5 x 4 inch negatives question

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jojojohn

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John Charles
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Where can I get 5 x 4 inch negatives made from a digital photo file. I have only been able to find one company doing these which is Digital Files, does anybody know of any other companies producing them. My first time here so I hope I am on the right page
 
I'm sure I saw a device to do this when searching for something else this morning. However, that may not be what you want! (Found it, FirstCall-Photographic https://www.firstcall-photographic....fer-36-digital-images-back-to-35mm-film/p7124, but only to 135 film.)

You don't say whether you want black and white or colour (you do say negative rather than slide, I guess). If it was as simple as display the image on a quality screen and photograph it with a 4x5 camera, you might be able to persuade someone to collaborate with you out of interest? (Not me, sold my LF gear!).
 
I've never seen an automated method of doing this with anything bigger than 35mm (as Firstcall advertise). It is possible that someone with an enlarger and enough darkroom skills could take the resulting 35mm negative and enlarge it onto 4x5 film. This would create a 4x5 positive image, which could then be contact printed onto another piece of 4x5 film, creating a 4x5 negative.

It would be a fairly time-consuming process and therefore expensive ... and if you need more than a few images producing in this way, perhaps too expensive.

(Incidentally, you can skip the first step and create a print from a mobile phone placed in an enlarger - I've done it a couple of times as an experiment and blogged about it here https://kevinthephotographer.wordpress.com/2022/09/05/darkroom-prints-from-a-smartphone/). If you substituted film in place of the darkroom paper, you would make a positive. But is is a bit fiddly and might not give the quality you are seeking.
 
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Another method would be to adapt the digital negative process - i.e printing on OHP material from your computer onto an inkjet printer. Instead of creating a digital negative, you could print a positive image on OHP , then contact print onto 4x5 film. I haven't used digital negatives but understand that getting the contrast right requires applying specific curves before printing.

I can imagine this method working with a mono image, but I'm not sure about colour.
 
If you want to go the digital negative route, you could start by looking here

www.danburkholder.com

Dan Burkholder

Official website for Dan Burkholder. Fine Art Photographer, Digital Pioneer, Artist and Educator
www.danburkholder.com

DB was the pioneer of the method.
 
jojojohn said:
Where can I get 5 x 4 inch negatives made from a digital photo file. I have only been able to find one company doing these which is Digital Files, does anybody know of any other companies producing them. My first time here so I hope I am on the right page
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Welcome to TalkPhotography, have a look around there is loads of interesting stuff going on here.

I can't answer your question but I am tempted to ask why?
 
My guess would start from " what can you do with a negative that you can't do with a digital file" and the only answer I can see are the "alternative" photographic processes which are alternatives to silver halide, like platinum or palladium, or salt prints, or cyanotype etc. etc. Or, to make a contact print on solver halide which would have the cachet of a darkroom print in the sale room.
 
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I think a question must arise - are the original photos your own original work? Presumably so, and they are not someone else's published work that is being copied? I can't help being suspicious but hopefully the explanation will clarify this?
 
StephenM said:
My guess would start from " what can you do with a negative that you can't do with a digital file" and the only answer I can see are the "alternative" photographic processes which are alternatives to silver halide, like platinum or palladium, or salt prints, or cyanotype etc. etc. Or, to make a contact print on solver halide which would have the cachet of a darkroom print in the sale room.
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I suppose I was thinking why 4x5 rather than a smaller format
 

Kodak LVT

<p>Kodak LVT From digital files original negatives or transparencies we can produce film outputs to either 35mm, 5×4 or 10×8. This is perfect for digital photographers who need a film original for traditional darkroom printing, or you may have a damaged film original which we can digitally...
www.bayeux.co.uk www.bayeux.co.uk

You can go up to 10x8" if you'd like.
 
sirch said:
I suppose I was thinking why 4x5 rather than a smaller format
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Good point.

I hadn't considered the choice of 5x4 specifically; alternative processes would probably be better served by a larger negative - I'm assuming (again) that @jojojohn doesn't have a 5x4 enlarger.
 
This reminds me of something we did a very long time ago, when I was a very young and naive assistant at a London studio.

For some reason, the boss wanted to make a 5x4 glass interneg from a 6x6 negative - don't ask me why, because I never found out. He told me to print the 6x6 onto single weight paper, cropping to the image area of the glass plate. Then we contact printed the trimmed single weight paper print onto the glass plate. Then we tested the glass interneg by printing it onto 20 x 16 and the boss declared the experiment a success.

Hey, it was the mid 1960s and perhaps the boss was the one doing "too much LDS" (my apologies to Admiral Kirk).
 
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