Vuescan Q for the Coolscan 9000 users out there

[philipus]

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I am wondering if I am having a problem with my Coolscan 9000 which I recently bought.

 

I scan colour negs as linear scans in order to "develop" them in ColorPerfect.

 

At the start of each roll, I do a preview of a part of unexposed film and press "Input | Lock exposure". Then I do a second preview and press "Input | Lock film base color". Locking these values saves time by avoiding having each frame previewed before being scanned.

 

While the first preview is as quick on the 9000 as it has always been on my Coolscan V, the second preview is increeeeeeedibly slow. The scanner literally "ticks" one milimeter of the frame per second. It takes some 10-15 minutes to cross a frame during the second preview (and strangely it says the 9000 "scans" during this preview). However, after this second preview the "Lock film base color" setting refuses to "stick".

 

And when I then scan (thus, with only the "Lock exposure" set), the scan process is equally slow, some 15 minutes per scan.

 

But, if I untick "Lock exposure" the scans are impressively quick.

 

Oddly, I don't believe the scanner did this on the first several rolls I scanned. In fact, I am quite sure of it because I do the double previews as a habit and the scanner behaved as my V has always done. But I may, of course, have a faulty recollection here.

 

Can other 9000 (and perhaps also 8000) users shine a light on this mystery?

 

Cheers and thanks very much in advance. I'd hate for the scanner to be broken...

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[Stealth3kpl]

Oddly, when scanning with vuescan and V700, I've noticed the first part of the scan to be alot quicker than I recall, and the second scan to be a l o t s l o w e r than I recall.

Pete

[philipus]

Thanks Pete. Just a clarification - what do you mean by first and second part of the scan, the first and second previews I described or parts of the actual scanning process?

 

Cheers

[Stealth3kpl]

I mean of the actual scan. My previews are very slow because I do so with quite a high resolution with the understanding that the software will figure out what it needs to better. After these previews I highlight a frame then scan. My scanner's set up to do 2 passes. The first "pass" seems quick whereas the second seems much much slower than it once was.

Pete

[erl]

I'm running an 8000. Same as 9000 only slower.

 

Unless all exposures on your roll are equally exposed and under the same light, I don't see the wisdom of 'lock exposure'. OTOH, 'lock film base color' does make sense.

 

It's a while since I scanned MF so may be a bit rusty on procedure but my technique with my 5000 is very similar. I set the graph type as 'B&W' and linear. I prescan at a lower res but always set scan @ max res. and make sure the BP and WP cover the full histogram. The lower res prescan allows for faster preview. I may then crop and set colour fairly closely under the 'Color' tab.

 

I then manually set colour and density 'to taste' rather than 'accuracy' in PS. Philipus, I know you prefer Colorperfect for this.

 

Re speed of 8000/9000, it is slow to scan, especially if you select multiple samples or exposures. I try to 'multi task' when scanning MF because of the time factor. That's life I guess. (Some of the best things in life take a little longer).

[plasticman]

Hi Philip

 

I've always ignored those settings, and it hasn't been a problem (in my judgement). You seem to imply that the reason you lock the settings is to save time - but the outcome is that the scan takes much longer! Do you see where I'm going with this?

 

In any case, I assume that if the problem arises when you change settings in Vuescan, then the software is a more likely cause for slowness than the hardware.

 

FWIW I sometimes experience a slight slowdown in speeds if I forget to purge memory when doing a lot of scans - then the scanner ticks along quite slowly (but not one tick a second). I usually notice it straight away, abort the scan (takes about twenty clicks on the 'abort' button), purge memory or even restart Vuescan, and then everything speeds along again.

 

Incidentally - not a best practice - but I decided to abandon all sorts of preprocessing like multi-sampling. I know this can dig greater details from shadow areas, but the trade-off in speed wasn't worth it for 95% of my scans. I decided to use Lightroom or NoiseNinja to deal with the increased digital noise (not always necessary), and will re-scan any images that are important enough or especially noisy in the shadows.

