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06-08-2008, 11:51 AM   #16
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QuoteOriginally posted by ve2vfd Quote
Do you seriously get a better quality and resolution with a SLR slide/negative copy lens attachment than with a scanner with a slide scanner on it?

Pat
It's equipment dependent. My scanner images were poorer - but it's a cheap scanner vs a much more expensive lens/slide holder setup.

06-08-2008, 11:56 AM   #17
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Hmmm thats pretty interesting!

Pat
06-08-2008, 01:14 PM   #18
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QuoteOriginally posted by Gooshin Quote
and i'm not a post processing god, but i do know that information is what counts. Mike seems to be surprised how i cannot be content with a 1meg jpeg if i ever wanted to do some post processing.
I neither explicitly stated nor intimated any such thing.

You apparently missed the point about the "pieces of string" analogy. It can take a zillion small pieces.....or just one piece if it is long enough. So to ask whether a photo/negative scan can have as much information as a 10mb RAW file displays a lack of understanding that scans can be of various sizes/resolutions.

Is English your first language?
06-08-2008, 01:38 PM   #19
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QuoteOriginally posted by KungPOW Quote
Here are some examples for what its worth. No they were not done in laboritory conditions.


At 400 ISO, the K10D kicks butt on the film. At the low quality scan, the film grain, and the digital resolution are very close. The high quality scan, the film grain is far greater then the digital resolution.

I get my scans done at the same place that develops my film. I am not yet developing and scanning my own, but it is in the plans to do so. The big problem I have with the guys that do the scanning is dust. Some scans have ALLOT of specks.

I think we are discussing the merits of a scanner vs. a camera for copying film.

06-08-2008, 03:32 PM   #20
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QuoteOriginally posted by Gooshin Quote
if i was to shop around localy for a place that converts my film negatives (or pictures?) into a digital file

what should i be on the look for so as to get the best quality of conversion.

can photo/negative scanning compete with 10 megabite RAW files in terms of amount of information? Will i still be able to play around with these images in photoshop as well as my digital RAW files?
QuoteOriginally posted by Wheatfield Quote
I think we are discussing the merits of a scanner vs. a camera for copying film.

I just re-read the OP, where does Gooshin ask about a scanner vs a Camera w/ a slide copier?

And your 7:42 post, you seem to be talking about a scanner and not a slide copier with a DSLR.

All I was trying to show was that with some film, you will get diminishing returns as you increase the scan resolution. As the resolution goes up you just get a more accuratly scanned grain. The K10D crop was just to show the detail diference between a RAW file and a scanned file. I think that is part of the initial question.

I don't see the "slide copier" enter the conversation until sugested by jslifoaw.

@Wheatfield, This looks to be a topic you know a great deal about. I expect far more then I know, as I admit I have someone else do my scanning. How about an example of a scanned negative vs one that is digitised with a slide copier?

I am interested as I am looking into buying a scanner. If I can get good results with a slide copier and my DSLR maybe that is a direction I should look at.
06-08-2008, 04:44 PM   #21
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QuoteOriginally posted by KungPOW Quote
I just re-read the OP, where does Gooshin ask about a scanner vs a Camera w/ a slide copier?

And your 7:42 post, you seem to be talking about a scanner and not a slide copier with a DSLR.

All I was trying to show was that with some film, you will get diminishing returns as you increase the scan resolution. As the resolution goes up you just get a more accuratly scanned grain. The K10D crop was just to show the detail diference between a RAW file and a scanned file. I think that is part of the initial question.

I don't see the "slide copier" enter the conversation until sugested by jslifoaw.

@Wheatfield, This looks to be a topic you know a great deal about. I expect far more then I know, as I admit I have someone else do my scanning. How about an example of a scanned negative vs one that is digitised with a slide copier?

I am interested as I am looking into buying a scanner. If I can get good results with a slide copier and my DSLR maybe that is a direction I should look at.
Pardon me, I misinterpreted the gist of your post.
I could probably come up with a comparison between a scanned slide and a rephotographed slide in a few days. The only time I have done any of this has been for paying customers, and I don't keep copies of the files.
06-08-2008, 05:05 PM   #22
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My experience is that the dynamic range of the scanner is the critical factor here. You need DM of 3.2 or better to get decent results. Since this take a lot of time to do high resolution scans, it is very expensive to process by a service outfit. As stated before, they may not have the required equipment. If you must, buy a good used Nikon or Minolta film scanner and do it yourself. They are fairly cheap in todays market. It will likely require a scsi pci interface board for your PC. I used to scan my film before the digital cameras improved. I have had enough of that. I still have a large box of film to scan someday.

Dave


QuoteOriginally posted by Gooshin Quote
if i was to shop around localy for a place that converts my film negatives (or pictures?) into a digital file

what should i be on the look for so as to get the best quality of conversion.

can photo/negative scanning compete with 10 megabite RAW files in terms of amount of information? Will i still be able to play around with these images in photoshop as well as my digital RAW files?


