What's inside

RAW from most cameras, JPEG, HEIF. From RAW the full latitude is taken — highlights that have not yet burnt out and shadows that are not yet noise.

How much light from the RAW goes onto the film — the first card of the rack, Source. As shot — the photographer's exposure: a dark frame stays dark and a bright one stays bright · Auto — the middle of the frame goes to the middle of the film · Protect highlights — auto, but the brightest places do not burn out: night, street lamps, windows · Protect shadows — auto, but the shadows do not sink: backlight, deep shade. The preview and the export count it the same way. JPEG and HEIF have already been developed by the camera — their exposure is as in the file.

Film — the scene light keeps its colour, as the emulsion sees it: tungsten film goes blue in daylight, as in life · As shot — the camera's balance (for RAW) · Custom — for tungsten film: light matched to its balance. Temperature in mireds and Tint — the colour of the scene light before the lens, like a conversion filter, not a white-balance slider. There is no digital correction in the program and there will not be: the source describes only the light that reached the film — how much of it and what colour; there is no contrast, saturation or sharpening of the source.

The frame is the first stage, before the master and the lens: the cut is made at the input, no resolution is lost. Ratios free · “Frame” · 1:1 · 5:4 · 3:2 · 4:3 · 16:9; on instant film “Frame” is the card itself. Tilt −45…45° — along the horizon, by dragging outside the frame or with the ruler in 0.1° steps; it happens before the lens, so vignetting and halation centre on the new frame. Crop and angle are properties of the frame and do not travel in presets.

Stops of exposure onto the film, ±6: over- and underexposure behave as on a negative — with the shoulder and the toe of the curve, not with clipping.

Neutral (the reference) · Summilux-M 50/1.4 ASPH · Summilux-M 35/1.4 ASPH FLE

M-Glow after the Summar / Summitar, pre-aspherical classics · Uncoated 50s uncoated, fog and a wide bloom · Swirl 58 after the Helios 44-2, swirly bokeh

Petzval ~1900 a portrait lens, tangential swirl · Dagor 1892 uncoated but clean anastigmat · Wollaston meniscus 1812 no achromatisation — the softness is coloured · Pinhole a camera without glass: a 0.3 mm hole — nothing is sharp anywhere, but there is no distortion, fog or chromatic aberration either

With a sieve disc Imagon type — the disc is interchangeable, and the picker calls it by name: H5.8 · H7.7 · H9.5 or custom. H is the effective aperture of the disc: the smaller the number, the more light passes around the sharp core, so H5.8 gives a haze and H9.5 a light glow. · Without a disc Verito type — there the strength and the spread follow a single aperture. The sharp core stays in place on all of them: soft focus is not defocus

Aperture — from wide open to +5 stops in ⅓ steps: it changes glow, vignetting and swirl, but not brightness · the sieve disc on the Imagon (glow strength and radius separately, if you choose "custom"), a single pair of knobs on the Verito · distortion on/off · a smear that follows defocus on the Petzval, the Swirl 58 and the Wollaston · the pinhole has no aperture: the hole is the aperture

Light yellow #6 (K1) · Yellow #8 (K2) · Orange #21 · Red #29 the partner of SFX and Retro 80S · Cyan #44A minus-red, aerial perspective · Blue #47

Pro-Mist 1 · Black Pro-Mist ⅛ · Black Pro-Mist ¼ · Black Pro-Mist ½ after Tiffen

ND 1 · ND 2 · ND 3 soft · ND 2 hard · "Tobacco" 2 cuts blue twice as hard as red — the sky goes brown · ND 2 reverse densest right at the line: for a sunset, when the strip above the water is brighter than the zenith. Soft and hard are different pieces of glass, not a knob: the soft one's transition spans nearly a third of the frame (woods, mountains, a broken horizon), the hard one's is a narrow band (sea, desert). Knobs — "Line" and "Rotation".

Star 4 · 6 · 8 points · Anamorphic flare. One knob — "Ring rotation": the strength of such glass is the product itself, only the angle turns in the ring. Light is not added but redistributed: under a star filter the lamp itself dims a little, and the more points, the weaker each one. The end of a ray is warm — the diffraction angle grows with wavelength. On a frame with no bright points the filter honestly does nothing.

