Photographs!
A consideration of the various sizes of photographs from a 35mm frame!
For those of you reading this that have only ever used a digital camera, this article will help explain a few things, in particular, why the whole frame is not on the photograph, something that applies to both types of camera; digital and pre digital 35mm cameras.
To get a better understanding, here is a transparency film strip:
In measuring a frame on my PC monitor it is 15 tenths across and 10 tenths (1 inch) up. Incidentally, that is the exact aspect of a 6 X 4 photograph (width 1/4 inch(s) X 1.5/6 inch(s). Formula: width + 50%).
That said, when a frame is printed onto a 6 X 4 photograph, as I know only too well, not all of the frame appears on the photograph, something that was noticed in the film ‘Murder at 1600’ starring Wesley Snipes.
On one occasion that I had a roll of film processed and printed, the photographs had part of two consecutive frames on them, something that should not have happened and this is why: The tiny holes at the top and bottom of the strip serve a dual purpose for each stage of a photograph. First and foremost, there is a corresponding vertical wheel that has spikes at the top and bottom:
The spikes line up with the holes and draw the negative or transparency film strip forward a complete, measured frame, each time the user winds the film onto the next frame or the camera does it automatically.
When it comes to printing the photographs from the processed strip of film, the machine uses a similar technique to that of a camera to move the film 1 frame at a time. What had to have happened with my roll of film was, and it’s the only logical explanation, the machine operator misaligned the negatives, which are darker than a transparency.
That, however, although being the basis of this article, is not what the article is all about, while it needs to be made clear, in order to fully appreciate the next part.
So, we’ve established that a 35mm frame will fit perfectly onto a 6 X 4 photograph and without any loss or distortion; in particular, stretching, when it comes to viewing a 4.3 aspect image full screen on a widescreen TV.
The same; however, can’t be said of the other two photograph sizes: 7 X 5 and 10 X 8.
By applying the same formula of a 6 X 4 photograph (width + 50%) to each of those, they should be 7.5 inches X 5 and 12 X 8.
As it stands, and using a 35mm image, there is a loss of 7% on the 7 X 5 photo and an even bigger, almost 3 times, a loss of 20% on the 10 X 8 photograph:
In the case of the 10 X 8, the processing trays may not be big enough to accommodate 2 more inches while the problem with the 7 X 5 is the machines used are set to that size and would cost more to replace them.
That; however, and since 7 X 5’s were originally printed the same as 10 X 8’s, says little for the, any sort of forethought when the 7 X 5 machines were produced.
What, though, of using a PC and a printer? There, again, as far as the middle size goes, photo printing paper is, in the main, the same, meaning that, in order to print a full frame image onto the middle size photo paper, you will need to cut it to size 7 X 4.66. Even on an A4 size sheet of photo paper, measuring 29.7 X 21 cms there is a loss of 6% for the larger size while the full frame can be achieved by using margins when printing from a Word document. Margins of 1.5cms top and bottom = 26.7 X 17.8 (10.5 X 7 inches).
In checking amazon, they also offer 12” X 12” and A5, half the size of an A4 document.
Contact us: the.irrefutable.truth2020@gmail.com