In 2000, Christian Poulsen, Hasseslblad's current CEO, created a new proprietary format for the Imacon scanners, the Flexible File Format or fff. 3F has determined the bigger revolution in the field of original analog scanning since the introduction of the drum scanners

3F if a proprietary file created by Hasselblad, which allows one to obtain a file similar to a raw file from analog original. This has changed my professional life, and more importantly my archive, and in this article I would like to tell you why.

Normally, when scanning an original photo, it is necessary to establish a series of settings in order to obtain a tiff or jpg file as close as one’s requirements. The quality of the scanning, therefore, is directly proportional to the ability of the person operating the scanner, who often is not the photographer. The changes made during the scanning are not reversible and all the information contained in the original that is, by choice or incompetence, left out cannot be retrieved. Also, negative originals, either color or black and white, are reversed during the scanning process to the positive; the reversal process is the most crucial phase, during which most of the noise and grain are generated. Finally, eventual retouching of scratches and remaining dust need to be done on the saved file and they need to be done again if the file needs to be saved again.

A traditional scanning is, therefore, irreversible and requires the photographer to be an expert in scanning techniques and to own an expensive scanner. The alternative is to entrust the scanning to a third party and to establish a direct connection with the scanner operator, not an easy task.

3F files are based on a concept both basic and revolutionary. The scanner’s software acquires all the information contained in the original without any intervention. The resulting file is a peculiar 16bit, flat, without any usharp mask and not inverted. The 3F from a negative remains a negative.

A 3F scanning is completely reversible and contains all the information that the scanner is able to acquire no matter what choices will be made later. Scanning in this format is equivalent to transforming a negative analog into a negative digital preserving the file forever.

The 3F format is, for a functionality point of view, the equivalent of a raw file for analog; its structure, however, is different because it is a flat tiff with an incorporated file containing the preview, the metadata and the history of all your savings

Here above, an actual pixel detail of a 3F file, remained a negative. Please note how the incomparable tonal range of the original have been totally preserved. Below, the same detail saved in tiff with a custom setting that can be modified any time you need.

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