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colpepper

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I've begun scanning old negs and slides and although the B&W images are acceptable, the transparencies lack something in colour and I think, saturation once digitised.

I have an HP Scanjet 4850, a basic domestic scanner with film and tranny inserts. The accompanying software is nothing special and I scan at 200 dpi. Is there a better way of scanning or better scanner for the job?
 
Like all things it depends on how much you want to spend.

I think 200dpi is not enough to pick all the information up from a colour slide.

http://www.scantips.com/

Might give be useful to have a look at.

Other than that if you after better scans then a different scanner maybe the fix.

Epson 4990 I believe are good and not much money.

Other than that your looking at the dedicated film scanners which are more again.
 
Knikki said:
Other than that your looking at the dedicated film scanners which are more again.
Click to expand...

Do dedicated scanners have more of something I should be looking for? My trannies go up to 6 x 9 cm and 5 x 4".
 
Dedicated Film scanners are designed simple to scan films, where as the Flatbed ones can in some case be multi purpose for scanning documents to.

If you scanning 5x4 at 200 dpi then you will be not be doing it any justice at all.

As an example I scan my 35mm negs/slides at 2900dpi
I scan my 6x6 / 6x9 at anything up to 4000dpi which can give huge files and so retain loads and loads of detail.

However

If you scanning 6x9 then your looking at something like the Nikon 8000 or 9000 which sell for around the £1800 - £2200 mark and are regarded as the best (next to the Imacon ones but they are winning lottery money prices)

But

If you scanning 6x9 to 5x4 then I would suggest looking at the Epson range
The 4990?
Or the V 500 / V700 range which I know a few people on here have and work very well for the larger neg formats.
 
Thanks, I'll check the Epson out. Think I need to update my steam powered computer too as it'll take forever at those dpi.
 
If you're looking at 5x4" I'd recommend the Epsons - V500 upwards. My Canoscan 8800F works fine on 120 format film, up to around 20cm long - so 3x 6x6 or 2x 6x9's at once. Unfortunately the backlightiig slot that it relys on for neg/slide scans is only 8cm wide, so even by using the "lay the neg on the glass bed, and cover it with anti-newton glass cover to keep it flat" method it'll not do 5x4" :(
 
There's a scanner thread with some old crap in it..

http://www.talkphotography.co.uk/forums/showthread


Being able to scan 120 and 5x4 is awkward, since 5x4 is gonna have to be a flatbed.
I'm not impressed by flatbeds for 120, dedicated scanners are better, so I'd personally be looking for 2 separate scanners which is poop.
Alternatively, I've heard good things about the Microtek i900 and M1 pro.
 
Knikki said:
As an example I scan my 35mm negs/slides at 2900dpi
I scan my 6x6 / 6x9 at anything up to 4000dpi which can give huge files and so retain loads and loads of detail.
Click to expand...

Is that true optical resolution or is that interpolated as despite loads of scanners saying they do 4000dpi its actually only up to 600dpi or something usually and all interpolatation does IMO is make hugh files that can look worst.
 
Knikki said:
I have 2 scanners both dedicated film ones. a Nikon CoolScan IV and a Microtek 120tf.

Nikon CoolScan IV

The Nikon is a 35mm only scanner and I used to use it on the PC but now I run it on a IMac with Tiger 10.4.8 installed. The latest Nikon software works fine within that environment.
I scan at 100% + 2900dpi (max it will go to) which gives me a 58Mb file. Takes approximatly 2-5 minutes to scan, with those settings. Connects to the Mac via USB.
The film holders are fine for this machine doing a reasnable job of holding the film flat. Mind you I have a habbit of sticking film inbetween book first to make them really flat.
The Nikon software is fine to use, like all software you need to get used to it. It has Color Recovery and Digital ICE with it. These work very well but do require a little bit of fiddling with to get right. Over do it and it looks a mess.
Overall I am very pleased with the scanner, as it gets it right 99% of the time.

