Own HQ scan of AS11-40-5931, 70mm duplicate fiducials

[apollo16uvc]

Bought this 70mm positive duplicate on Ebay, with the intention of scanning it with my Nikon Super Coolscan 9000 at 4000DPI.

Has a blue/magenta colour cast and physical perforations. Most certainly an authentic analog copy.

Full-res processed and RAW TIFF uploaded later, with a proper video debunking this claim once and for all.

Full-scan PNG:


Full resolution download link.

Crop of processed TIFF:


Crop of RAW TIFF:


Scan of camera original for comparison:

 

[smartcooky]

IIRC Apollo used Ektachrome MS (64ASA) or Ektachrome EF (160ASA) processed using the E-3 process, but do you know what the dupe film is (any film edge markings?) or do you know when the dupe was made.

That magenta cast is pretty typical of 1960's era Kodak transparency film.

[JayUtah]

First-generation dupes should have been on Eastman 5389 stock.  I don't know what stocks the AV contractors used.

[apollo16uvc]

Unfortunately there are no markings on the film anywhere. There are no digits or written numbers or Kodak emulsion index next to the perforations.

This is the seller, he has more items like it: https://www.ebay.nl/str/before101timemachine?_bkw=70mm
 
Note the description:

NASA SPACE HISTORY FOR SALE................NASA produced Master Duplicates of all Negatives After Each Mission,While The Originals Were Lock in cold storage vaults.From The Original Masters Duplicates Photographs Were Printed and Distributed for Use Even By NASA's Own Scientists and Public Relations Department NASA Had Several Processing Centers and Each Print Was Produced on Demand.....NOTE:(All NASA Photographs produced came from 1st Generation Duplicates)..................This 1st Generation Negative/Transparency you see here came from The Estate of a NASA photographer that Also work for Houston Chronicle (One photo shown shows the press photographer badges)...(Badge photo only for reference)

Now, pretty much every auction of NASA film seems to claim their items are first generation duplicates, so take that with a grain of salt. Other information is relevant.

What is good, and as I expected, the positive dupe has a higher dynamic range than any print I have seen. The crosshair, often omitted by lesser optical copying/printing equipment and highlight clipping is clearly seen.

[apollo16uvc]

This video near the end gives you a better idea of what the slide looks like in real life:

[JayUtah]

Hm, all the verified first-gen dupe masters I've seen have the sequence numbers on the edge.  Based on that, I doubt what you have is first-generation.  However, in actuality a number of copies were made from the camera transparencies for purposes other than duplication.  So maybe you have something that descended from one of them.

[apollo16uvc]

Hm, all the verified first-gen dupe masters I've seen have the sequence numbers on the edge.  Based on that, I doubt what you have is first-generation.  However, in actuality a number of copies were made from the camera transparencies for purposes other than duplication.  So maybe you have something that descended from one of them.

Some of the stuff for sale on his account does have frame numbers and digital digits.

Apparently somebody who worked for nasa or had connections. He just kept some for keepsakes? Or nasa was going to throw it out. I think that is why a lot of stuff is still around I think.

In a video, any information I can tell about the duping progress, how people got hold of dupes, what they were used for.

Your conclusion from my scans?

[JayUtah]

Or nasa was going to throw it out. I think that is why a lot of stuff is still around I think.

That's my guess.  With high-quality digital scans now available, the demand for film duplication is probably minimal.  Discards from NASA and contractors are how they got hold of the guidance computer in near-working condition.  Someone just bought a ton (as in literally, that's how it was represented) of miscellaneous discarded NASA equipment, and while rooting through the debris they recognized the equipment.

In a video, any information I can tell about the duping progress, how people got hold of dupes, what they were used for.

The information I recall about the duping process is that they used commercial automated equipment for the most part, operating within the established variance limits Eastman provided.  Ordinary people could order duplicates in many forms from NASA's AV contractor.  Once NASA provided dupe masters, they essentially washed their hands of the need to supply them for editorial use.  You need to remember that masters were created that were not first- or second-generation duplicates from the camera originals.  So something you could accurately call a dupe master need not have been a rare or expensive thing.

Your conclusion from my scans?

With regard to the fiducials, your results are similar to mine.  Mere duplication and scanning has a notable effect on the fiducial density, but doesn't seem ever to obliterate them altogether.  I had to use DCT encoding at typical settings in order to make them go away altogether.

[bknight]

...

With regard to the fiducials, your results are similar to mine.  Mere duplication and scanning has a notable effect on the fiducial density, but doesn't seem ever to obliterate them altogether.  I had to use DCT encoding at typical settings in order to make them go away altogether.

Why would you desire an image without the fiducials?

[JayUtah]

Well, first, what I mean by "altogether" is that just the portion of a fiducial that lies over a very bright background is no longer visible against the background.  That doesn't mean you still can't see other parts of the same fiducial that happen to lie over a darker background.  The goal is to understand the mechanism by which that might occur in a typical workflow for the digital images released a while ago, that some hoax claimants have used to say the images were composed.

In my experiments, overexposure on the film wasn't enough to cause the effect, although the fiducial was dimmer.  Scanning didn't contribute to it.  Even reductions in resolution using common algorithms and error diffusion didn't make fiducials over bright spots disappear.  Finally it was JPEG-style image compression using something like a 75% quality setting that caused the faint fiducial segments to become completely invisible on a white background.  As this would not be an atypical workflow for processing images to release as a convenience on the web in the 1990s, I consider the hypothesis suitably supported by evidence.

As for reasons in general why someone would not want fiducials in the picture, there are various artistic and editorial arguments.  But in those cases, the fiducials are removed entirely, probably by digital editing.

[apollo16uvc]

I think a lot of early digital files online and on CD-ROMs were scans of prints, not positive/negative duplicates, let alone the originals.

Prints  added a host of intrinsic problems that further faded fiducials out in bright areas.

It would not surprise me if some manufacturers of 35mm slides merely photographed a NASA/KODAK print and used that in their dupe machines. 

[bknight]

...

As for reasons in general why someone would not want fiducials in the picture, there are various artistic and editorial arguments.  But in those cases, the fiducials are removed entirely, probably by digital editing.

Well you, or whomever else, have more artistic desires than I .  The originals with fiducials are fine by me, but that is just me.