Neutral — a clear base for contact printing: no grain, no halation, no mask, no edge effects; the tone is left entirely to the paper — the way a digital negative is printed on gum, cyanotype and bromoil.

Kodak Portra 160 · Portra 400 · Portra 800 · Ektar 100 · Gold 200 · Pro Image 100 · UltraMax 400 · Vericolor III 160 VPS, 1983–2000 · Vision3 250D · Vision3 500T · CineStill 800T · Aerocolor IV 2460 aerial film with no orange mask · Eastmancolor 5247 1950s, a fresh print and two faded prints of it, 20 and 40 years · Konica VX 100 · VX 400 · Centuria 800 · Fujifilm Pro 400H · Superia X-TRA 400 · Natura 1600 · Agfa Ultra 100 · Harman Phoenix 125 · Lucky Color 200 lo-fi · Svema DS-4 GOST 45 · Svema DS-5M cine negative, GOST 90: the mask is already there, the DIR couplers are not yet · Agfacolor B-2 Wolfen, 1941 — the first negative-positive colour film, no mask · Sovcolor of the 1950s Agfacolor B · Lomography Color Negative 400 · Lomochrome Color 92 · Color 92 Sun-kissed · Lomochrome Metropolis · Lomochrome Purple · Lomochrome Turquoise

Kodak Tri-X 400 · T-Max 400 · Double-X 5222 · Ilford HP5 Plus · FP4 Plus · Pan F Plus 50 · Delta 100 · Delta 400 · Delta 3200 · Pan 100 · Pan 400 · Ortho Plus 80 · SFX 200 · Fomapan 100 · Fomapan 400 · Agfa APX 100 · Rollei Retro 80S · Svema Foto-65 GOST 65

Kodak Ektachrome E100 · Kodachrome 64 a K-14 reconstruction · Aerochrome III 1443 false-colour infrared · Fujifilm Provia 100F · Velvia 50

Polaroid SX-70 · 600 · i-Type · B&W SX-70 · B&W 600 / i-Type · Fujifilm Instax Square · Instax Wide · Polaroid Polacolor ER Type 669 · 59 · 809, peel-apart · Fujifilm FP-100C · FP-100C Silk · FP-3000B peel-apart

Prokudin-Gorsky 1909 — one panchromatic plate, three exposures through blue, green and red filters, the colour assembled from three projections; the red exposure always fell short — hence the cool shadows. The “Plate misregistration” 0…3 knob — coloured fringes along the edge of the frame. From there on it runs as a slide.

Wet collodion 1851 — sensitive to blue and ultraviolet only: the sky and blue eyes come out white, lips and a tan dark, the shadows are bare glass. Knobs “Pour” 0…3 a crescent at the pour, an unfilled edge and corner, crystals on overdevelopment and “Silver intensification” density ceiling 2.0 → 4.2; developed in iron or pyro; viewed as an ambrotype or a tintype, printed by contact. · Dry plate, ortho 1890s — a gelatine-bromide emulsion on glass, black and white by its chemistry; the “Edge” 0…3 knob the rim of the machine coating and frilled gelatine, rerolled with the dice. Everything on glass gets a halation ring from the back surface; grain of the microfilm class.

Format: 135 · 120 · sheet · plate. Size — how much of the film the picture takes: on 135 Full 36×24 · Half 24×18 · XPan 65×24; on 120 6×4.5 · 6×6 · 6×7 · 6×8 · 6×9 · 6×12; on sheet 3¼×4¼ · 4×5 · 8×10; on a plate ninth · sixth · quarter · half · whole, 6.5×9 · 9×12 · 13×18 · 18×24 and 4×5 · 8×10. A standard size sets the crop to its ratio, “Custom” does not. The larger the piece of emulsion, the finer the grain relative to the frame and the larger the master; a crop is an honest cut from the negative, the grain grows (switchable in the settings). Instant film is its own format.

Exposure · grain strength and size · interlayer physics on colour films (spectral overlap, DIR couplers) · datasheet grain — RMS calibration instead of the taste calibration. Always on: emulsion turbidity from the datasheet MTF and edge effects — Mackie lines.

D-76 standard · Rodinal acutance · fine grain · stand with a saturating edge effect — plus push and pull.

