They don't call it the Scenic Highway for no reason

            I was recently out at the Gorge to assist on a photo workshop for the local Photo Club PDX.  In between moments while the instructor was working with the students and models at Latourell Falls I decided to steal up the path and get a couple minutes of quiet and enjoy the fall colors.  I had traveled light that day, only bringing my Hasselblad as I had not intended to make many photos.  The path back from Latourell Falls passes under the old Scenic Highway at one point and the view among the fall foliage was pretty, to say the least.  I didn't make any images of it that day other than a snap with my phone but marked it for a return trip.  Two days later I had the day off work and drove out with a Horseman SW612 I was borrowing from the shop for "testing".

I use a lot of panoramic cameras.  Most of the time I work in the 6x17 format with either a Fuji G617 or a Reality So Subtle 6x17 pinhole, but I also have a Holga WPC 6x12 pinhole that I have been using more often and on this day I had a Horseman 6x12.  I was asked a couple days ago how I scan my panoramic negatives because I mentioned I scan on a Kodak HR500.  Through my work at Blue Moon Camera I actually have access to four different scanners I could scan them on:
a Nikon Coolscan 9000
a Kodak HR500
a Noritsu S1800
and an Epson V800.

Of the four, the Kodak is my current favorite to work with, but the Epson is the one I would recommend to most other photographers since it is the most accessible.  I get "proof" scans done by my co-worker who runs our scanning station and he does them on the Noritsu and says it is easy to do.  The Nikon, while my usual favorite scanner, is my least favorite for panos.  But here is a bit of a more detailed look at this process.

Of all the scanners, only the Epson is capable of scanning these negs in one go.  All three of the other scanners have to do it piecemeal and then they get stitched back together in Photoshop.  Once you know how, this is actually quite easy and Photoshop does a seamless job of it.

I prefer to scan in pieces because I prefer the other scanners over the Epson.  In my experience I have better luck getting sharper scans out of anything other than the Epson.  

So the biggest issue with scanning in pieces and assembling into a full pano is each individual scan has to have the exact same color and density, otherwise weird things can happen in the stitching process. I avoid the Nikon largely for this reason.  It is harder to turn off all the auto-corrections that the Nikon scanner does, so sometimes the pieces would have slightly different color or density to them.  But I also discovered that the Nikon's focus is so specific that sometimes I would get pieces that had different amounts of sharpness to how well focused the scan was.  Half the pano would have sharp grain and the other half would have slightly less sharp grain and it was visible at a certain magnification.  Plus the Nikon scanner is sooooo slow.  I could spend almost an hour scanning the two or three pieces I'd need to assemble a 6x17 neg.  Interestingly enough, the carrier for the Nikon can hold a whole 6x17 negative but the Nikon Scan software I use only goes up to 6x9 as a format.

I get my proof scans done on the Noritsu and its ok.  The big thing I don't like about it is its look.  The Noritsu naturally has a harsh, high contrast look that is liable to clip detail from the negative, even if it is turned down in the settings.  Other than that though, the Noritsu makes pano scans fairly easily once you have figured out how to coax the machine into doing it.

So I use the Kodak HR500 which is a bit of an antiquated film scanner at this point but it has a distinct look that I feel like is truer to the film.  Plus I don't have focus issues like I do with the Nikon.  It is easy to turn the scanner's auto corrections completely off so you can fully manually correct the scan's color and density, which means I get really consistent scans.  And it is fast, even with ICE.  A max resolution scan on the HR500 with ICE takes me about 15-30 seconds a scan.  With the HR500 I use the individual, single frame, magnetic masks that it came with.  I just find this easier.  And I work in the 6x7 format.  So for a 6x17 negative I break that up into three scans and for a 6x12 I can do it in two.  Why not use 6x9 for the 6x17?  That's because the stitching algorithm in Photoshop loves to have overlap.  Two 6x9 frames side by side run out to 6x18. So that means to try to do a 6x17 in two 6x9 frames I would have only a centimeter of overlap in the middle... if I am precise.  So I work in three 6x7 frames because it gives me plenty of overlap between each and makes stitching generally go really smooth.

Anyway, that is how I approach digitizing these negatives.  It is a bit of a process and often I'll wait til I have a sheet or two.  I will also often take the full sheet and throw it on the Epson and make a quick scan of the whole sheet, creating sort of a digital contact sheet, so that I can decide which individual frames I am going to take the time to fully scan.

Anyway, I hope this gives you some insight and helps any other pano photographers out there. Then again, if you are already a pano photographer, you have likely already figured out how to digitize that film.

Horseman SW612
Kodak Portra 160
   

Taken on: November 1, 2019

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