> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.grainpress.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Scanning at Home, Part Two: A Process You Don't Have to Rediscover - URL: https://www.grainpress.com/scanning-102/ - Published: 2026-10-02T18:16:53.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-02T18:16:53.000Z - Description: Part One helped you choose a way to scan film at home. Here we explain which settings to finalize and which steps to repeat every session, so each scan follows what you have already worked out. - Author: Grainpress Editors - Tags: PRACTICE, Scanning, Hybrid Workflow, #fmt-guide, #series-issue-02, #issue-slot-06, #home-materials-tools In Part One of this series, [Scanning 101](https://www.grainpress.com/scanning-101/), we covered the ways to scan film at home: flatbed, dedicated scanner, camera, or lab. This piece is about using the one you chose, so that each session doesn't start with retracing your steps and relearning what you did last time. If you scan only now and then, you probably know the problem. You come back to the Coolscan and can't remember which lens adjustment you settled on for this particular film. SilverFast opens with settings that are almost right. A folder of older files has both TIFFs and DNGs in it, and you can't tell whether the color was fixed in the scan or afterward. None of this means your scans don't look good. It means that what you worked out last time might have to be reconstructed before you can begin again. ## The big picture The workflow falls under two headings: your working settings, and a repeatable workflow for every session. > **A: Your working settings** > > 1\. The lens setting for each film format, found by testing. > 2\. The resolution for each film format, also found by testing rather than assumed from the scanner’s maximum setting. > 3\. The unconverted file you will keep: camera raw, DNG, or your scanning software’s raw format. > 4\. Bit depth: > \- Color: 48-bit, or 64-bit when the infrared channel is included. > \- Black-and-white: 16-bit grayscale or 48-bit color. Infrared cleaning does not work with silver black-and-white film. > 5\. Saved starting settings for each film in VueScan, SilverFast, or your camera and conversion software. > 6\. Separate folders for the raw masters and finished TIFFs, with matching filenames. > > **B: Repeatable workflow for every session** > 7\. Clean and load the film. > 8\. Load the saved settings for that film. > 9\. Scan each frame without conversion, adjusting the exposure for the negative and checking for clipping. > 10\. Convert the scans afterward. > 11\. Save each finished positive as a 16-bit TIFF in the working folder, using the same base filename as its raw master. > 12\. Back up both folders. ## Start with the negative Before any software is involved, clean the film. Handle unsleeved negatives by the edges, wearing lint-free cotton or nylon gloves. The Canadian Conservation Institute says a soft brush is usually enough to remove dust. A blower is a common second step. Then get the film flat. Negative Lab Pro's scanning guide calls flatness crucial to sharpness across the whole frame. A strip that bows in the holder puts part of the frame outside the plane of focus, and that part will be soft. If your holder or carrier uses glass, the federal digitization guidelines (FADGI) recommend antireflective glass, and note that this is not the anti-Newton glass commonly used for film scanning in the past. Load the film the same way every time, with the same side up and the same end first. That keeps orientation and frame order consistent from roll to roll. ## Set up the scanner or camera On a Coolscan, test the lens adjustment, because the best setting can change from one film to the next. For each film you shoot, scan the same strip at each setting and compare the grain. When you find the sharpest setting, write it in your notes with the name of the film. A flatbed such as the Epson V750 handles focus differently. According to LaserSoft, choosing Transparency mode in SilverFast sets the V750's focus to the film holder. A camera rig has more to test. A light with a CRI of at least 90, balanced to 5000K or 5500K, spread evenly across the frame. Negative Lab Pro recommends placing a mirror on the light pad to set the camera parallel to the film. Look through the camera or use live view. You will see the camera lens reflected in the mirror. Adjust the copy stand or camera position until the center of the lens, and its reflection, appears centered in the frame. If the camera is tilted, the reflection shifts off-center. FADGI's advice on the lens is to find its sharpest aperture by testing, usually one or two stops down from wide open, and to keep exposures short so vibration doesn't soften the image. Once the rig is aligned, mark the column height and the carrier position. If you have the space, leave it set up. Whatever you use, save the results as a preset for each film in your scanning software, whether that's VueScan, SilverFast or your camera and converter. Also write the values in your notes. A preset is stored by the program that made it, and it can be lost when you change software or computers. ## Make the capture Some capture settings stay the same for every