Iron physical development: light silver, what ambrotypes were developed in · Pyro denser and contrastier — for printing · silver intensification density ceiling 2.0 → 4.2. The dry plate is black and white by its chemistry and has the ordinary set.

Machine the datasheet 37.8 °C · hand tank temperature 18…37.8 °C: crossover, fog, grain · bleach bypass higher contrast, quieter colour, coarser grain — plus push and pull

A machine process; push and pull lengthen the first developer — contrast and grain grow.

Pack temperature 4…38 °C: in the cold — blueness and mottle, in the heat — contrast and warmth. There is no push — exposure is the only knob. For peel-apart Polacolor — the pack size 3¼×4¼ · 4×5 · 8×10: 8×10 is developed in a processor, and the roller marks are more even.

Loaded backwards — redscale: the light comes through the base and the red layer takes almost all of it; two stops brighter gives the classic orange, +4 brings out yellow and green. Colour negative only. · Expiry 0…80 years: fog lifts the shadows, drops the contrast, grows the grain and eats the speed; heat speeds it up fourfold. On B&W the sensitisation fades and the film slides towards ortho; on slide film the black goes grey; on instant film the paste ages, the scale runs to 40 years, and which dye gave up first is the lottery of the pack.

0…3: tongues from the edges, streaks from the sprocket holes, patches of exhausted developer. Every frame has its own pattern, rerolled with the dice — the knob changes the strength, not the pattern.

Four scans by quality and transmitted light: Neutral the reference point: the machine does not intervene at all · Film scanner Coolscan and Imacon class: fine detail slightly rolled off, contrast slightly lower, a light warmth · Minilab crisper, clips the highlights earlier; gives an honest 3089 pixels on the long side — that is what you get in the export · Flatbed scanner an honest loss of detail by MTF · Projector / light table a slide by transmitted light, as in a dark room: gamma 1.0, slide film only

Fibre-based neutral the deepest black · Fibre-based warm · Chlorobromide the far end of the warm range · Graded No. 3 the contrast is built into the emulsion · Variable-contrast RC neutral · Variable-contrast warm

RA-4 optical print: brighter, a blacker black · RA-4 Fuji Crystal Archive · RA-4 matte lustre, as in the minilab · RA-4 hand print Fuji CA Supreme under an enlarger: gentler contrast, no capture sharpening or highlight clipping, the enlarger's flare holds the highlights back a little

A plate is not printed but viewed: ambrotype glass on black lacquer · tintype, ferrotype japanned iron, no halation ring. Not an inversion but the reflection of silver: milky highlights, shadows that sink into the lacquer. The knob is “Plate brightness”.

A positive from a positive, with no negative: Cibachrome / Ilfochrome Classic silver dye-bleach, the deepest black of any colour print · Dye transfer imbibition from three matrices, pure dyes instead of couplers

Iron processes: classic cyanotype after Herschel, pigment by measurement · new cyanotype Ware · platinotype · palladiotype · Pt/Pd the printers' favourite recipe: a warm grey without sepia · Van Dyke brown · salt print · albumen print egg white, printed out under the sun: a long scale for a dense collodion negative. Pigment processes: gum bichromate · three-colour gum four layers, each from its own separation negative · carbon print with real relief. Ink processes: bromoil · bromoil transfer an etching press · collotype a screenless halftone

Inkjet on plain or photo paper: FM screen of droplets, feed banding and its direction are knobs · Offset: newspaper 85 lpi · magazine 150 · book 175 AM screen with a rosette, dot gain, misregistration. Separation by inverting the ink model, so grey stays neutral along the whole scale; B&W prints in black alone. The line under the picker says whether the screen resolves at the chosen sheet: to see the dots, print smaller.

A CRT: TV shadow mask · Trinitron stripes and two damper wires · monochrome monitor green, amber or white phosphor. The whole chain, not “scanlines”: the video signal, scan lines through the mask, bloom in the glass, a curved screen. The tube is an object from the profile; the knob is “Closeness” ×1…×10: from the whole screen to the mask dots with the black matrix between them.

