16bit TIFFs using Silverfast 8.5 SE?

[rodluvan]

Advertisement (gone after registration)

Hi, 

 

Scanners and scanner software seem to be notoriously elusive. 

 

Currently I'm using Silverfast 8.5 SE to scan my 35mm negs (bw and colour) with a Plustek 8200i scanner. The software has several settings pertaining to desired  colour depth however none of them yield 16bit Tiffs (only 8bit tiffs). Trying to wrap my head around it, I believe (but I'm not certain) that I need to pay additional money to get the Silverfast AI version to be able to produce 16bit tiffs. Trying any of the suggested 16bit settings, inverted, highly compressed 16bit files are produced as such:

 

 

Can anyone confirm that I need to buy Silverfast AI to actually get 16 bit files? 

Edited November 16, 2015 by rodluvan

[Stealth3kpl]

Have you tried putting that through ColorPerfect?

pete

[Advertisement]

The Leica Q3 is available for pre-order at B&H Photo Video and Adorama

[rodluvan]

no, why?

[MarkP]

The setting for 8 or 16 bit scans is within the densitometer panel in SilverFast.

[rodluvan]

The setting for 8 or 16 bit scans is within the densitometer panel in SilverFast.

so you're saying I can't produce 16bit scans to edit in Photoshop using SE? do I need Ai for that?

[MarkP]

Quite likely but I haven't used SE for ages.  With SilverFast nothing beyond the bundled SE version comes cheap. I decided after much angst that the HDRI version with batch scanning for digital negative archiving on my Nikon CoolScan 5000 saved me so much time that it was worth it  - I think...

 

You should be able to upgrade online, but for a Plustec scanner it will be expensive. If you do go down that route look at the HDRi upgrade as it's an excellent and fast tool for scanning high-res 64Bit files (80-160MB) from 35mm negs for digital archiving (it also stores an IR scan for later scratch & dust removal).

 

Beyond getting a high quality neutral TIFF I leave more sophisticated adjustments to LR/PS after exporting from SilverView HDRi.

 

Or you could save a lot of money and get VueScan but I really don't find it very intuitive.

Edited November 16, 2015 by MarkP

[rodluvan]

Advertisement (gone after registration)

Quite likely but I haven't used SE for ages.  With SilverFast nothing beyond the bundled SE version comes cheap. I decided after much angst that the HDRI version with batch scanning for digital negative archiving on my Nikon CoolScan 5000 saved me so much time that it was worth it  - I think...

 

You should be able to upgrade online, but for a Plustec scanner it will be expensive. If you do go down that route look at the HDRi upgrade as it's an excellent and fast tool for scanning high-res 64Bit files (80-160MB) from 35mm negs for digital archiving (it also stores an IR scan for later scratch & dust removal).

 

Beyond getting a high quality neutral TIFF I leave more sophisticated adjustments to LR/PS after exporting from SilverView HDRi.

 

Or you could save a lot of money and get VueScan but I really don't find it very intuitive.

 

thanks, but somehow this needs to be explained to me like I'm 5. 

 

let me explain, an upgrade for me to AI would be €250 online (yes, I agree, that is expensive). I don't care much for archive scanning for later processing, I scan one neg at a time at highest possible colour-depth (as to the OP 8bit), export to PS and do the necessary edits (I do NO edits other than adjust orange mask detection/tolerance, in scanner software). I don't use scratch and dust removal as I find it degenerates over all IQ and I might as well do it by hand (I don't scan old film so they're generally not scratched).

 

when editing (not extreme manipulation, but exposure correction, curves and levels mostly) I feel I need 16 bit as they sometimes suffer from unnecessary posterization. 

 

I don't know what HDRi upgrades are or how they would help me (I assume 64bit files must mean something else entirely - is it 16bit/channel + 1 channel ir??). AI can do 'multiple exposure-scans' and I assume 16bit files (but it seems impossible to get a yes or no-answer for such a seemingly straight forward question which is why I guess there is something I'm not understanding here). 

 

I don't know what SilverView is either.

 

finally, ppl keep talking about this VueScan, I've only tested the free demoversion and it seems as to about the same as Silverfast (how many ways can one skin a cat??).

 

I feel there is something essential I'm not getting about al this scanning business, why doesn't it just hand over the scanned 16bit file like a good boy, seems like such an easy task

[rodluvan]

apparently this is one of life's unsolved mysteries 

[philipus]

I also don't know Silverfast but there's a comparison here, brings up a window with a PDF wherein it says the SE and AI can do "48-bit/16-bit RAW Data" and that AI in addition can do "48-bit/16-bit Images". This Silverfast forum thread seems to suggest 16-bit is only in the AI version.

 

For such an upgrade price, a pro licence of Vuescan (which many here use and can help with) is a considerably cheaper alternative that will give you full access to all your scanner's hardware functions out of the box. And unlimited future upgrades.

[rodluvan]

ok, cheers. I thought vue and silver were about the same. I don't see how silverfast can compete offering software that much more expensive for the same functionality 

[rodluvan]

yes, vuescan does produce 48bit tiffs, however it seems incompetent when it comes to scanning colour negatives, producing colours off the chart. too bad

[michaelwj]

yes, vuescan does produce 48bit tiffs, however it seems incompetent when it comes to scanning colour negatives, producing colours off the chart. too bad

 

I use vuescan, I find it much easier to repeatedly get good scans. For colour, vuescan requires a colour profile for the scanner - https://www.hamrick.com/vuescan/html/vuesc19.htm#topic13 - the target is quite cheap and super easy to use. I use just one for all film, once its close its easy to tweak in LR or PS.

