Recommendation on negative scanner

[250swb]

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8 hours ago, Lord Wilmore said:

has anyone tried the Plustek OpticFilm 120 Pro? this thing seems to be the new modern Pakon... 

In what way is it similar? The Pakon was a low resolution 35mm lab scanner used for batch scanning holiday snaps as quickly as possible, the Plustek 120 Pro is a multi format high resolution scanner aimed at professionals or keen amateurs requiring the best output.

[105012]

9 hours ago, Lord Wilmore said:

has anyone tried the Plustek OpticFilm 120 Pro? this thing seems to be the new modern Pakon... 

In some ways I'm sure it is better, but do you still have to use film holders? It is so convenient to just put a roll of developed film in one end of the Pakon and have it zip through the whole roll without touching it, all done in a minute or two, no fuss...

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[dimm]

9 hours ago, Lord Wilmore said:

has anyone tried the Plustek OpticFilm 120 Pro? this thing seems to be the new modern Pakon... 

I had this scanner. It worked fine till one day when it stopped (mechanical reason). It has very "Chinese" quality - I saw it when tried to fix it by myself. 

Take into account, that this scanner has verrrryyyy slow workflow:

SilverFast:

1. You place negatives into holder - scanner takes holder and slowly moves it inside

2. You press on preview - scanner slowly moves whole holder in order to scan preview

3. you select first frame - scanner slowly moves holder into position of first frame

4. you perform required changes on selected frames and select next one - scanner slowly moves holder -> 3.

5. Finally, you finish with the frames and press on scan - you can go watch the movie, because for color film it will take a very long time.

 

When scanner broke down, I just ordered Epson V850 with 2 sets of holders for each type of film and never regretted. Workflow on V850 it's like Formula 1. 

I can finish few rolls of films in one evening - and never mind that this is not "automatic" scanner. Total workflow takes less time.

[250swb]

I clean forgot that film photography was primarily about getting it all done as fast as possible. But if you want 'formula 1' surely scanning with a DSLR or similar mirrorless camera is faster (and better quality) than anything else? In fact you could just speed everything up with such a camera and avoid using film altogether if it's such pain?

[dimm]

4 minutes ago, 250swb said:

I clean forgot that film photography was primarily about getting it all done as fast as possible. But if you want 'formula 1' surely scanning with a DSLR or similar mirrorless camera is faster (and better quality) than anything else? In fact you could just speed everything up with such a camera and avoid using film altogether if it's such pain?

Look, I by myself think that film photography is long and contemplated process (otherwise we would be shooting digital). But. Scanning it's actually all another topic.

When I used OpticFIlm 120 scanning process for 4 rolls of film was taking hours. With Epson I can finish it in less than a hour.

 

As for digital scanning - I don't have any digital camera. And Epson works fine - why bother?

[250swb]

3 hours ago, dimm said:

 

When I used OpticFIlm 120 scanning process for 4 rolls of film was taking hours. With Epson I can finish it in less than a hour.

 

I agree an Epson flatbed is ideal for doing digital contact sheets, I still use mine despite using my Nikon Z7 for the final full resolution scans after choosing the best few frames to concentrate on. 

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Not sure if this is posted in the right place, but I have and use a Reflecta scanner and like it a lot if only for the fact that it can be set to "automatically" scan a whole 35mm roll, since buying the Reflecta I don't use my Nikon Coolscan 4000Ed or the Plustek scanners very much. The output quality of the Reflecta is more than good enough for my needs and I regularly print to A2 or larger with the files produced.

What I do like to have though is a "contact" sheet of the processed rolls of film that can be filed with the sleeved negatives. The films are processed here in my home darkroom. To produce the "contacts" I have used a GH4 or a Nikon D810 with macro lenses mounted and either works well, but last evening I had a brain-burp and figured I'd try my Q2M to shoot the film strips, ( A4 size ), and it works great!

With film I only shoot and process B&W and the Monochrom Q2 produces really nice files with no need to mount Macro lenses either, covering the +A4 size scanning area of the negative strips without even going into Macro mode. I then print the files on an Epson P800, but that seems quite a waste to use the large printer to print A4 contacts so I am now thinking seriously of finding an ok A3-A4 size printer that can handle photo' papers nicely so I can dedicate it to the contact sheet tasking...........Any recommendations for such a printer?