Contrast disabled on graded paper · brightness of the print, scan or screen — to the right is lighter · “Black” and “White” — the ends of the scale, the grey stays put · borders and film rebate — right here, under the paper · “Black field” on a scan and the screen — the field around the frame in the print's own black · sheet 9×13 · 10×15 · 13×18 · 18×24 · 24×30 · 30×40 · 40×50 · 50×60 cm and custom from 5 cm · the paper base on alternative processes: white rag, natural, cream · the brush edge — none, even, brushed · brush or roller on bromoil · the share of ink lifted in a transfer · relief on carbon and gum · a texture multiplier

None · 3 · 5 · 10 %; measured from the frame, not from the canvas with the rebate

None · thin · wide — width, unevenness and corner rounding are built into the mode, each frame's own, rerolled with the dice. By format: on 135 the holder's edge, on 120 the film-edge bands with their “ears”, on sheet in the “wide” setting the whole sheet with the holder's rails and the notch code, on a plate the holder's rails.

The pressed edge of an etching press. Handmade printing only, and only with margins: it lives in the print's margin, a third of the way in from the frame, and stands in PRINTING under “Borders”. On by default for bromoil transfer.

Line: single or double all round, single or double top and bottom · a studio stamp and a signature — pressed type centred in the bottom border, from small to very large

Classic 45° bevel · double a second board with a 6 mm reveal, the reveal colour is a knob · embossed · French ink lines and a wash band. Board white, cream, grey, black; margins in centimetres. Bevel, overhang and overlap come from physics: the board overlaps the sheet by 4 mm, the window is cut to the frame, the rebate by the window stays.

The native frames are taken apart from scans: a dark skirt along the edge of the picture (on Instax it is light instead — the reagent carries a white pigment), the rhombic embossing lattice of the mask, the almost square corners of a Polaroid and the four different corners of an Instax Wide. The card sits in a mount like a real one.

White · grey · black · linen, table margins 0.5…10 cm. Materials, not pictures: albedo in linear light, texture in millimetres and the light unevenness of a pour; no wood. A scan or a screen has no table.

From the physics of film, not from settings: full-frame 135 → ≈29 MP, half → ≈14, 6×6 → ≈104, 6×9 → ≈156, 4×5 sheet → ≈377 MP — for sheet film there is practically no ceiling, the master equals the input. Input above the ceiling is reduced once, in linear light; there is never any upscaling. A crop reduces the master in proportion to the area cut away — no resolution is lost in the process.

Full, ½ or ¼ of the side — the size in pixels is shown in the dialogue · social copy “Instagram · 1080 wide” or “Large · 2048 on the long side” — a reduced copy of the same print into the social subfolder · batch export, a single frame, a contact sheet as PDF 1…6 per row · JPEG 4:4:4, or the codec eats the colour grain · the file carries the original's EXIF, the film and paper as keywords, the author and © — never a location · progress with time remaining, a stop keeps what is written

Marks ○ pick · ✕ reject · filter All · Not rejected · Picked · A/B — two versions of a frame side by side · undo and redo across the whole rack · rotate and mirror · badges in the caption: “orig.”, developed, crop, rotation · arrows ‹ › at the sides of the frame — to the neighbour. Selection: ⇧-click and ⇧-arrows — a range, ⌘-click — one at a time, a rubber band, ⌘A — everything visible; whatever is done to one frame is done to the selection, and one ⌘Z undoes the batch. On Windows ⌘ is Ctrl and ⌥ is Alt.

A frame is either an original or has a process of its own — there are no project-wide settings; the first knob you touch starts from “Neutral”. Copy ⌥⌘C · Paste ⌥⌘V — between frames, projects and launches · Apply to all… asks about frames with settings of their own.

A dark interface; accent Amber · Tiffany · Patina · Heather · Chalk · Grey · Graphite · Tab removes the rack, F goes full screen · the tier badge next to the zoom · Language — same as macOS, Russian or English (⌘,): the whole interface together with the names of films, papers and recipes.

Saves itself — once a minute, on export and on quit. "File → Open Recent" — the latest projects. Backups: the last three states and one per day for two weeks, "File → Restore from Backup…". If the originals have moved or the disk is not connected, the project does not break: the frames keep their settings and marks, show a preview from the cache and a ⚠︎ badge, and "Locate…" reconnects the files by their fingerprint.

The state of the whole rack or part of it — by block · a .zpreset file for sharing, user profiles travel inside · applying is a stamp, not a link: editing a preset does not rewrite what has been processed