 

This makes me feel that I'm not only saving time (really significant amounts on 120 scans), but also saving wear on the scanner. The extra per-frame previews that are the problem you started with, are an insignificant extra scan in comparison to full, multiple sample scans.

 

Just my feeling about the 9000 (which is an incredibly solid piece of engineering as far as I can tell).

[philipus]

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Unless all exposures on your roll are equally exposed and under the same light, I don't see the wisdom of 'lock exposure'. OTOH, 'lock film base color' does make sense.

(...)

I then manually set colour and density 'to taste' rather than 'accuracy' in PS. Philipus, I know you prefer Colorperfect for this.

 

I agree with you, Erl, re locking exposure. Instinctively, it doesn't seem useful to do unless a roll is exposed in the same/similar light but Hamrick says differently in his online user guide (for similar light situations he recommends locking the colour balance). Unfortunately, Vuescan won't allow locking film base colour without first having locked exposure.

 

The online user guide says that locking exposure, and unchecking Crop | Auto offset and Crop | Auto rotate, will prevent the "Scan" button from performing a preview scan. So even if locking exposure is of little use, it may still result in some saved time.

 

Btw, Erl, can you give any tips for how to adjust colour in Vuescan? I've been wondering about this.

 

Speaking of time savings, in the ten years I've been scanning with my Coolscan V I have never multi-sampled. So I agree with you, plasticman - it's a question of diminishing returns and I would only use this feature only when really necessary for a particular frame.

 

I don't have Noise Ninja but I've discovered that Photoshop's noise reduction filter is pretty good at desaturating noise so that it looks much like grain. It can clean up poorly exposed shots quite well actually.

 

Btw, I've sent Ed Hamrick an email about whether locking the film base colour is fully supported on the 9000 and 8000 models.

 

Plasticman, thanks for framing the problem about the sloooow second preview in terms of software vs hardware. It's very logical that it could be a software issue, which I do hope. I'm also going to try purging the memory - great tip, thanks.

 

Cheers

Philip

Edited February 8, 2013 by philipus

[russell]

I might be slow because it's working with increased exposure. It increases exposure by taking longer time. Whenever mines slows down this is the reason.

 

I'm starting to get into a rhythm with my 9000 + Vuescan. I don't use multi sample or multi exposure and don't miss it. I also think the debate is out on lock exposure for B&W. I find It slows down the process. Also that the film rebate isn't always pure black. It varies.

 

I do, however, use an anti newton plate over the film. It's thick so I can only scan 1 strip at a time like this.

 

I think the more practical workflow is to get them scanned in as best as you can. Then go back for the keepers (2-5 per roll?) once you know what you have and think about re-scanning.

[erl]

 

Btw, Erl, can you give any tips for how to adjust colour in Vuescan? I've been wondering about this.

 

 

Cheers

Philip

 

Thinking back, my technique has changed over time. Because I have spent so much of my life printing colour in a darkroom, I feel comfortable assessing a colour cast visually. Consequently I tend to correct fairly closely in VueScan. Under the Color tab I set the 'Negative Vendor' to 'Generic'. Never select a VueScan profile.

 

I start with 'Brightness Red/Green/Blue' all set to '1'. Adjust 'Brightness' to '1' or vary it if the Preview shows it really should be different. Then I roughly adjust each colour to get a reasonable balance. I find and believe that PS is best to finely adjust critical balance. Sometimes I use Silver FX to do some tricky stuff but that slows me down on straight forward images. Funny thing is, I reckon you can always pick an image that has been processed in SFX, or am I imagining that?

[philipus]

I might be slow because it's working with increased exposure. It increases exposure by taking longer time.

 

You're spot on Russel. It turns out that I kept including a portion of exposed film. User error quite simply but at least the scanner isn't broken.

 

Btw, Ed replied very quickly and confirms that lock exposure is fully supported on both the 8000 and the 9000 models.

 

Erl, thank you very much for posting your workflow. I'll try it at home tonight. I have for years doubted the use of Vuescan's film profiles actually because often I use films that aren't included (here, ColorPerfect is much better).

