AboutMikael Barnard Expertise I have much experience in photographing events and my most specialist area
of knowledge is alternative photographic processes. I may well answer
questions on broader topics of photography but only if my sphere of
knowledge extends to the question in hand. Please feel free to ask away
though!
Experience I have both a GCSE and an A-level in photography and much experience with event photography, I now persue photography as a hobby.
Education/Credentials GCSE photography- B. A.S. Level- C. A-Level- D- nothing wrong with my work, seems the exam board are pretty narrow minded when it comes to alternative photographic processes :-(
Expert: Mikael Barnard Date: 5/21/2004 Subject: I am a beginner photographer...
Question I am a beginner photographer and I am usually using slide film such as fujichrome sensia or kodachrome elite and when I go get the slides back from the lab, they look fantastic but at the moment that I get some prints, they look horrible. Is there anything that I don't know. I would really appreaciate if you can help me out with this. Thank you very much!
Answer Hi Marco.
The primary use of slide film these days is for projection. As the image is a positive on the film there are very few economic ways to get a decent print on paper. You can't print in the same way as from a negative because you will have a negative image form on the emulsion and if you contact print this you will have a positive print but you will a)have lost a generation of quality and b)the image will be back-to-front. The only other methods I can think of is to strike a duplicate print on slide film from the original and turn it the correct way round in the enlarger, there are some chemical processes that will process slide film as negative but then you may as well have shot on negative film anyway and the only other method is to scan them digitally and print them from computer.
My reccomendation to you is that if you want to have paper prints rather than slides for projection you should use negative film as slide film is not really designed for this. Hope this helps in some way. Happy photographing, best wishes.