 

I think some options are only available in the "professional" version, which is not much extra for upgrades forever. I also found them to be very approachable, answering emails within a day.

 

Cheers,

Michael

Edited November 18, 2015 by michaelwj

[rodluvan]

Cheer, 

 

I did buy the pro version, so now I ave to get a hold of that target. I thought it was an issue of not handling the orange mask properly. one would think that the scanner producer (Plustek) would provide said profile

 

thanks  Michael

[250swb]

yes, vuescan does produce 48bit tiffs, however it seems incompetent when it comes to scanning colour negatives, producing colours off the chart. too bad

 

Vuescan is highly influenced by the operator because unless the correct settings are used it has no way of knowing what the correct colours are. Silverfast may work differently but I have no patience for the bloated interface and costs of running it. The crucial thing to consider whichever scanning software you use is you should only be getting close enough to the end result, not all the way there, because scanning software is too crude at making fine corrections compared with Lightroom or Photoshop. The skill of the operator is recognising what 'close enough' actually is. 

 

Steve

[rodluvan]

Vuescan is highly influenced by the operator because unless the correct settings are used it has no way of knowing what the correct colours are.

well, unless it's a properly counter-intuitive interface I have dialled in sufficient information; selected film (ektar or Portra). both yield horrible results (ektar worse than portra though, it was generally the other way around in silverfast). ultimately silverfast knew what colours to use (having fiddled about a bit).

 

what tool do you use to correct colours in, say, photoshop? it's hardly just a matter of selecting white/grey point I've gathered. 

 

and wile I have you guy's attention: what's the difference between "number of passes" (what does it do?) and "multiexposure"?

Edited November 18, 2015 by rodluvan

[philipus]

When I emailed with Wolf Faust I was told his targets are only for transparency film (which makes sense since only E6 produces a finished image on the film). 

 

I use vuescan, I find it much easier to repeatedly get good scans. For colour, vuescan requires a colour profile for the scanner - https://www.hamrick.com/vuescan/html/vuesc19.htm#topic13 - the target is quite cheap and super easy to use. I use just one for all film, once its close its easy to tweak in LR or PS.

 

Vuescan is great for C41 and easy to setup to get linear RAW TIFFs for use in ColorPerfect in Photoshop. True, Vuescan's interface is a bit convoluted but there's logic to it (input through output) and it's become a bit better over the years. Try following this guide for a first start on settings - it should give you an OK result. And once you've got ColorPerfect (there's also a trial version but which adds a grid on the image), follow this guide to get linear TIFFs. ColorPerfect works really well with C41 (less so (imho) with E6 which I scan as normal TIFFs these days). There are other ways to deal with the orange mask, but CP is the easiest and well worth the money.

 

As for number of passes etc, see Hamrick's explanations. 

 

yes, vuescan does produce 48bit tiffs, however it seems incompetent when it comes to scanning colour negatives, producing colours off the chart. too bad

 

well, unless it's a properly counter-intuitive interface I have dialled in sufficient information; selected film (ektar or Portra). both yield horrible results (ektar worse than portra though, it was generally the other way around in silverfast). ultimately silverfast knew what colours to use (having fiddled about a bit).

 

what tool do you use to correct colours in, say, photoshop? it's hardly just a matter of selecting white/grey point I've gathered. 

 

and wile I have you guy's attention: what's the difference between "number of passes" (what does it do?) and "multiexposure"?

[rodluvan]

quick and dirty scan 48Bit (tested the 16bit grey, but the resulting scan was noticeably worse)

 

[philipus]

So this was scanned as colour neg in Vuescan? Looks OK to me as a starting point. I'm surprised though that the 16-bit option would have given poor results; in which way?

 

I should have added (relevant to your question about Photoshop tools for correcting colour) that ColorPerfect will in most cases give good colour. However, it may be necessary to use tools in Photoshop, too. Hue Saturation is one but for more control the Color Balance tool is good since it lets you adjust shadows, midtones and highlights separately. Of course this can also be done with Curves which will allow more fine-tuning.

 

what tool do you use to correct colours in, say, photoshop? it's hardly just a matter of selecting white/grey point I've gathered. 

[rodluvan]

So this was scanned as colour neg in Vuescan? Looks OK to me as a starting point. I'm surprised though that the 16-bit option would have given poor results; in which way?

 

I should have added (relevant to your question about Photoshop tools for correcting colour) that ColorPerfect will in most cases give good colour. However, it may be necessary to use tools in Photoshop, too. Hue Saturation is one but for more control the Color Balance tool is good since it lets you adjust shadows, midtones and highlights separately. Of course this can also be done with Curves which will allow more fine-tuning.

 

no, this was a Kodak BW400CN (a C41 bw film). I think I will leave the colour negs for now (downloaded a demo version of colorperfect and it looked and ran very uninspiring, plus it was expensive for a single plugin imo). will try the IT8 calibration though.

 

the "16bit grey" gave noticeably less tonality (blotches of single shades of grey appeared). obviously it was faster though.

[Advertisement]

Hallo,

Look here: Interesting Leica gear