Eastgreenlander Posted January 29, 2011 Share #1 Posted January 29, 2011 Advertisement (gone after registration) Now that the Nikon coolscan 9000 is discontinued, are there any possibility of a new higher end dedicated film scanners to be announced? Besidde buying used, the marked seems very limited. Ofcourse there is the super great and expensive flextight x1/5, I just don't sence any developement in this segment of photography and I find that kind of sad. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted January 29, 2011 Posted January 29, 2011 Hi Eastgreenlander, Take a look here Scanner propects. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
Austinite Posted January 30, 2011 Share #2 Posted January 30, 2011 Plustek 7600 i. It's great. I use it with the silverfast software. 2 passes at 7600. Damn files are 10,000 pixels wide and the resolution digs so deep you will be amazed. All at a very affordable price. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
piblondin Posted January 30, 2011 Share #3 Posted January 30, 2011 I've also seen great results from the Plustek, but my understanding is that you had to scan one frame at a time rather than an entire strip of five or six frames. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tobey bilek Posted January 30, 2011 Share #4 Posted January 30, 2011 Few film cameras are sold compared to digital. Leica is the last manufacturer as far a I know. Film usage is dropping off at an accelerating rate. Scanner manufactures might assume demand for the product is going away. So you can perhaps make something cheap or adapt something you already have. Small runs are difficult as small quantities of things you buy are difficult to source. Small runs of what you make become expensive on a per piece basis. This drives up the price of components and then the final product. Then you still have to sell it at a profit. Now look at the Silverfast software. Development cost is the same if you sell one scanner or a million. So if you use film, get a commercial scan or open a darkroom. Economics rules. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Holy Moly Posted January 30, 2011 Share #5 Posted January 30, 2011 Few film cameras are sold compared to digital. Leica is the last manufacturer as far a I know. Film usage is dropping off at an accelerating rate. Scanner manufactures might assume demand for the product is going away. So you can perhaps make something cheap or adapt something you already have. Small runs are difficult as small quantities of things you buy are difficult to source. Small runs of what you make become expensive on a per piece basis. This drives up the price of components and then the final product. Then you still have to sell it at a profit. Now look at the Silverfast software. Development cost is the same if you sell one scanner or a million. So if you use film, get a commercial scan or open a darkroom. Economics rules. There are a lot of others analogue camera makers - but not in Germany..... Here is the announcement of a new multi-format scanner for early summer 2010: https://reflecta.de/de/products/list/~pcat.1/Digitalisierungs-Technik.html?gclid=CIzo9dDO4qYCFYe_zAodQVCdcA upper right corner..... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
nhabedi Posted January 30, 2011 Share #6 Posted January 30, 2011 This has been discussed several times. I think it is very unlikely that a new vendor will enter the film scanner market and fill the gap Nikon has left. Several companies will cater to the low-end market as long as enough users are willing to pay a few bucks to digitize their old slides and negatives. And Hasselblad will continue to sell their great but expensive high-end scanners as long as enough pros and wealthy amateurs buy them. I guess our only hope is that Hasselblad will at least re-introduce a smaller (read: cheaper) model similar to the 343 Imacon had before they were acquired by Hasselblad. It'll still cost as much as a film Leica I'm afraid... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wattsy Posted January 30, 2011 Share #7 Posted January 30, 2011 Advertisement (gone after registration) get a commercial scan or open a darkroom. Economics rules. Or rent time on a decent scanner. I know of at least five places in London where you can cost-effectively hire a Flextight by the hour. Presumably you can do the same in other major cities? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
