looking for a budget photo scanner?

[RRYANSMITHH]

I'm considering the V300 and the V600. Can the V300 scan medium format negs?

 

[Josh66]

Looks like it only comes with a holder for 35mm (1 strip 6 frames long, or 4 slides).

Epson Perfection V300 Photo Scanner - Product Information - Epson America, Inc.

Since it can only do one strip at a time, I would guess that it probably can't do MF...

 

[CaranDache]

It is amazing to me that such a cheap printer could be so good. What are the advantages of the much more expensive Nikons or even the slightly more expensive V700?

 

[Josh66]

Larger scanning area, higher resolution scanning head. That's about it, I think - those are two pretty big pluses though, if that's something you need.

 

[RRYANSMITHH]

I'll probably go with the V700, since someone previously said it can do MF.

 

[Josh66]

The V600 and V700 both can do medium format. The V600 is around $250, the V700 is around $600... The V700 can also do large format though, and the V600 can't.

 

[Professional]

I went with epson V750, i am very very happy to do that because i went with large format, i always spend a lot today to save in the future, many think if they buy cheaper now they are saving money, but later they will replace it with another model, so if i did what most people do and save money and buy say V300 or V600 then i will end up to sell it and buy V700 or V750 to do large format scanning, so why i didn't go with V700/750 first place?

I can show you many scans i did with my V750 if any interested in to see, i know it is not as drum scanning or film dedicated scan quality, but at the end it doing the job flawlessly, scanning 35mm is not so great and maybe i will not be satisfied, but i don't shoot 35mm film at all, and MF scanning is really amazing, but once i did scan LF, i think i will not think to buy Nikon Scanner, not sharper of Nikon scanning of MF but the details are unbelievable, LF is another class by its own and i see what i have missing all these years, scanning 4x5 is like i am printing film at 4x6 and scanning it, i can't imagine if one day i go with 8x10 how will be the results then?!!!!!!!!!

 

[Dialectic10]

Ryan,
I got my V300 last week and I've been using it a lot. It's awesome. =]
However, compared to the scans you can get from CVS or Walgreens with their drum scanners, the V300 isn't as good at all. But it's good enough IMO.

 

[Proteus617]

Ryan,
I got my V300 last week and I've been using it a lot. It's awesome. =]
However, compared to the scans you can get from CVS or Walgreens with their drum scanners, the V300 isn't as good at all. But it's good enough IMO.

Are you scanning in auto? Scanning is a bit of an art. Until you get the hang of manually scanning your frames you wont get the best performance out of your scanner.

 

[Dialectic10]

Are you scanning in auto? Scanning is a bit of an art. Until you get the hang of manually scanning your frames you wont get the best performance out of your scanner.

Yeah, I actually do scan in auto. What settings do you use?

 

[Proteus617]

Yeah, I actually do scan in auto. What settings do you use?

I have an old Epson 3170 and only shoot B+W, so your experience may vary. Here's how I do it.
I scan both 35mm and 120 as Tiff, 16 bit greyscale. Click "Professional Mode", click "Preview". The scanner does a bad job of selecting the actual frame from the negative strip then tries to autocorrect for info that is not there. So, use the marquee tool to select your first frame. Select liberally. Click "Zoom", and adjust your marquee so that ONLY your image is selected. Click the the button that looks like a histogram. Now, the histogram you see will only include the info from the actual image and not the base fog from the strip. Use the sliders like you would on the "Levels" tool in Pshop. The scanner is good with highlights, not so good with shadows. Set your blackpoint so no info is clipped. Actually, set it a touch liberally as there is more info at the left of the histo than what shows up in the graph. Set your white point so nothing is clipped, not liberally (you most likely will have more than enough info there anyway). Now, set the midpoint to value 1.00. Minor adjustments in the midpoint will affect the tone curve. Sliding to the left gives you more values in the shadows to play with, and vice versa. Color works the same way except that you can adjust all three channels individually. If you have some Pshop skills the interface will look immediately familiar.

 

[Dialectic10]

I have an old Epson 3170 and only shoot B+W, so your experience may vary. Here's how I do it.
I scan both 35mm and 120 as Tiff, 16 bit greyscale. Click "Professional Mode", click "Preview". The scanner does a bad job of selecting the actual frame from the negative strip then tries to autocorrect for info that is not there. So, use the marquee tool to select your first frame. Select liberally. Click "Zoom", and adjust your marquee so that ONLY your image is selected. Click the the button that looks like a histogram. Now, the histogram you see will only include the info from the actual image and not the base fog from the strip. Use the sliders like you would on the "Levels" tool in Pshop. The scanner is good with highlights, not so good with shadows. Set your blackpoint so no info is clipped. Actually, set it a touch liberally as there is more info at the left of the histo than what shows up in the graph. Set your white point so nothing is clipped, not liberally (you most likely will have more than enough info there anyway). Now, set the midpoint to value 1.00. Minor adjustments in the midpoint will affect the tone curve. Sliding to the left gives you more values in the shadows to play with, and vice versa. Color works the same way except that you can adjust all three channels individually. If you have some Pshop skills the interface will look immediately familiar.

Hallelujah! The color correction option works like magic (if it's necessary). The one I have does a really good job selecting frames though. I played around with the Pro mode and there's a lot I can do before I actually scan. Thanks Proteus.

 

[Proteus617]

Cool! Glad it's working out for you.