Edited August 12, 2022 by petermullett

[RayD28]

I use a Plustek 8000.  I load a film strip with six frames into the holder.  Do a preview scan of the first frame that takes about 15 seconds.  If it's a keeper I tweak the sliders to get a flat image and do a full scan that takes about two minutes.  Then to the next frame.  I usually get about 10 keepers out of 36.  Process takes much less than an hour.  I have an Epson V600 that I told myself I'd use for contact sheets but the reality is my workspace has enough clutter and I never us it.  

Once I get the "keepers" into Lightroom I cull again and end up with four or five true keepers.  I don't feel bad about not digitizing the full roll.  Takes up hard drive space and I have the negatives.  

This is just my process.  To each their own.  

[dimm]

12 minutes ago, RayD28 said:

I use a Plustek 8000.  I load a film strip with six frames into the holder.  Do a preview scan of the first frame that takes about 15 seconds.  If it's a keeper I tweak the sliders to get a flat image and do a full scan that takes about two minutes.  Then to the next frame.  I usually get about 10 keepers out of 36.  Process takes much less than an hour.  I have an Epson V600 that I told myself I'd use for contact sheets but the reality is my workspace has enough clutter and I never us it.  

Once I get the "keepers" into Lightroom I cull again and end up with four or five true keepers.  I don't feel bad about not digitizing the full roll.  Takes up hard drive space and I have the negatives.  

This is just my process.  To each their own.  

I also have this one. It's a good and compact scanner, if you don't have to scan XPan or Medium format

[RayD28]

6 minutes ago, dimm said:

I also have this one. It's a good and compact scanner, if you don't have to scan XPan or Medium format

I guess I'd breakout the V600 for medium format.  However, the last thing I need is another camera.  

[grahamc]

I have the plustek 8200i and really like it for creating high quality scans of a negative I want to work on 

However, I do find it a little fiddly for scanning proofs of a whole roll, since you need to manually feed one frame at a time (using a holder that holds a 6-frame strip).  Despite that, a whole roll of decent sized proof scans can be processed in an hour but it is a process you have to be attentive to the whole way through. 
 

Because I didn’t find this process convenient, I changed my workflow and now first run batch scans on Epson V750.  Time wise it’s probably not that much less but I like the fact that I load 18 frames into a negative holder and then more or less click and leave it. I can do other things while the Epson batch scans the lot. 
 

All the images then go into Lightroom and I can re-scan anything I particularly like in the Plustek.  Sometimes I don’t need to , depending on what I’m using the image for.
 

I like it this way and for the rolls to be complete.
 

Works for me but mainly because I found a cheap second hand Epson V750.  It would’ve seemed a bit extravagant paying full price for the Epson having already bought the Plustek

Edited August 12, 2022 by grahamc

[Aryel]

On 8/11/2022 at 2:28 PM, dimm said:

I had this scanner. It worked fine till one day when it stopped (mechanical reason). It has very "Chinese" quality - I saw it when tried to fix it by myself. 

Take into account, that this scanner has verrrryyyy slow workflow:

SilverFast:

1. You place negatives into holder - scanner takes holder and slowly moves it inside

2. You press on preview - scanner slowly moves whole holder in order to scan preview

3. you select first frame - scanner slowly moves holder into position of first frame

4. you perform required changes on selected frames and select next one - scanner slowly moves holder -> 3.

5. Finally, you finish with the frames and press on scan - you can go watch the movie, because for color film it will take a very long time.

 

When scanner broke down, I just ordered Epson V850 with 2 sets of holders for each type of film and never regretted. Workflow on V850 it's like Formula 1. 

I can finish few rolls of films in one evening - and never mind that this is not "automatic" scanner. Total workflow takes less time.

Got quite a different experience. Used mine for over three years and always very happy with it. Stunning scans.  I only sold it when I built a darkroom.

