Making more than one exposure.

Copy Photography II
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a. You should make trial exposures, starting with one-quarter of the exposure time you expect

you will need, an aperture of f/8 (lens setting). You then make five exposures on one sheet of film. You

do this in the following manner: first you pull the dark slide out 1 inch, make an exposure for 2 seconds,

pull the slide out 1 more inch, and make another exposure. Do this a total of five times at 2 seconds

each. The result will be a single negative with five different exposures, as shown in Figure 3-10.

Figure 3-10. Trial exposure

b. If your negative does not have a desired shade of black and white, you must make another

test negative. This time, instead of 2 seconds, double the exposure to 4 seconds and start over again.

Let us say that exposure area 3 has the right amount of blacks and whites for your specific copy work.

You then take the 3, multiply that by the seconds of exposure that you used for each exposure area. If it

was 2 seconds, then it will be 3 times 2 seconds equals 6 seconds, which will then give the best negative

for your specific copy job.

c. If time does not permit you to make and develop a trial negative, then make three separate

exposures; one at the estimated exposure, one two stops underexposed, and one two stops overexposed.

One of the three exposures should produce a good copy.

d. When using commercial film for line copy, underexpose two stops and overdevelop 50

percent to get high contrast and sharp deep blacks; also, use a high contrast developer.

Process the film.

a. You use the standard process for developing, fixing, washing and drying the film, with the

following exceptions:

(1) develop line copy to the highest contrast.