Digital BW, The Print

Phillip Kimble <grimmieoldfart@...> wrote:

> ... 
> How did you print medium format negatives using this technique? 
 

I scanned them, so I had the digital tools of the time available.

The significant recent advance for dual focus workflows, in my view, has been the Photoshop Edit>Auto-Align Layers."  No dual-focus images easily lay over one another without a fair amount of work.  I'd use math to calculate and apply re-sizing, which is necessitated by the different effective focal lengths of the differently focussed shots, but the details could never be perfectly aligned manually.  The Auto Align saves lots of time. 

The Auto-Blend Layers is a step in the right direction and is useful, but it needs manual help, best both before and after the automated step.  A basic Duplicate-Layer & Eraser-Tool workflow handles the aligned layer blending well.

When I have an occasion to handle a dual-focused MF film shot, I'll now try to follow the same basic procedures in Photoshop that I outlined at http://www.paulroark.com/Dual-Focus-Focus-Stacking.pdf

One issue that I'm not sure of is whether the Auto-Align algorithm uses the color information.  If it does (and why not?) then the B&W negatives may not work as well with the system.


Paul
www.PaulRoark.com