 

In devising my own workflow my focus has been on scan speed. For this reason I usually scan at Print resolution (1333 dpi) though I am beginning to move to Edit resolution because it doesn't seem to make a big difference in seconds/frame. I do like the 9000's film strip holder because there's no need to preview to get a perfect frame crop. On my Coolscan V I had to reset the crop on each strip and the crop would still slide or creep a little towards the end of the strip. Very annoying. Overall the 9000 gives me a much faster scan experience than the Coolscan V.

[A miller]

I mean of the actual scan. My previews are very slow because I do so with quite a high resolution with the understanding that the software will figure out what it needs to better. After these previews I highlight a frame then scan. My scanner's set up to do 2 passes. The first "pass" seems quick whereas the second seems much much slower than it once was.

Pete

 

For the idiot of the group, can you please explain why is helps to set the preview to high resolution? I had thought that is was the actual scan that mattered and that the amount of resolution on the preview was just so that you could see the potential that the actual scan could produce....

[philipus]

I'm not sure if this is what Pete refers to, but it is possible to "scan from preview". I didn't use this on my Coolscan V because I always had to adjust the crop on each frame because I was unable to set the frame spacing correctly, but on the 8000/9000 I can see the benefit of this (provided the preview resolution is set to a sufficiently high level).

[A miller]

Aha, in the context of "scan of preview," this makes sense indeed. Thanks

[wda]

I use NikonScan software which came with the scanner. I find that works well. I also scan MF at high res, each one taking several minutes. But I have parallel work which fills the time. (Such as editing, refiling etc).

 

On WB, I use an eye dropper on a carefully selected tone and repeat, if necessary, until I get an optimum balance. I also spend time tweaking the histogram to maximise quality. The 9000 does a very good job, using the sandwich glasses to ensure flatness. I miss that facility with the 5000.

[A miller]

I use NikonScan software which came with the scanner. I find that works well. I also scan MF at high res, each one taking several minutes. But I have parallel work which fills the time. (Such as editing, refiling etc).

 

On WB, I use an eye dropper on a carefully selected tone and repeat, if necessary, until I get an optimum balance. I also spend time tweaking the histogram to maximise quality. The 9000 does a very good job, using the sandwich glasses to ensure flatness. I miss that facility with the 5000.

 

 

In cases in which you are further editing the file in LR or PS, do you use the WB only when there are material adjustment that need to be made that you think LR or PS wouldnt be able to correct or do you try to fine tune the image as much as possible prior to scanning??

[wda]

In cases in which you are further editing the file in LR or PS, do you use the WB only when there are material adjustment that need to be made that you think LR or PS wouldnt be able to correct or do you try to fine tune the image as much as possible prior to scanning??

I try to get the scan to maximise relevant information and colour fidelity. It is not always possible. I always complete the processing in LR and PS, fine-tuning as required. You can be generating a great deal of digital data, so it makes sense to me to get as much accuracy upstream as possible.

[A miller]

Thanks. I have always wondered if this pre-scan tweaking helps. Now that you affirm that it has some utility, I will give it a try!

[mobirobo1]

hmmmm I am confused now...has the slowness problem been solved?

 

with my coolscan v I had a veeeeerrrrrrry slow experience as well with Vuescan.

 

for me it turned out to be an os problem.

 

i had tried with ubuntu 12.10 and that definitely did not work.

after switching to windows 7 / 64b everything was fine and switching to 8 / 64b did not cause any problem either.

 

what are you using as os Philip?

 

rolf

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[philipus]

Hi Rolf

 

I'm using OS X (Lion) and the 64 bit version of Vuescan.

 

It was like Russell suggested earlier - I accidentally kept including an exposed part of the negative which caused the lengthy previews. So, (an embarrassing) user error

Edited February 14, 2013 by philipus

[Stealth3kpl]

For the idiot of the group, can you please explain why is helps to set the preview to high resolution? I had thought that is was the actual scan that mattered and that the amount of resolution on the preview was just so that you could see the potential that the actual scan could produce....

 

I'd read somewhere that the software uses information from the prescan to set exposure and other magical things, and it could do so more accurately with a higher resolution of prescan.

 

Pete