A program like VueScan can read a TIFF and process it as the scan data of a digital negative. Works best with linear gamma TiFFs.
Yes it can, but I have found the VueScan's results to be mediocre, compared to converting using Photoshop curves. I just now converted the image
I used as an example a few posts ago using VueScan. Here is how it converted:
This was with VueScan set for Kodak Gold 200 Gen 6, which is the film I used. (The film was exposed and processed by Dwayne's Photo in the fall of 2013.)
This was converting an image as a linear TIFF exported from DPP (as you advised me to do in a different thread.) I also tried converting directly from the Canon .CR2 RAW file and VueScan gave identical results, so if you want to use VueScan you can skip converting to a linear TIFF. Just convert the RAW file that your camera generated.
I've tried using VueScan before. I have always found the conversion results to be enough "off" that I end up spending as much time twisting curves in Photoshop as I do when I convert using only ACR + Photoshop, as I
explained in my earlier post. The time spent in VueScan is wasted time. Based on the several hundred camera scanned negatives I've converted over the past several years.
Bart, the procedure using DPP + Photoshop on my
Camera Scanning your Negatives page was derived from advice
you gave in another thread. The procedure that uses ACR + Photoshop was me ignoring
your advice that ACR is incapable of producing a linear file. In actual practice, I seem to get just as good results using ACR as I do by exporting a linear TIFF from DPP, so I usually use ACR + Photoshop.
I also want to look at Raw Therapee closer. I stumbled up
a web archive of Raw Therapee developers discussing converting film negatives, with the main point being that the current version of Raw Therapee does the same kind of "favors" behind your back that ACR does, which make converting negatives be problematic. They said that they wanted to add converting film negatives where it belongs in the processing chain. This thread was from earlier this year (2014) and I haven't looked closely at Raw Therapee since then.
Ah, on this thread they suggest using an inverted DCP (Adobe DNG) profile. I've tried this and Adobe's DNG editor also does "favors" behind your back. An inverted DCP profile isn't what you think it is (some colors go hog wild crazy.)
Wayne