Scanning film/Film scanners.

[Matthew Howell]

So as I have begun to shoot more and more film I have started wondering if I could get a better quality from the 35mm Neg if I bought my own scanner and did them myself. Nothing against my current developer but some I would rather not have 5mp Jpeg files to work with when I could possibly be getting 9mp Raw images.

Now my question what is a good quality "budget" 35mm film scanner? Im not worried about scanning in old prints or anything or even medium format at the moment as I am worried about pulling as much quality out of these negatives as I can

 

[gsgary]

Ive got the Epson V500 and have had big prints from 35mm but only scan for the internet now I have a darkroom again

 

[Light Guru]

Nothing against my current developer but some I would rather not have 5mp Jpeg files to work with when I could possibly be getting 9mp Raw images.

You won't get a "raw" file from a scan but you can get a uncompressed tiff file. There are some scanning software programs that say they will save as a raw file but you don't really get anything more then what a uncompressed tiff would have. And the raw files they give you are not vary compatible with other software.

Now my question what is a good quality "budget" 35mm film scanner?

Define "budget"

 

[Derrel]

This article on scannerless digitial capture of film appeared not too long ago: Scannerless Digital Capture and Processing of Negative Film Photographs

I thought it was interesting to see the BETTER performance of a high-MP camera over a scanner when it came to grain and dust; the camera captures were a lot less ugly than the scanner captures.

 

[Gary A.]

I have a dedicated 35mm film scanner, a Plustek OpticFilm 8200i Ai Film Scanner.

 

[480sparky]

I have a dedicated 35mm film scanner, a Plustek OpticFilm 8200i Ai Film Scanner.

Me too. I can extract the grain out of my old Kodachrome 25 slides.

 

[Matthew Howell]

Im looking at dropping $100-$300. looking more at the used market than new. I am still between DSLR's as I am trying to save up for a 5Dmk3 as my old EOS 55 is chugging along in the meantime so using digital is out of the question for now.