Maximilian Götz

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Mounting and Archiving Slides

Published 6 May 2024, filed under "film"

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If you are shooting slides, it makes sense to mount them in slide mounts. Mounts make handling the film a whole lot easier and allow for projecting and better film flatness, which is especially important for scanning and general reproduction purposes.

There are some things to consider, though. If your lab does not mount your slides (or charges too much for it), you have to do it yourself which costs time. Certainly, not everyone has the time or wants to invest it into mounting as the process does not really improve the image itself and adds additional cost. There are techniques to help with that, though.

Styles of Mounts

There is a multitude of slide mount types. Opinions on them vary wildly. Each has their technical benefits and drawbacks.

With cutting, there are two common ways: Either using scissors or with a slide cutting/mounting station. While the latter is certainly faster and more precise, some stations may scratch the film as it travels through because it will be in direct contact with the case of the device.

The many mount options differ quite a bit not only in how easy/quick mounting is but also in their “features”. Some slide mounts are made out of paper or metal but those are very uncommon these days. I have never used either. Most are made out of plastic instead.

Some mounts come in two pieces that click together. One positions the piece of film in between the two and aligns it, then clicks both halves together. Others come in one piece and have a hinged “door”. Here, one opens the door, aligns the film and closes the door. Some specialty mounts like Hamafix come in one piece that has a ridge the film slides into; more on Hamafix later. Which one to use is entirely a matter of personal preference.

There are high end mounts with 16 protruding pins on the inside that one aligns the film into. Such a system allows for even better film flatness and precision alignment. Gepe offered slide mounts which had metal pieces on the inside, helping with film flatness while projecting; the metal pieces would keep the film in place as it moves due to heat. Cheaper mounts are made entirely from plastic with some small alignment posts or borders on the inside.

Despite those extra flatness enhancements provided in the more expensive mounts, I can hardly make out a noticeable difference, as long as I am not projecting my slides for longer periods of time.

Glass (-less?)

Most slide mounts are glassless. That means that the piece of film is directly exposed. That way, it can easier be damaged and collect dust while offering worse film flatness.

By itself, that sounds bad. However, glass mounts have some important disadvantages. First off, some glass mounts feature Newton rings. If you do not know what they look like, search for a picture. Newton rings are a big optical issue. Luckily, most glass mounts are corrected against them. However, even those corrected against Newton rings may feature other optical issues, reducing the slides’ overall reproduction quality.

Glass mounts also do not allow the film to “breathe”. That means that fungus can build up on your film over time, effectively damaging it.

What is more, glass mounts are typically heavier and slightly thicker than those without, making transport and storage more difficult. In fact, the thickness of slide mounts is an important factor as the thicker mounts sometimes do not fit within certain loading openings of scanners, projectors and the like. This becomes an especially big issue when using archival sleeves (more on that later).

I myself prefer and exclusively use glassless mounts. As long as you even somewhat care for your slides, there is next to no reason to use glass mounts in my opinion. The disadvantages outweigh the advantages.

Hamafix

Hamafix is a quick mounting system introduced by Hama, presumably in the 1970s. It was very common in Germany. The mounts came in one piece with two ridges to slide the film into (excuse the pun). One has to align the film in the top ridge, then slide the mount with the “half-mounted” film into a mounting station, which would slide the other edge of the film into the bottom ridge. The ridge system allows for much quicker mounting because no real alignment is needed. One should note that this inherently means that the film will have some wiggle room to move around. In practice, this does not matter much, though. I never had the film in Hamafix mounts sit at weird angles.

Hama offered a combined mounting and cutting station, the RC44. This device features a backlit film path with a knob for advancing the film, a sharp knife moving along a rail and a mounting tool. This device streamlines the cutting and mounting process tremendously. And the best thing: it can be had for anywhere between 0-10€ on the used market today.

At least my RC44 has not scratched a single piece of film travelling through it which is a common concern for many people. As long as it is kept clean, scratching should not be a problem.

Although Hama stopped slide mount production long ago, new old Hamafix stock can be found pretty much everywhere, often times even for free. Just a few days ago, I got hold of roughly 2700 (!) mounts, some used, some not, for just the shipping cost.

Despite all the criticism this mounting system gets online for being “unprofessional”, I think it is great, especially when mounting lots of film. It is just far quicker than going through the entire process manually and I have nothing to complain about the results.

Larger and Smaller Formats

Up until now, the entire article focussed on regular, standard 35mm slides which brings up the topic of mounting larger slides.

Larger mounts are not so common to find anymore these days and when they are, sellers tend to charge far higher prices for them than they do for their 35mm equivalents. Mounts for the 6x6cm format are still somewhat obtainable. After all, it is probably the most used medium format standard out there. However, if you are trying to mount 6x7cm or larger slides, it gets a bit more tricky. Mounts for those not as common formats can be pretty hard to find at times.

With large format, mounting is entirely out of the question. I have yet to come across any 4x5 or larger slide mount. The closest thing to a mount for large format is individual film sleeves.

More obscure formats like 110 or 127 could be mounted at some point in time as well; pictures of such mounts exist. But again, coming across such mounts is very unlikely.

Another issue with formats other than 35mm is that archival can become tough, but more on that below.

I personally do not mount slides bigger than 35mm, simply because fitting mounts are hard to find and expensive, although I would certainly like to if only the mounts and archival sleeves were easier to obtain.

Archival

Regular film strips are often times archived in clear plastic or paper sleeves. Similar clear plastic sleeves are available for mounted slides. The big advantages of such sleeves are that they take up relatively little space and can be filed in folders while protecting the slides from dust. Putting such sleeves onto a light table gives a quick overview over all the slides in them. The only real disadvantage to this approach is that one cannot just load them all into a projector all at once. For projecting, they have to be taken out, arranged and put into a slide magazine. Afterwards, they need to be put back.

Some prefer storing their slides directly in covered magazines, ready for projection. All one has to do is to take out the magazine from the cover and load it into a compatible projector. That is it. However, those magazines take up far more space and do not allow for a quick overview of their contents. If you decide to go with magazines, make sure to inform yourself about the different types of magazines, including their benefits and disadvantages. Not all magazines are compatible with all projectors and some are suited better than others for certain use cases.

The thickness of the mounts used is of importance here: I found that the thicker mounts fit very poorly into the otherwise excellent PrintFile slide sleeves. They tend to go in only with force and cause tears at the sides of the sleeve pockets.

I use PrintFile slide sleeves exclusively.

Either way, if you are going to archive mounted slides larger than 35mm, it gets tricky because I have yet to see any archival sleeves for larger formats. As it seems, larger mounted slides can only really be archived in projector magazines. That is, if you manage to find any for your given format!

Where to Buy Slide Mounts

The used market. It is flooded with new old stock and used mounts for nothing or next to it. Go have a look online, you would be surprised.

If that is not an option for you (why?), try checking photo stores, although chances are your photo stores will be among those that do not carry mounts anymore. Not all do these days. Reflecta and Matin still produce mounts. In fact, Matin has quite a good selection of formats available. However, do expect to pay a massive premium compared to buying on the used market.

Those with a 3D printer could take a chance at creating their own.

No matter which way you choose, it is always a good idea to ask around. If there are amateur photographers in your family or friend circle, you could maybe get your hands on some old slide mounts for free. Asking costs nothing.

Got any questions or comments? Let me know via mail!