Keith Worsley-Brown

Q: B&W negatives to positive photos

I have some old B&W negatives (35mm film) that I want to convert to positive photos.  I can't see any way to do this in iPhoto so I was wondering if Aperture would give me this capability.  Any advice please?

 

Thanks, Keith

Posted on Feb 3, 2012 4:57 PM

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Q: B&W negatives to positive photos

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  • by Frank Caggiano,Helpful

    Frank Caggiano Frank Caggiano Feb 3, 2012 5:19 PM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown
    Level 7 (25,782 points)
    Feb 3, 2012 5:19 PM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown

    The scanner software will actually take care of that even Image Capture will do it.

     

    regards

  • by Keith Worsley-Brown,

    Keith Worsley-Brown Keith Worsley-Brown Feb 3, 2012 5:29 PM in response to Frank Caggiano
    Level 1 (20 points)
    Feb 3, 2012 5:29 PM in response to Frank Caggiano

    Thank you for your quick response Frank.  Sorry, I'm not sure what you mean by scanner software.  Is that in Aperture?  Also, image capture, I'm not familar with that as I've only used iPhoto so far.

     

    I just need to be sure that Aperture will invert negatives before I buy it.

     

    Thanks, Keith

  • by Frank Caggiano,Solvedanswer

    Frank Caggiano Frank Caggiano Feb 3, 2012 5:36 PM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown
    Level 7 (25,782 points)
    Feb 3, 2012 5:36 PM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown

    Aren't you going to scan in the negatives? If not how are you getting them onto the system?

     

    If you're scanning them in the software that does the scanning will convert the negatives to positive images.

     

    Image Capture is an application included with OS X which can do scanning as well as camera import and a few other things. My point was that even the built-in software will do the conversion so any scanner software that you might be using should do it also. Of course you could just use Image Capture to do the scan.

     

    regards

  • by Keith Worsley-Brown,

    Keith Worsley-Brown Keith Worsley-Brown Feb 3, 2012 5:45 PM in response to Frank Caggiano
    Level 1 (20 points)
    Feb 3, 2012 5:45 PM in response to Frank Caggiano

    Frank, I see what you mean, thank you  Yes, I have used Image Capture before with our Epson CX 7800 scanner.

    This scanner will give positive images.

     

    But the negatives tend to curl in the holders and I'm never very satisfied with the focus.  For this reason I have set up Photosolve's Xtend-a-slide which allows me to photograph the images on my digital camera.  These I import into iPhoto, but, of course, they are negatives.  I need to then invert them into positives.

     

    Would Aperture allow me to do that?

     

    thanks, Keith

  • by Frank Caggiano,

    Frank Caggiano Frank Caggiano Feb 3, 2012 6:06 PM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown
    Level 7 (25,782 points)
    Feb 3, 2012 6:06 PM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown

    Then you have a bit of a problem, that is not a normal function of Aperture. It's possible by using the curves adjustment to 'flip' an image.

     

    I gather you don't have Aperture yet. You could download the 30 day trail and see what it does for you.  Also googleing converting B&W negatives to positives turned up a few ideas. In fact this link Film conversion I found on the front page of the Extend-a-slide site. They use the curve adjustment in what looks like PS (didn't read the whole article.)

     

    Anyway if you're only reason for getting Aperture is to do this I'd look hard at other solutions. But if you also want all the other things that Aperture does well (image management comes to mind in your case) it could be worthwhile.

     

     

    good luck

     

    regards

  • by Keith Worsley-Brown,

    Keith Worsley-Brown Keith Worsley-Brown Feb 3, 2012 6:42 PM in response to Frank Caggiano
    Level 1 (20 points)
    Feb 3, 2012 6:42 PM in response to Frank Caggiano

    thank you Frank, that's helpful.  I'll continue searching.  I appreciate your help.

     

    Best wishes,

     

    Keith

  • by léonie,Helpful

    léonie léonie Feb 3, 2012 10:57 PM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown
    Level 10 (105,690 points)
    iLife
    Feb 3, 2012 10:57 PM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown

    Hello Keith,

    since your negatives are Black-and-White, a simple Automator Workflow may suffice to do the ground work of the negative-positive conversion.

