Digital transfer of fillm

[molested_cow]

Hey hey how about this. You contract the job to me so I can quit my job and just sit at home doing nothing while my V700 scans your slides?

 

[David R]

I'm usually very quiet around these forums, but in this case I may be able to give some useful advise. Used to work at a service bureau that did a lot of scanning, while film was used professionally in my location.

As many have said already, you need to edit down the number of images to be scanned. Try as one might you can only go so fast when scanning, and its rarely possible to achive quoted scanning speeds for a sustained interval. Either you or the scanner will jam.

Clean, cleaner, cleanest. You, your environment and your film have to be clean. Setup a station that's separated or at least away from any air flow or movement. Lots of cotton gloves and trash them regularly as dirt and skin oils will build up. While a sqeeze ball is good for the occasional scan, you'll end up with cramps in you hand after a dozen scans. Stay away from the cans of compressed gas, while they do work, if it burps it will spray slush on you film. Then you'll have a real mess. You'll want a compressor with a moisture trap. An artist's airbrush compressor is good, but some can be noisy. Avoid the diaphram based compressors these are really noisy. You'll want a unit that can burst about 80 psi for several seconds of blowing. Blowing along the film to lift dirt works better than blowing at the film. This gets most stubborn dust off. It will also blow film out of a holder or mount if you're not careful.

You really need to address what your end need is, HD video, 8x10 print, mural print? I've found most people only want a few prints out of a couple of hundred scanned slides. The rest they're happy to look at on their monitor or large screen display.

A lot of mention of Nikon scanners. I've used several and the more recent units produce very good quality. Better than the Epson scanners that I've used. The Nikons wouldn't last more than a couple of years, scanning any significant volume of slides on a daily basis. Just to many plastic parts. The other thing is that you would be most likely be purchasing a used scanner as Nikon doesn't appear to sell any of their units anymore (which is a shame), as far as I can tell.

That really leaves you with Epson scanners, which are ok, but are overstated on their specifications. Most informal reviews put the optical limit around 2000 dpi. Which is quite workable for medium and large format films, but pretty limiting for 35mm or other smaller formats. They also get very noisy when scanning dense film, so overexposed negatives or under exposed transparencies can be problematic.

Many users find that the film holders from Epson are inferior, causing problems with film flatness verses focus quality. People recommend film holders from betterscanning.com. Haven't used them, but I like the idea of the adjustable height as this was a big issue with earlier fixed focus flatbed scanners ariving from the factory out of focus. Wasn't a problem at 300 or 600 dpi, but at 2000 and higher it was very apparent.

Hope I've added something.

David

 

[pbcrazyboy]

I'm usually very quiet around these forums, but in this case I may be able to give some useful advise. Used to work at a service bureau that did a lot of scanning, while film was used professionally in my location.

As many have said already, you need to edit down the number of images to be scanned. Try as one might you can only go so fast when scanning, and its rarely possible to achive quoted scanning speeds for a sustained interval. Either you or the scanner will jam.

Clean, cleaner, cleanest. You, your environment and your film have to be clean. Setup a station that's separated or at least away from any air flow or movement. Lots of cotton gloves and trash them regularly as dirt and skin oils will build up. While a sqeeze ball is good for the occasional scan, you'll end up with cramps in you hand after a dozen scans. Stay away from the cans of compressed gas, while they do work, if it burps it will spray slush on you film. Then you'll have a real mess. You'll want a compressor with a moisture trap. An artist's airbrush compressor is good, but some can be noisy. Avoid the diaphram based compressors these are really noisy. You'll want a unit that can burst about 80 psi for several seconds of blowing. Blowing along the film to lift dirt works better than blowing at the film. This gets most stubborn dust off. It will also blow film out of a holder or mount if you're not careful.

You really need to address what your end need is, HD video, 8x10 print, mural print? I've found most people only want a few prints out of a couple of hundred scanned slides. The rest they're happy to look at on their monitor or large screen display.

A lot of mention of Nikon scanners. I've used several and the more recent units produce very good quality. Better than the Epson scanners that I've used. The Nikons wouldn't last more than a couple of years, scanning any significant volume of slides on a daily basis. Just to many plastic parts. The other thing is that you would be most likely be purchasing a used scanner as Nikon doesn't appear to sell any of their units anymore (which is a shame), as far as I can tell.

That really leaves you with Epson scanners, which are ok, but are overstated on their specifications. Most informal reviews put the optical limit around 2000 dpi. Which is quite workable for medium and large format films, but pretty limiting for 35mm or other smaller formats. They also get very noisy when scanning dense film, so overexposed negatives or under exposed transparencies can be problematic.

Many users find that the film holders from Epson are inferior, causing problems with film flatness verses focus quality. People recommend film holders from betterscanning.com. Haven't used them, but I like the idea of the adjustable height as this was a big issue with earlier fixed focus flatbed scanners ariving from the factory out of focus. Wasn't a problem at 300 or 600 dpi, but at 2000 and higher it was very apparent.

Hope I've added something.

David

Thanks for the elaborate answer, it covered about all my questions. Right now my main focus is to scan the most important photos for an archive/website purpose, so high dpi isn't as important right now. What dpi would you reccomend for a website or catalog use?

 

[vidrazor]

What format are your negs? 35mm? Larger? While you can use a flatbed to make quick low res scans so you can see what's what, flatbeds are junk when it comes to scanning film. Even most film scanners suck because most don't have glass mounts to keep film flat so your scans are in focus across your entire live area.

The last quality film scanner manufacturer, Nikon, has discontinued their last and greatest scanner, the CoolScan 9000. Some are still available new on ebay, but they cost. If you plan to do quality scans, get one. Get the glass carrier for it. An absolute must.

If your negs are 2-1/4 or smaller, the '9000 with a glass carrier is your only option for a personal scanning station. It's unfortunate Nikon has dropped out of the scanner market. It's to be expected, I suppose, but it would've been great if they came out with a '9000-like scanner with back side illuminated sensors. Now that would rock.

As some have suggested, sending stuff out to get scanned is an option, but how close do you hold those negs to your heart? The moment they go outside, they can be subjected to anything. No one is going to love your negs like you do.

This is not to say that professional services aren't going to treat your negs with care, hopefully they will, but then again, accidents will happen. Even if not through ignorance, accidents can happen.

Years back in the photo-optical era, I was handed the last 2-1/4 chromes Bert Stern shot of Marilyn Monroe. The last photo session of her ever. The originals. I was instructed to make contact dupes, which I did. When I went to pull the chrome off the contact frame, the tape holding one strip down ripped off a piece of a thin gelatin layer on the base side of the image. I didn't even know such a thing existed on the base side of Ektachrome film (this had to be E-3 or E-4 stuff). Needless to say, it freaked me out. Fortunately it didn't destroy the image (dropping them in oil gets rid of it), but it looked like the chrome was ripped.

Accidents will happen. Granted, they can happen to you too, but then you only have yourself to blame.

Food for thought.

 

[David R]

Sorry I didn't get back sooner, don't get any email notifications.

For archiving, its generally highest possible resolution, possibly Raw if your scanner supports it. The idea being that this is now going to be your backup to the real film, or only source.

Index, catalog or thumbnail images can be low with finished output being target size at 72 or 96 dpi (screen-res).

Website material would start at, finished size at screen-res, and possible one or two multiples higher on resolution if you wanted decent zooming capability.

re: E3 or E4.
Even 35mm E6 from Kodak has this weird back coating that can cause water marks when drying. Scratches easier than the emulsion side as well. Strange as it may sound, I've use isopropyl alcohol to strip this coating off when its been a problem. My film of course. Wouldn't do it to a clients film.