Film Scanners

[philipus]

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Hi Robert

Just for future (hopefully unnecessary) reference, there are a few service points in Europe but lack of spare parts is a persistent problem. When my CS9000 broke down in January I contacted Nikon Service here in The Netherlands. They lacked some of the parts needed, notably the motherboard, but were happy to repair it even with the board I sourced from a seller on eBay. There is also this list of Nikon service points. 

Br

Philip

 

On 8/9/2020 at 10:44 AM, robert blu said:

I kept an old Mac Book Pro running Snow Leopard + Rosetta to connect to my nikon 5000 ED. Later I tried Vuescan on my Mac Pro and once learned (less intuitive than Nikon Scan becasue too many options) I found it works very well. Therefore I stay with that.

My only concern is if (or better when) one day the 5000 ED will die...have not found anyone able to work on it in Europe. I recently bought a BEOON to use with my M10 just in case...

 

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[bags27]

Plustek 120 Pro is now available. Tempting....

https://plustek.com/us/products/film-photo-scanners/opticfilm-120-pro/index.php?utm_source=news&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=first

[Jeff S]

On 8/3/2020 at 6:49 PM, graphlex said:

Marc Segal’s “Scanning with Silverfast” is a sanity-saver if scan you must  

 

In a recently posted webinar video at Photo PXL,  Mark said he was in the process of testing and reviewing another scanning software.  He’s delayed, however, due some hardware equipment issues he’s having with Mac and with X-Rite.

Jeff

Edited August 14, 2020 by Jeff S

[SJH]

On 8/14/2020 at 4:20 PM, bags27 said:

Plustek 120 Pro is now available. Tempting....

https://plustek.com/us/products/film-photo-scanners/opticfilm-120-pro/index.php?utm_source=news&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=first

Thanks for this as I’m looking to upgrade my scanner to either the Pacific XAs or now this one. I’ve searched on Amazon etc in the US and UK and it seems to be at either $2,000 or £2,000 which is 4 times the XAs. Is this really the launch price?

[bags27]

9 minutes ago, SJH said:

Thanks for this as I’m looking to upgrade my scanner to either the Pacific XAs or now this one. I’ve searched on Amazon etc in the US and UK and it seems to be at either $2,000 or £2,000 which is 4 times the XAs. Is this really the launch price?

yes, it is. 

[topoxforddoc]

That's the same money for a new Plustek 120 as an used Nikon 9000. I'm delighted that this is being made again, as it came out to a fanfare in 2017 and production stopped shortly afterwards. Now that Hasselblad/Imacon have stopped making the Flextights, these are probably the best MF film scanners available, short of buying a drum scanner.

[250swb]

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16 hours ago, SJH said:

Thanks for this as I’m looking to upgrade my scanner to either the Pacific XAs or now this one. I’ve searched on Amazon etc in the US and UK and it seems to be at either $2,000 or £2,000 which is 4 times the XAs. Is this really the launch price?

You are comparing apples with oranges.

[SJH]

On 8/17/2020 at 8:01 AM, 250swb said:

You are comparing apples with oranges.

Thanks for the replies, appreciate the comments. So it appears the view is that the 2k price fully justifies the feature set being a significant step above those scanners in the 400-500 price range?

[250swb]

7 hours ago, SJH said:

Thanks for the replies, appreciate the comments. So it appears the view is that the 2k price fully justifies the feature set being a significant step above those scanners in the 400-500 price range?

If you want to scan medium format as well the Plustek 120 is the best machine, it's also better at 35mm in the general scheme of things compared with a dedicated 35mm Plustek scanner. And as has been said before a 35mm Plustek plus an Epson V800 is the other option for scanning both 35mm and medium format although the Epson isn't as good for medium format and on it's own is terrible for high res 35mm scans. Or looking at it yet another way a 35mm Plustek is good for 35mm and an Epson V800 is great for doing 35mm digital contact sheets quickly. You may well find a Reflecta scanner is good enough for what you want to do, but a Plustek 120 is overall the best new scanner you can currently buy, the deal breaker may be the price.

