Latensification

Latensification is the name given to uniformly pre-exposing a photographic emulsion (film).

The benefits of latensification are applicable in astrophotography - capturing images of stars. Without latensification an image would come out with several visible stars and be a perfectly acceptable image. However, many areas of the image would contain 'sub-latent' images, or areas of emulsion which have not received sufficient light to be exposed enough to show up. If the film was pre-exposed, the threshold point of exposure could be reduced, so these 'sub-latent' images could become visible. More simply, the stars which would normally be too dark to expose the film would now be sufficiently bright to expose correctly.