06-08-2008, 05:47 PM   #23
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The scans I've been getting lately are from a Flextight 949 and the output from 120 film is 380mb 16-bit TIF.

They're almost 10000pixels on the long side and while not quite "great" at 100% viewing, they are brilliant once down-rezzed about 30%. Thats leave an image thats around 7000pixels on the long side and looks superb.

cheers,
bazz.
06-08-2008, 06:45 PM   #24
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Hi, I've recently bought a dedicated minolta film scanner (elite II which is USB, no SCSI adapter required) and it is sitting on my desktop near the epson 4490 which preceeded it.

Based on my recent scanning (with the minolta), i'd have to say in real world terms the dynamic range is indeed much more important than the resolution scanned at; I am scanning 35mm @3600dpi with an output of 400dpi, giving me well in excess the detail required for an 8x10 print. I am scanning direct 8 bit into jpgs with ICE and GEM on, which kills at least some of the grain and a lot of the chroma noise associated with scanning. I do minor rotational and levels changes, resize to around 3200x2000ish, do a minor sharpen and am pretty happy with the prints I've gotten so far.

Film type does indeed seem to make a huge difference - slide and good print film (reala, 160NPS) seem (thus far) to scan well. Kodak gold 200 does not......

The detail is astonishing compared to the epson, and the file sizes much, much smaller. If I used Tiffs and 16bit and multisampling up the wazzoo i'd probably get better scans and will do so for larger prints, but then I'd be replying to a lot more posts on here whilst waiting for the scanner to finish its business, and have to downsize a million times.

Personally, until someone comes up with a dedicated reducer (of some description) for slide copier units rather than having to play around with bellows units and additional lenses I will be sticking with my scanner. For less than the cost of a decent new lens this unit has changed my viewpoint on film!
*happily scanning on*
06-08-2008, 11:02 PM   #25
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I use a Canon 8600F Slides/Negatives scanner for converting my old negatives to digital. I have no complaints so far. Only that the work is very time consuming. Attached an example from a 70-yr old phots taken by my dad, using a simple Kodak Box Camera (Brownie 62, perhaps).

Last edited by ptxbillyk; 01-29-2009 at 07:19 AM.
06-09-2008, 02:46 AM   #26
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Ptxbillyk, how good is the Canon 8600F with 35mm negative scanning?

Ron
06-09-2008, 03:32 AM   #27
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QuoteOriginally posted by ptxbillyk Quote
I use a Canon 8600F Slides/Negatives scanner for converting my old negatives to digital. I have no complaints so far. Only that the work is very time consuming. Attached an example from a 70-yr old phots taken by my dad, using a simple Kodak Box Camera (Brownie 62, perhaps).
What software do you use?
06-09-2008, 07:06 AM   #28
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QuoteOriginally posted by Ron Quote
Ptxbillyk, how good is the Canon 8600F with 35mm negative scanning?

Ron
If your negatives are cut to strips of 5, this will fit nicely into the negative holder provided for 135 film strips. You can scan 10 negatives at a time. In my case a lot of negatives taken in the 60's had been cut to single frames. I put them into slide holders and then scan them using the 'holders' (for slides conversion) provided by Canon. Using the slide holder, you can scan 4 pix at a time.

A sample scanned from a 1961 single-frame negative is shown.

Last edited by ptxbillyk; 01-29-2009 at 07:19 AM.
06-09-2008, 07:13 AM   #29
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QuoteOriginally posted by pentagor Quote
What software do you use?
Two softwares wer supplied with my Canon 8600F:-

1) ArcSoft PhotoStudio 5.5 and
2) Adobe PhotoShop Element 4.0
06-09-2008, 07:59 AM   #30
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QuoteOriginally posted by Gooshin Quote
if i was to shop around localy for a place that converts my film negatives (or pictures?) into a digital file

what should i be on the look for so as to get the best quality of conversion.

can photo/negative scanning compete with 10 megabite RAW files in terms of amount of information? Will i still be able to play around with these images in photoshop as well as my digital RAW files?
I bouoght my own scanner, a Minolta Dimage II and scanned all my shots (about 20,000) with the scanner. it was slow, about 4 years, but worthwhile.

I scanned all shots using 8bit JPEG, and found that the quality was good, compared to the film I scanned.

I also cataloged all the neg's so that If I want to go back and take higher quality scans (i.e. not 8 bit jpeg) I can.

with respect to shops that scan, as others have commented, you need to clearly specify what quality you want, because if you are not careful you get really poor quality 1 MP scans.

One shop I deal with , Just Cameras in mississauga will scan strips for you. They recommend not cutting the negatives becasue they (at the time I got my K10D) charged a fixed price to load a strip, any length.
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