES-1 52mm slide adapter (50$)
7. flash in RC mode (fl600r)

View attachment 31178

Hi,

I followed the above-mentioned description by Christof, but important parts of the slides are cut off (maybe a third of the original slide). What can I do?

Thanks for your advice in advance

Erwin

 

[RichardB]

I followed the above-mentioned description by Christof, but important parts of the slides are cut off (maybe a third of the original slide). What can I do?

You need more distance between the lens and the slide holder. @christofp is evidently using a "Tele Metal Lens Hood" for the purpose. I use two 52mm x 28mm filter extension tubes, as described here: Macro lenses (Nikon and Olympus) for slide copying

 

[Ashenwelt]

So one thing that doesnt make sense to me... Why F8? That isnt a comon sweet spot for M43 and your target appears flat?

Looking for clarity.

 

[RichardB]

So one thing that doesnt make sense to me... Why F8? That isnt a comon sweet spot for M43 and your target appears flat?

The small aperture is for depth of field, to keep the image sharp corner-to-corner even if the film is not completely flat. An aperture smaller than f/8 starts getting softness from diffraction. I use f/5.6. The idea is just that there's no need to soften the image by using maximum aperture. Even if you don't use a flash, the subject is firmly mounted to the lens so there's little danger of blurring from camera shake during a long exposure.