     

    • Open Automator and select New -> Workflow
    • Set the Workflow to receive images in "Finder.app"
    • Add an Copy Finder Items action, disclose the triangle and edit the folder to save the converted images to
    • Add an "Apply Quartz Composition Filter to Image", set the selector to "Color Invert", Luminance
    • Add an "Apply Quartz Composition Filter to Image", set the selector to "Black and White"
    • Save the workflow and select a name.
    • Select an image in the Finder for a trial run. Press the "Run" button. The service should install itself automatically in your User Library in the "Services" folder.

    negativePositiveService.png

    Here is a sample run: The negative

    NegativeBW.png

    The convertes Reasult:

    NegativeBW copy.png

    I put the workflow here as a compressed zip file to download http://dreschler-fischer.de/scripts/BWNegative.workflow.zip

     

    Regards

    Léonie

     

    P.S. If the quartz composition action should not be available in Automator, you may need to install Xcode from the AppStore.

  • by Keith Worsley-Brown,

    Keith Worsley-Brown Keith Worsley-Brown Feb 4, 2012 9:33 AM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (20 points)
    Feb 4, 2012 9:33 AM in response to léonie

    Thank you very much Leonie.  I appreciate all the details, and the example of using the quartz composition filter. Clearly, this does the job I want.  Keith

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Feb 4, 2012 9:42 AM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown
    Level 10 (105,690 points)
    iLife
    Feb 4, 2012 9:42 AM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown

    You are welcome, Keith.

     

    My pleasure.

     

    Léonie

  • by Frank Caggiano,

    Frank Caggiano Frank Caggiano Feb 4, 2012 9:50 AM in response to léonie
    Level 7 (25,782 points)
    Feb 4, 2012 9:50 AM in response to léonie

    Does the quartz B&W filter really convert a negative image to a positive? I would have thought it only did a B&W convert on a color image.

     

    (just notice you did a color invert before the B&W, hmm still seems like somehting is missing)

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Feb 4, 2012 9:56 AM in response to Frank Caggiano
    Level 10 (105,690 points)
    iLife
    Feb 4, 2012 9:56 AM in response to Frank Caggiano

    I would have thought it only did a B&W convert on a color image.

    That is exactly what it does.

     

    The Action before that (Quartz Composition Filter) creates the negative: 

    • "Apply Quartz Composition Filter to Image", set the selector to "Color Invert" on the Luminance channel

    Cheers

    Léonie

     

    P.S. But it is a simple linear inversion, so Keith probably will still have to do some tweaking with the "curves" in Aperture to make it perfect.

  • by Keith Worsley-Brown,

    Keith Worsley-Brown Keith Worsley-Brown Feb 4, 2012 11:20 AM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (20 points)
    Feb 4, 2012 11:20 AM in response to léonie

    Thank you for your interst in this topic, Frank and Leonie.  You, and possibly other readers, may be interested to know that I have managed to do what I want using the channel invert filter in Final Cut Express.  It involves quite a lot of steps, including taking a screen shot which is of a low quality, but it has given me a positive from my negatives.

     

    The question always is, what's it to be used for?, and in my casse I just need a few old family photos to add to the story I'm writng of my childhood.  Let's face it, the originals are not that great, and a fairly low quality final product is adequate to include as small photos in a Pages document.

     

    For higher quality needs, and inverting some of my colour negatives, I will likely have to go to Aperture, along with its other many benefits.

     

    Thanks again, Keith

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Feb 4, 2012 12:05 PM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown
    Level 10 (105,690 points)
    iLife
    Feb 4, 2012 12:05 PM in response to Keith Worsley-Brown

    Hello Keith,

    You, and possibly other readers, may be interested to know that I have managed to do what I want using the channel invert filter in Final Cut Express.  It involves quite a lot of steps, including taking a screen shot which is of a low quality, but it has given me a positive from my negatives.

    Well, that certainly is a very resourceful and ingenious approach!

    Great, if it works for you, and thank you for letting us know.

     

    Cheers

    Léonie