Microtek 120tf.
This will take a variety film sizes from 35mm all the way to 6x17.
It will scan up to 4000dpi and if you use the 48bit HDR function can give you a file size of 450Mb when scanning 6x6 colour slides. Connection is by Firewire and is fine as far as I can see.
On this I use the Silverfast software and TBH I find it a bit of a pig. It has a fair number of settings and it is not that easy to navigate around. The biggest issue is it has probelms detecting 'frames'. Meaning you can scan the first one ok, but the second one will be slightly off and the third one can be a real pain to sort.
It is a slow scanner and very noisy and can take over 5 mins to scan an image.
Is it worth it?
Yes, when scanning in HDR mode it can produce fantastic images.
Click to expand...
 
s162216 said:
Is that true optical resolution or is that interpolated as despite loads of scanners saying they do 4000dpi its actually only up to 600dpi or something usually and all interpolatation does IMO is make hugh files that can look worst.
Click to expand...

I think you maybe relating to some of the numbers banded about by the early flat bed scanners which did quote some really big numbers but did not deliver the goods.

Mine's a Microtek 120tf scanner which is a dedicated film scanner and from what I have seen and used it for it certainly appears to deliver the goods when scanning at 4000dpi :)


Thanks for pulling that up Joxby.

Just had a look that was a long time ago that thread and yes I still have the scanner and it still works grand :D
 
Knikki said:
I think you maybe relating to some of the numbers banded about by the early flat bed scanners which did quote some really big numbers but did not deliver the goods.

Mine's a Microtek 120tf scanner which is a dedicated film scanner and from what I have seen and used it for it certainly appears to deliver the goods when scanning at 4000dpi :)


Thanks for pulling that up Joxby.

Just had a look that was a long time ago that thread and yes I still have the scanner and it still works grand :D
Click to expand...

I was refering to flatbeds as many of the ones I have seen usually claim 4000dpi but if you look at the specs, its actually only usually 600 to 1200 dpi optical and the rest interpolated.
 
I think most of them indicate optical and interplorated resolution.
Most peeps spending a few quid I would have thought would do their research before flashing the cash.
I mean if your only doing a hundred quid or so, maybe your not too bothered about optical and interplorated dpi.
For the record, my dedicated scanner scans 6x9 @ 1200dpi and 35mm @ 2800dpi which is fine for interwebz poop and A4.
I'd rather scan with this Minolta @ 1200dpi than 4800dpi with a flatbed..
 
Funnily enough I was about to ask the same thing...just missed out on a Nikon Coolscan 5000ED and was wondering if anyone's heard of these:
http://www.plustek.com/oeu/product/of7600i_ai.asp

I'm not a fan of flatbed scanning and will get a dedicated film scanner of some sort - just wondered if these are any good - I'm only planning to use 35mm film anyway so the current multi-format Nikon Coolscan 9000 doesn't really appeal at £2,000+
 
I would keep looking for a Nikon 50000ED or Nikon Coolscan IV if all you doing is 35mm.

Also keep an eye out for the Minolta ones but be wary as the very early ones connected to the the PC via SCSI cards, which personally I would avoid.

Also check the ffordes site as they get a few film scanners in often and not at a bad price either.

Interesting looking at the Plustek website there are no supplies listed for the UK. I think they are cheap and cheerful and will give you a scan just depends on how much quality you want and how often you going to use it.
 
Aldi are currently selling a 35mm scanner. No idea what it's like but it's worth the diversion for Bateman's at £1.15 a pint.
 
colpepper said:
Aldi are currently selling a 35mm scanner. No idea what it's like but it's worth the diversion for Bateman's at £1.15 a pint.
Click to expand...

I borrowed something similar to the one Aldi are knocking out, and it drove me mental. It was basically a dedicated webcam, mounted in the top of the tower arrangement, with a light panel at the bottom to provide the "shine-through" for slides/negatives. Problem came in that it would only scan with the provided editing software, rather than a Twain driver and into Photoshop. My problems were made even worse in that it had problems interacting with a USB based TV tuner card i'd got installed in the machine. It would basically scan 1-2 images then die on its harris. After a month or so of faffing around, I asked the bloke I borrowed it from if he wanted it back, he said "no fear, it's a piece of crepe... if you don't want it, bin it!" So I literally threw it out of the open window into the bin, and bought myself a Canoscan 8800F.:D
 
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