medium format film scanner

elliotjnewman · Feb 2, 2005

Im looking at getting a medium format film scanner. I have £200 - £300 to spend, and am looking at getting one second hand. Whats a good one to get? I presume I will still take the occasional negative to get drum scanned when I want the extra bit of quality...

ksmattfish · Feb 2, 2005

I don't know if you are talking about a film only scanner or a flatbed that'll do film and prints.

I've been using a Microtek i900 flatbed scanner, and have been pretty happy with it. I'm mostly using it for lower resolution scans to be posted on my site and the web, but I occasionally use it to provide clients with higher resolution files. I have a photog friend who has the previous Microtek model, and he uses it to scan his medium and large format film for printing with inkjet. His results are very good with the bigger film; he says it's not good enough for printing from 35mm.

I have 2 gripes about the scanner: Microtek has ZERO customer service as far as I can tell, and you have to cut 120 and 220 film into individual frames to scan if you want to use the glassless medium format film holder. I don't want to cut my film, because I still want to print it in the darkroom, and handling a single neg is a pain in the butt. I use the glass "do-it-all" film carrier to scan strips of 120. It's okay for low res files, but the neuton rings might be a problem if you're going to be printing from the scans.

Epson has very similar flatbed scanners. The main difference seems to be that they use glass in all of their carriers. I think that the film is suspended over the glass though, to avoid the neuton rings. You also have to cut medium format film into single frames to use the medium format film carrier, although there is an device available (made by folks other than Epson) that allows scanning of 120/220 strips. I wish they made one for the Microtek.

elliotjnewman · Feb 2, 2005

Well I am after a film only scanner. I already have a flatbed, which is fairly old, and I dont really scan from prints, so any ideas on a dedicated medium format film scanner?

Cheers,

Elliot.

PS had a scan done on the Microtek 9800 xl and the results where very dissapointing...

Jeff Canes · Feb 2, 2005

[font=&quot]I honestly think that most new medium format scanners in your price range are going to be flatbeds with a transparency option. New medium film only scanners are going for 1000-2000 USD. IMO you need to look at discontinue model. [/font]