David Dunthorn has released a Mac version of ColorNeg, a Photoshop plug-in for converting color negative scans to positive images. This had been one of the Windows only programs that I most grieved losing, so this is great news. I was a beta tester on this version.
Most photographers rely on their scanner software to make the conversion from negative to positive. It's never ideal however, and with color negs it's a real effort to get decent looking color balance out of the process. ColorNeg has some sophisticated algorithms to make the conversion, based on specific film profiles. It works only on 16 bit files and on linear scans at a gamma of 1. You need to trick your scanner into giving you a linear output, but there are instructions on the website on how to do this.
What you should get out of your scanner is a very dark looking negative (you scan it as a "positive" so that it's not inverted). ColorNeg inverts it into a brilliant, near-perfect positive image. There are an innumerable possible adjustment tweaks you can make to the image here, most of them too complex for me to understand. I just change the lightness and maybe the auto-color a little, and leave it at that.
If you download the manual, be prepared for one of the more opaque, information dense explanations you'll ever encounter. This is one rich plug-in. David knows his stuff, but translating it for civilians is not his strongest suit. For a taste, check out his FAQ.
The plug-in works great with black and white too. The download is available at http://www.c-f-systems.com/Plug-ins.html. Registration is $67--the trial will put a grid on your image, but you can at least see how it works.
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