Scanning and printing negatives

[oldlamps]

I bought a scanner from Staples that had a frame inside for holding negatives during scanning. The scanner was built like a normal scanner , scans from the bottom up with a white back ground on the lid.
With this scanner I was able to scan and print some B & W photo's. This worked good for normal negatives but when I got to darker negatives it didn't work, the photo.s came out all white. 50 years ago when I was toying with B & W Photography I would just give it a little more time in the print box but now I can't give it a little more time in the scanner. So I took a sheet of white glass and put that on my old contact print box, lite up the dark negative, took a Macro photo with my camera then reversed it and printed it out, and it came out quite good. So my question is there a scanner for negatives that uses my way of lighting the negative from behind instead of a reflection, maybe around $200 - $300 , Thanks, David Ward oldlamps@aol.com

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I have this scanner - It works good and is in your price range.

Newegg.com - Plustek OpticFilm 7300 A17-BBM31-C 48bit CCD Single Pass 7200 x 7200 dpi Hardware Resolution Scanner - Scanners - Specialized Scanners

Might want to look into it.

If you have hundreds of negatives to scan, it will take a while, but if time is not a concern - it's a great scanner. (Time will probably be an issue on any 35mm scanner...)

Despite what those few reviews say, it does come with a power cord, and it does work. I'm not convinced that those reviewers know what they're talking about...

[Dwig]

Most scanners that handle film, either dedicated film only scanners or flatbeds setup to handle both prints and film have illumination systems that light the film from behind.

The EPSON flatbeds that handle film all work this way. They have one illumination system for opaque materials (prints, ...) and a second in the lit for film. The EPSON v500 is a decent model that fits your price range:

Epson Perfection V500 Photo Scanner, Overview - Product Information - Epson America, Inc.

The better v700 and v750 offer better performance but are out of the price range you list.