Edited August 21, 2020 by 250swb

[SJH]

17 hours ago, 250swb said:

If you want to scan medium format as well the Plustek 120 is the best machine, it's also better at 35mm in the general scheme of things compared with a dedicated 35mm Plustek scanner. And as has been said before a 35mm Plustek plus an Epson V800 is the other option for scanning both 35mm and medium format although the Epson isn't as good for medium format and on it's own is terrible for high res 35mm scans. Or looking at it yet another way a 35mm Plustek is good for 35mm and an Epson V800 is great for doing 35mm digital contact sheets quickly. You may well find a Reflecta scanner is good enough for what you want to do, but a Plustek 120 is overall the best new scanner you can currently buy, the deal breaker may be the price.

 Many thanks that’s very helpful. 

[John Robinson]

On 7/2/2020 at 8:48 PM, Sspector15 said:

I was finally able to find a BEOON and have started digitizing B&W negatives using the 50 Summicron and an M Monochrom. The only problem I'm having is getting the negative lined up/ It always seems to be slightly askew. Also wondering if the best workflow is using Lightroom and reversing the tone curve. 

Aside from that, it is easy. The viewing tube that came with the set is terrible, though. Seems to have collected layers of dust. But, once the focus is set, there's little more to do. Actually, I may set up a three exposure bracket. And also test the same negatives on my V700.

I tried using the Monochrom on a BEOON (for B+W negatives) but could not get the focus right.  I am getting very good results by putting an SL on top via the M-Adapter L and an old Micro-Nikkor 3.5/55 underneath with a Nikon-F to L39 adapter and two of the shortest extension tubes.  I found the metal mask very hard to line up so cut a cardboard mask just a bit larger than a 34mm frame and put it underneath the BEOON with some tape (long side, not short sides to avoid touching the film).  I put the film on the light box, move the unit into place, check focus via the SL viewfinder in zoom mode (focus on the film grain), take the exposure, move on.  Compared with one minute or so per frame on a film scanner, I can get through a strip of six negatives in the same amount of time and -- provided the focus is right and I don't bump the camera which is exposing at about 1/15 at ISO400 and f/5.6 -- the results are excellent.  Curiously, the resulting images, once inverted and adjusted, show up dust and scratches quite a lot less than the Coolscan 5000.  Processing is raw files in Capture One which I find has a better range of adjustments than Lightroom.

Edited September 2, 2020 by John Robinson
typo

[Rokkor]

I am trying to understand how feasible a scanner at home is for once and then scanning a film in a good quality (otherwise makes no sense using a good Leica camera with good lens).

How long does a scan take with noise/scratch removal on a Plustek 8200i and on a Pacific Image XE/ Reflecta Proscan 10T? Would that take below an hour for a 36 film? 
 

I get the impression the XE /10T might be faster and better scan quality, but it is not so straightforward...

 

thanks for your comments.

[bags27]

If you already have a good digital camera, a macro lens, and a tripod and your negatives are pretty clean, digital camera scanning is significantly faster and gives you denser and better files, I think. My work flow is now so quick and effective that I've put away any thought of buying a scanner.

[Rokkor]

vor 6 Minuten schrieb bags27:

If you already have a good digital camera, a macro lens, and a tripod and your negatives are pretty clean, digital camera scanning is significantly faster and gives you denser and better files, I think. My work flow is now so quick and effective that I've put away any thought of buying a scanner.

Thank you. I could use the built in macro lens of the Q. Or get a lens for my Fuji x-t1. Still curious to learn about the XE and 8200i options and experiences.

[bags27]

2 hours ago, Rokkor said:

Thank you. I could use the built in macro lens of the Q. Or get a lens for my Fuji x-t1. Still curious to learn about the XE and 8200i options and experiences.

Sounds as if you want to explore the scanner and that's great. Don't mean to deflect you. Just to say that the Q probably doesn't have sufficient macro abilities. Ideally 1:1.

