Proper Care for Photographic Negatives

The best way to preserve your older photographs is to carefully preserve the negatives. Negatives fade much more slowly than printed pictures, but they are a bit fragile if not cared for carefully. To keep your negatives free from dust and scratches, consider these steps.

Use Archival Sleeves

You can purchase plastic sleeves for your negatives to be stored in. these are different than the sleeves the film developer may have put on your negatives. They are typically on a paper-sized sheet with holes for a binder, so you can easily store your negatives in an organized manner. Be sure to use an acid-free product to store your negatives, because acid that is sometimes found in plastic can damage your negatives.

Why are sleeves so important? Archival sleeves keep dust off of your negatives. Even small pieces of dust can cause permanent scratches on a negative that will ruin any future reprints you might want to make. Archival sleeves also make it easier to handle your negatives without the risk of fingerprints. Fingerprints on a negative are not removable, and they will show up in a printed image.

Proper Storage Box

If you wish to house your negatives in a box for long term storage, choose either a metal box or a box made from acid-free cardboard. This is important even if you have the negatives in an archival sleeve. Again, the acid in most storage containers, including plastic and wood containers, can damage negatives.

Protect from Moisture

Moisture is one of the biggest enemies of a photographic negative. Keep your negatives dry by throwing a silica gel pouch into the box where you are storing them. Even if moisture does not touch the negatives, moisture that is in the air can cause them to curl or cause mold and mildew growth on them, which destroys them.

Choose the Proper Storage Location

Your negatives need to be in a relatively dry location. The humidity should be around 60 percent in the area where you store your negatives. Also, they need to be protected from extreme heat and exposure to sunlight. A cool, dry place, like a basement, is ideal.

Consider a Permanent Storage Solution

No matter how careful you are with your negatives, damage can occur. You cannot control all of the factors in the environment, no matter how hard you try. Also, storing your negatives becomes cumbersome over time, as you have to constantly deal with boxes and binders. Instead of storing your negatives, you might want to consider permanently storing them in a digital format.

You can send your negatives to a lab with specialized equipment that can scan them, create a positive digital image, and store it on a CD or memory card. The CD or memory card can then be used to make prints if you should want them at a later date. High resolution scanners make it possible to turn that box of negatives into a carefully preserved digital file, without sacrificing image quality. Instead of a box crammed full of negatives, you will have one or two CDs with all of your pictures on them ready to share online or offline.