Vuescan is a must in my opinion with this scanner as you can batch preview and batch scan, making it smooth and easy. I now use a v850 for contact sheet and quite happy with it but the quality isn’t  coming near the plustek in my opinion.  The reasons you are listing are all software related and solved with vuescan. I never had any issue with the motor too.  My workflow was very simple: press preview and let it batch 12 frames fairly quickly. Select and scan in raw. Start editing whilst the scanner work at the back.

A fine and very convenient scanner in my opinion 😊. 

Edited August 14, 2022 by Aryel

[dimm]

1 hour ago, Aryel said:

I now use a v850 for contact sheet and quite happy with it but the quality isn’t  coming near the plustek in my opinion

I wonder what problem with the quality of v850. Resolution? I scan with 6400 dpi. Yes, it slightly lower than was with Plustek (7200 dpi), but it's more than enough for sharing photo on web and even for digital print.

 

1 hour ago, Aryel said:

Vuescan is a must in my opinion with this scanner

I just tried this software yesterday. What I hated most is complete lack of visual controls when altering image, just slidebars and numbers. 

And absence of Global Color Correction option which SilverFast has (and which is must for color photography, imho). And this option is much more powerful than Adjusting color balance vuescan has.

Edited August 14, 2022 by dimm

[Aryel]

3 hours ago, dimm said:

I wonder what problem with the quality of v850. Resolution? I scan with 6400 dpi. Yes, it slightly lower than was with Plustek (7200 dpi), but it's more than enough for sharing photo on web and even for digital print.

I find the scans a tad softer and need more sharpening. I still like it though. I just find the plustek better.

I use vuescan to control the scanners, nothing more. It is not really suited for image processing and I never do any colour correction with it: I batch scan everything in raw and use photoshop along with colour perfect plugin to invert. I do the same with the Epson now but have to sharpen a bit at the end which affects how the grains look.

I don’t think the plustek resolves 7200 dpi nor the Epson 6400. It is better to find out and use the real dpi. 

Overall, I fully agree with you that the Epson is good enough to share photos on the web and I am sure prints would be nice to (haven’t tried yet).  I just think that the plustek is better and regret selling mine. 

Edited August 14, 2022 by Aryel

[250swb]

9 hours ago, dimm said:

I wonder what problem with the quality of v850. Resolution? I scan with 6400 dpi.

You can scan at whatever resolution you like, often it is just interpolation of valueless information and it doesn't add to fidelity. The diffuse light source from an Epson flatbed scanner is always what has held it back with 35mm scans. If anybody has ever used a cold cathode enlarger with its diffuse light source they will appreciate the similarity and that it doesn't do 35mm very well, just like the Epson flatbed scanners. But like the Epson scanner a diffuse light source from a cold cathode enlarger can do medium format very well. So you are trying to compare chalk with cheese. Flatbed scanners will give you an acceptable image with a 35mm negative, but it will be average compared with a similar high resolution scan from a dedicated 35mm film scanner or DSLR/Mirrorless.

 

[MesaArchive]

I use a Coolscan 4000 ED for 35mm and find it gives me scans comparable to my local labs. I have a V850 for everything else and it's honestly a huge pain in the ass. It's true that with some finesse you can pull out very professional looking results from the higher end flatbeds, but IME it's so much more time intensive to hit that threshold that I wouldn't recommend them to anyone. Eventually I will switch to camera scanning for MF and above.

[qqphot]

From seeing tests people have conducted it looks like the Epson v700-750-800 scanners usefully resolve about 1800 dpi in real life, or something like 1700x2500 pixels for a 35mm frame, or 4000x4000 for a 120 format square frame. For 35mm it's fine for posting online and for contact sheets but I'd say it's probably not that great for more serious uses especially printing large. You can definitely improve results quite a bit by testing and adjusting the film carrier height with the newer carriers. For even better results, the betterscanning wet mounting setup gives you full adjustability and perfect flatness.  For 120 film when adjusted right it's getting into the realm of being good enough for most uses.