plasticman Posted January 30, 2011 Share #8 Posted January 30, 2011 Few film cameras are sold compared to digital. Leica is the last manufacturer as far a I know. If by this you mean that manufacturers have a vested interest in selling to consumers expensive products which need to be renewed at regular very short intervals, then I'd agree with that assessment. If, however, we assess the total number of cameras currently in use in the world, then the figures are naturally completely different. You're also totally incorrect in stating that Leica is the only manufacturer still producing film cameras. I'm not sure how anyone can think this... Film usage is dropping off at an accelerating rate. Scanner manufactures might assume demand for the product is going away. I don't actually have the current figures for this - I suspect you don't either - but even assuming it's true, and disregarding the increasing list of people here and on other sites who are either returning to film, or even using it for the first time, then I would say that the vast majority of people who are leaving film for the greater convenience of using their phonecam, are not the sort of people who would ever have bought a high-end (or indeed any) scanner in the first place. I'd say that the target market for scanners - and particularly mid- to high-end scanners is increasing, as the new users are most often familiar with a digital workflow - which they bring to film (as I did), and will also be coming to film for aesthetic reasons, and regardless of economic considerations. So you can perhaps make something cheap or adapt something you already have....Economics rules. While still in sporadic production, the Nikon LS9000 was always subject to long waiting-lists, and was most often available only to those willing to pay a large (sometimes 1500+ dollars) premium to secure a new unit. When I decided to buy one, I downloaded the entire list of Nikon retailers worldwide, and simply began working my way through the list (initially the US list of retailers), and first visiting the websites in alphabetical order, then calling and mailing if the scanner was listed in stock - which it most often was not. Most of the very few retailers who had the scanner were selling at a sizeable premium. When production ceased, amazon.com listed two units available new for $5,999. I notice that one of those units is now sold. Apparently your contention that no-one wants to buy these scanners is wrong. The real problem is that the massive (and monolithic) camera industry has become subject to the same economic pressures as the rest of the industrial world: needing to fuel accelerating consumption of short-lived products at an ever-increasing rate. It is no longer in their interests to supply us with a scanner that potentially lasts for ten or fifteen years so that we can continue to use old cameras that may have been bought from them thirty (or fifty or eighty) years ago. Put simply, they need to ensure that the only option available to you is buying a new camera from them at regular, predictable intervals of no more than two or three years. This may be for smaller increments than the one-off purchase of a scanner, but cumulatively the expense will be much greater over the foreseeable future - and this is exactly the pattern of consumption that shareholders and owners will favor. These are the economics you're talking about, and are nothing whatsoever to do with the defeatist talk about "Film usage dropping off..." Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
250swb Posted January 30, 2011 Share #9 Posted January 30, 2011 This has been discussed several times. I think it is very unlikely that a new vendor will enter the film scanner market and fill the gap Nikon has left. It is more a case of exactly why a new company can enter the market, because they don't have to compete with Nikon and Canon. The market is now wide open for smaller companies to get involved with the strong (but not strong enough for Nikon) film market. The technology needed isn't exactly ground breaking, all thats needed is a product that will meet the needs of film enthusiasts, perhaps like this, due in June 2011 Pacific Image Electronics Steve Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Penzes Posted January 30, 2011 Share #10 Posted January 30, 2011 I'm wondering why Kodak not starting to produce scanner, even as licensed product of Nikon like stuff. I think its logical that Nikon as a DSLR manufacturer is not really interested in keeping Film a live. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
adan Posted January 31, 2011 Share #11 Posted January 31, 2011 ....my understanding is that you had to scan one frame at a time rather than an entire strip of five or six frames. Funny - in 30 years of using enlargers, I never used one that would print more than one negative at a time. (well, one could try fitting 3 strips of 35mm film - 3 shots each - into a glass 4x5 negative carrier, but either the individual prints were small, or one needed a horizontal enlarger bench to get enough reach (> 10 feet/3 meters) for big prints.) Speaking of enlargers, I notice B&H lists 3 pages of those and only one page of film scanners. I think the prospect for film users is to go the full Monty on chemical photography and set up a print darkroom. And why not....? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Penzes Posted January 31, 2011 Share #12 Posted January 31, 2011 For B/W is a own darkroom a great think, but for colour.... some wet prints by Istvan Penzes, on Flickr Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveO Posted January 31, 2011 Share #13 Posted January 31, 2011 Nikon still makes two film cameras, the FM10 which is very inexpensive and the F6 which is very expensive. I don't know how long they will continue this. As far as I know no other company makes film slrs. I don't know about point and shoot film cameras. DaveO Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