[Guest]

On 10/9/2020 at 11:06 PM, Rokkor said:

trying to understand how feasible a scanner at home is for once and then scanning a film in a good quality

If you have only negatives the main issue is IR-based dust and scratch removal, which you do not get with a digital camera. If you also have slides, the colour management is another issue that is worth looking into. The latter can also be achieved with a digital camera.

For any details about scanners you should look at the scanner test page of ScanDig. The only warning there is that the resolution tests quoted there apply only for the scanner that is tested, not the whole series of this type, since the resolution is, besides the technical issues like step width and CCD resolution setting the nominal resolution, mainly dominated by the adjustment of each instruments optical system.

On 10/9/2020 at 11:22 PM, bags27 said:

digital camera scanning is significantly faster and gives you denser and better files, I think.

I think this is not necessarily true. Good scanners have a 16bit/channel ADC and deliver an RGB-triple for every pixel, which digital camera with a Bayer matrix don't do.

Hermann-Josef

[Rokkor]

Am 10.10.2020 um 02:00 schrieb bags27:

Sounds as if you want to explore the scanner and that's great. Don't mean to deflect you. Just to say that the Q probably doesn't have sufficient macro abilities. Ideally 1:1.

So the Q is not suitable to scan negatives? What does "ideally 1:1" mean?

[Rokkor]

vor 23 Stunden schrieb Jossie:

If you have only negatives the main issue is IR-based dust and scratch removal, which you do not get with a digital camera.

Thank you - so you would favour a scanner? I can see the time advantage taking the shots, in case I had a macro lens, but setting up the equipement and manuall removing dust & scratches sounds also some time invest - I do not know how much effort that would be with newly developed negatives. 

vor 23 Stunden schrieb Jossie:

For any details about scanners you should look at the scanner test page of ScanDig. 

Yes, thank you - I did take a look there and wanted some real user experience, especially in the "lower" resolutions around 2400 / 3600dpi which would still fit the purpose of digitally archiving the negatives and would even allow for an A4/A3 print if needed. 

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[Guest]

16 minutes ago, Rokkor said:

manuall removing dust & scratches sounds also some time invest

This you should also do with a scanner with IR-based dust and scratch removal since the information behind dust is lost forever.

17 minutes ago, Rokkor said:

"lower" resolutions around 2400 / 3600dpi which would still fit the purpose of digitally archiving the negatives and would even allow for an A4/A3 print if needed. 

The scan times quoted by ScanDig should be reliable. The resolution you need for "archiving" depends essentially on the quality of the optics of your camera and the film. If you are not sure about this you should ask for some test scans and see what you get.

Since you are worrying about scanning times I assume you have a substantial number of images to digitize. So both, "scanning" with a camera of scanning with a scanner with manual feed, will cost you quite some operator's time. If you really want to save operator's time you need a magazine scanner like the DigitDia series from reflecta aka PIE. My DD6000 scans a magazine with 100 slides including the IR-channel in about 3.5h at a resolution of about 4500 ppi (as estimated from a USAF1951 target scan). With a decent scanner multi-exposures do not bring any advantages.

And in addition, if you "scan" with a camera, you need dedicated software to convert the negative images to positives. Just numerically inverting the pixel values will not work satisfactorily for two reasons: You have to remove the orange mask (which is done by a white balance operation) and colour negatives do not yet contain the "true" colours. These are obtained only with the second exposure, which produces the positives. In scanning, this second exposure/development is substituted by film specific negative profiles,  provided with the dedicated scanning software (VueScan, SilverFast, ColorPerfect, ...). As Giorgianni & Madden (2008) write, "A negative film comprises the first half of a two-stage imaging system composed of the negative film and a print medium."

Hermann-Josef

[Doug A]

Things are a little simpler with black and white negatives.

IR-based dust and scratch removal does not work. The silver particles in the negative are opaque to IR light so they are treated as defects.

Inverting the pixel values works fine for inverting the black and white image. Easily done with any pixel editor, or with Lightroom et al. by sliding the black and white points to their opposite ends.

Edited October 12, 2020 by Doug A