[Doc Henry]

31 minutes ago, qqphot said:

From seeing tests people have conducted it looks like the Epson v700-750-800 scanners usefully resolve about 1800 dpi in real life, or something like 1700x2500 pixels for a 35mm frame, or 4000x4000 for a 120 format square frame. For 35mm it's fine for posting online and for contact sheets but I'd say it's probably not that great for more serious uses especially printing large. You can definitely improve results quite a bit by testing and adjusting the film carrier height with the newer carriers. For even better results, the betterscanning wet mounting setup gives you full adjustability and perfect flatness.  For 120 film when adjusted right it's getting into the realm of being good enough for most uses.

..."1700 x 2500 pixels for a 35mm frame, or 4000 x 4000 for a 120 " in Tiff or Jpeg ? ...   and the size in Mp or Mo ?  ... and how many bits 24 bits , more or less ?

I remind you that Epson's scanner factory software allows the fastest scan by going through Vuescan (VS) or Silverfast you slow down the duration of the scan

and in addition there is a color denaturation of the original specially with VS. 

I have a computer under XP reserved especially for my two Nikon scanners. I scan in TIFF (size of each picture 120 Mo) in 16 bits , but when i was scanning with my Epson V700 it's 24 bit or more always in Tiff .

Best H

Edited August 17, 2022 by Doc Henry

[qqphot]

1 hour ago, Doc Henry said:

..."1700 x 2500 pixels for a 35mm frame, or 4000 x 4000 for a 120 " in Tiff or Jpeg ? ...   and the size in Mp or Mo ?  ... and how many bits 24 bits , more or less ?

 

well, the format doesn't impact the number of pixels. with Vuescan I have it output DNGs which i think are at least nominally 16 bits per color channel, though I have no idea of the actual dynamic range optically. It seems sufficient for editing pretty well in lightroom or photoshop though.

 

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[dimm]

On 8/14/2022 at 11:31 PM, 250swb said:

You can scan at whatever resolution you like, often it is just interpolation of valueless information and it doesn't add to fidelity. The diffuse light source from an Epson flatbed scanner is always what has held it back with 35mm scans. If anybody has ever used a cold cathode enlarger with its diffuse light source they will appreciate the similarity and that it doesn't do 35mm very well, just like the Epson flatbed scanners. But like the Epson scanner a diffuse light source from a cold cathode enlarger can do medium format very well. So you are trying to compare chalk with cheese. Flatbed scanners will give you an acceptable image with a 35mm negative, but it will be average compared with a similar high resolution scan from a dedicated 35mm film scanner or DSLR/Mirrorless.

 

 

Last few days I made comparison between my Epson V850 and Plustek 8200i using same negatives.

To make long story short, results are following:

1. 35mm film - indeed Plustek 8200i scans with more details and sharpness even if UnsharpMask is disabled for Plustek in SilverFast

2. Epson V850 can approach such results only if you will do multiple tries and play with focusing (by changing position of height adjusters) - epson guide

3. Medium format / XPan - Since Plustek 8200i can't scan it I compared results with negatives that I scanned when my Plustek OpticFilm 120 still worked. Results from Epson are comparable with those I had from OpticFilm 120.

4. Scanning from the glass - to my surprise in many cases I achieved yet more sharper results when scanned from the glass instead of scanning with film holder. Such method has its own downsides though: you can't use iSRD for color films.

5. Epson V850 really shines when we are talking about whole workflow. It has 2 sets of holders and while it performs batching scan of one holder you can place negatives into another. Single roll of film can be done very quickly.

 

Another note regarding SilverFast versions. My Plustek has license to SilverFast 8.8, while Epson V850 comes with SilverFast 9. While version 9 is more stable and has more NegaFix profiles, I really liked colors I got from version 8.8. Both scanners were calibrated.

When Color Management was enabled on SilverFast 9 it produced some purple cast on final scan which disappeared only when I decreased scan resolution. With Color Management disabled color cast disappeared on any resolution.

 

For those who are interested  - here is detailed and profound work of Mark D. Segal comparing Epson V850 with line of different scanners, like Plustek OpticFilm 120, Nikon etc.

https://luminous-landscape.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/The-New-Epson-V850-Pro-Scanner-Final.pdf

 

Edited August 18, 2022 by dimm