adan Posted February 1, 2011 Share #14 Posted February 1, 2011 Minor correction: Cosina builds the FM10 for Nikon (same chassis they modified for their Bessa rangefinders, also used for Vivitar V3800N). And it is always an open question what is still actually produced, and what is being sold out of warehouse stock. On the flip side, B&H lists 241 film cameras still available for purchase. A lot of duplicates (white Holgas vs. red Holgas) but still: Zeiss-Ikon, Nikon, Canon EOS 1v, Toyo, Horseman, Hassy 503, Mamiya 7/67RZ/645AF, Arca-Swiss, Rollei TLRs, Hy6, and 6008AF, Voigtlanders, the aforementioned Vivitar. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
plasticman Posted February 1, 2011 Share #15 Posted February 1, 2011 Minor correction: Cosina builds the FM10 for Nikon (same chassis they modified for their Bessa rangefinders, also used for Vivitar V3800N). And it is always an open question what is still actually produced, and what is being sold out of warehouse stock. On the flip side, B&H lists 241 film cameras still available for purchase. A lot of duplicates (white Holgas vs. red Holgas) but still: Zeiss-Ikon, Nikon, Canon EOS 1v, Toyo, Horseman, Hassy 503, Mamiya 7/67RZ/645AF, Arca-Swiss, Rollei TLRs, Hy6, and 6008AF, Voigtlanders, the aforementioned Vivitar. There are also high-end manufacturers like Alpa and Linhof, mass-producers like Seagull (and probably other producers in China that I haven't heard of), cottage-industry large-format film-camera makers, Fujifilm's cooperation with Voigtländer (as well as making low-end plastic film cameras) and the list actually goes on and on when you start looking around. I think it says an enormous amount about the perspective of commenters here (particularly the doom-and-gloom merchants) that they think the only film camera still available is a Leica MP (probably with their name engraved on the top-plate)... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpattison Posted February 1, 2011 Share #16 Posted February 1, 2011 Or rent time on a decent scanner. I know of at least five places in London where you can cost-effectively hire a Flextight by the hour. Presumably you can do the same in other major cities? Calumet at Drummond St., London, and Manchester.... Calumet Manchester - CALUMET John Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xmas Posted February 1, 2011 Share #17 Posted February 1, 2011 Funny - in 30 years of using enlargers, I never used one that would print more than one negative at a time. (well, one could try fitting 3 strips of 35mm film - 3 shots each - into a glass 4x5 negative carrier, but either the individual prints were small, or one needed a horizontal enlarger bench to get enough reach (> 10 feet/3 meters) for big prints.) Hi Andy People use to contact print 6x6 strips on one 10x8 AgBr for filing proof on enlarger base plates? Noel Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
pico Posted February 1, 2011 Share #18 Posted February 1, 2011 Funny - in 30 years of using enlargers, I never used one that would print more than one negative at a time. You forget the common 4X (~32"x40") 35mm contact strips done on an 8x10 enlarger. I can do the same on the Saltzman with a glass holder. . Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sblitz Posted February 1, 2011 Share #19 Posted February 1, 2011 I find it odd that scanners are disappearing. As the world goes digital, there are a huge number of people with old photos, negatives, slides, that have yet to scan them in. Perhaps they would just go to commercial vendors to get the job done, but I want to believe there are enough people out there who are shooting only digital that would want a high quality home scanner to make it a commercially viable product. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
adan Posted February 1, 2011 Share #20 Posted February 1, 2011 You forget the common 4X (~32"x40") 35mm contact strips done on an 8x10 enlarger. I guess our definition of "common" is different. I've seen exactly one of those in 40 years looking at pictures as a student, editor, designer and gallery-goer. (For the terminally anal, the reason I mentioned using enlargers for "30 years" out of that 40 is that I donated my last enlarger to an art school 10 years ago.) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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