MPJMP Posted October 23, 2008 Share #1 Posted October 23, 2008 Advertisement (gone after registration) I've had a Nikon Coolscan V scanner for the past 4 years and have never used anything but the supplied Nikon Scan 4 software. I open NS4 from within Photoshop and import the scan directly to the work space. I hear people talking about Vuescan and that they prefer it to NS4. What can it do for me that NS4 can't? Does it produce better quality scans? Easier interface? Last time I checked Vuescan was freeware. Is that still the case? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted October 23, 2008 Posted October 23, 2008 Hi MPJMP, Take a look here Why should I use Vuescan?. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
fingerprinz Posted October 23, 2008 Share #2 Posted October 23, 2008 Don't bother. Nikon Scan is great if it runs on your computer. I am on the Mac (latest OSX version) where Nikon Scan crashes very often. And because there is no more software update for Nikon Scan, I was forced to look for an alternative. Vuescan is good, offers film presets (which I don't use), but misses the index scan, which Nikon Scan offers. Suggest you just download the demo version and play around with it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rolo Posted October 23, 2008 Share #3 Posted October 23, 2008 I use Nikon Scan on an 8000 running on a Mac Pro desktop and have down-loaded the trial version of Vuescan 4 or 5 times. I've also downloaded Silverfast a few times. My findings are that whilst Nikon Scan has a 'clunky' interface, it produces scans that are no worse than the other and several of the test scans have produced better results than the other two. I'm more into acquiring a capture for PhotoShop than scanning for the final image, so maybe that is an influence. I would like Silverfast, but there's a big price tag on it in the UK that I'm not prepared to pay. Vuescan is cheap and not a cost to worry about if it has any benefit. Maybe I should investigate more as I'm open to change. I don't suffer any abnormal crashes with Nikon Scan. I read that lots of users do and another version of the software is due out very soon. I'm running on OS X 10.5.5 with 9 gig of RAM with a Dual Core Intel chip @ 2.66 GHz. Production of big files is slow and I suspect Silverfast would speed it up. Hope that is of interest. Rolo Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tgray Posted October 23, 2008 Share #4 Posted October 23, 2008 I don't suffer crashes in Nikon Scan on my mac, but I do vastly prefer Vuescan for B&W scans. I find that Nikon Scan seems to give me contrastier scans. I have Vuescan set up to give me really flat scans and a simple curves adjustment in Photoshop usually gives me a great scan. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
peter_n Posted October 23, 2008 Share #5 Posted October 23, 2008 I bought Vuescan several years ago and only started using it this year. It has a horrible user interface. I only scan for the internet so I use a cheapo Konica-Minolta SD IV and have used only the Minolta software until now. The Minolta software is tolerable to use. My reason for finally using Vuescan was that I couldn't avoid blowing the highlights in the bundled software. Viewscan does a better job with that, it scans quicker, and the files are about 20% of the size of the Minolta scans. Vuescan is better software, but I still hate using it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomasis7 Posted October 23, 2008 Share #6 Posted October 23, 2008 I use minolta dualscan III and the vuescan crashes every 10-20 min or so. Im annoyed so I had be forced to use minolta which is not great as Vuescan. Vuescan recovers quite a lot of tones compared to minolta. I dont know how good is nikon scan. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrian Lord Posted October 23, 2008 Share #7 Posted October 23, 2008 Advertisement (gone after registration) I use Nikonscan but bought Vuescan recently. Found the Vuescan interface impossible to use as I am 41 rather than 14. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fernmelder Posted October 23, 2008 Share #8 Posted October 23, 2008 What are the differences between the trial and the purchase-version of Vuescan pro regarding those film pre-sets/profiles? In the trial there's only Ilford XP2. Are there others like HP5+ in the purchase pro version? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tgray Posted October 23, 2008 Share #9 Posted October 23, 2008 I don't really use the profiles. I just set it on kodak portra for color or TMAX CI=.55 for B&W. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.