frame. Others change with each negative. Once chosen for a given workflow, resolution and bit depth can stay fixed. FADGI's targets for negatives from 35mm up to 4×5 are 2,000, 3,000 and 4,000 ppi across its three higher quality levels. They are targets for institutions, not rules for home scanning, but they are a useful reference. Scan color film at 48 bits, 16 per channel. Black-and-white film can be scanned as 16-bit grayscale, but it is worth trying a 48-bit color scan as well. In our experience, a color scan sometimes holds detail that a grayscale scan loses. Results vary by scanner, so test it on yours. Decide about infrared now, too. On color film, a scanner's infrared channel records where the dust and scratches are, and the cleanup software uses it later. SilverFast's 64-bit HDRi file keeps that channel alongside the 48 bits of color, and its 48-bit HDR file does not. Negative Lab Pro's guide recommends the 48-bit file. NegPy, another converter, reads infrared from HDRi files and tells users to scan to HDRi if they want to keep it. If the infrared channel isn't saved at capture, it can't be added later without scanning again. Keep in mind that exposure can change. FADGI says scan settings for negatives may need to change with every frame, depending on the negative. A thin negative and a dense one need different exposures. What stays fixed is the rule that nothing should be clipped at either end. For camera scans, Negative Lab Pro suggests exposing up to a stop over the meter reading. ## Decide what you're keeping Before you convert anything, decide which file is the one you'll go back to if you want to remake the photograph. Camera-scanning and conversion tools say keep the raw file. Negative Lab Pro tells its users to shoot raw, because a TIFF or JPEG has settings built into it. SilverFast describes its HDRi file as a kind of raw format for film. FADGI takes the opposite view. It calls raw and unadjusted files inappropriate as master files, because each one needs individual adjustment before it's usable, and it raises concerns about how long raw formats will stay readable. For a photographer working on their own negatives, the sensible course is to keep both, the raw file for future reconversion and a 16-bit TIFF as the working master. Store the raw files separately, protect them from being overwritten, and make all further edits from the TIFF. ## Make the positive Conversion is its own stage. FADGI notes that no conversion of a color negative shows how it would have looked printed on photographic paper, and compares conversion to printing a negative in the darkroom. Two people can convert the same negative differently, and so can the same person at different times. An unconverted master keeps that option open. Converters also handle a roll in different ways. In batch mode, Negative Lab Pro analyzes each negative on its own. Its Sync Settings command copies control settings across frames, and its Match command copies both the analysis and the settings from one frame to the rest of the roll. Negative Lab Pro keeps its conversion settings as internal metadata, which Lightroom's own sync command doesn't carry. NegPy stores its edits in a local database keyed to each file, with optional sidecar files, and never changes the source file. In both cases, the conversion stays with the program that made it and won't carry over to another converter. When the conversion is finished, save the positive as a 16-bit TIFF. This becomes the working master, following the recommendation above. Dust cleanup belongs here too. Infrared cleaning, such as SilverFast's iSRD or VueScan's Infrared Clean filter, works on color and chromogenic film. It doesn't work on conventional silver black-and-white film or on Kodachrome, which block infrared the way dust does. NegPy skips infrared cleaning on those films automatically. Those frames have to be spotted by hand. ### Make it possible to return Decide how you'll name files before you start scanning, not after the fifth roll. FADGI recommends names that are unique, consistently structured and permanent, in lowercase, with leading zeros that will retain the length of your expected final file but no longer than 32 characters. Keep the raw scans in a protected master folder and the finished TIFFs in a separate working folder. Use the same base filename for each raw file and the TIFF made from it, so it is always clear which files belong together. Never overwrite the raw. Back up both folders. The TIFF preserves the conversion and cleanup already completed; the raw remains available if the photograph needs to be converted again. For copies, the Library of Congress advises keeping at least two, stored as far apart as practical, copying them to new media every five years, and checking at least once a year that the files still open. ### Next time you scan When you come back to your scanner, your earlier rolls are in order. Each unconverted master is kept in the protected master folder, with its matching finished positive in the working folder. The lens adjustment for the film and the preset's values are in your notes, and the preset is saved in your scanning software. All you need to do is clean the first strip, load the preset, set the lens adjustment and start scanning.