Originally posted by LesDMess How many scans so far?
Also, which of the three methids - Coolscan, Flextight and DSLR, provides the least work to get color/contrast right?
I have used the Coolscan for years, for hundreds of scans. With the X1 (Flextight) I have so far processed several films, and likewise with the K-1. Which one is the least work? That depends on your preferences and workflow. I'm an all manual type, so I like a workflow that gives me the most control of all parameters, and that's the DSLR. If all frames of a negative film have been digitized exactly the same way I can apply a global correction to all of them and then correct the colours if needed (if the lighting white balance is off). I tend to adjust the contrast individually anyway.
Scanning software tends to apply auto correction to colour and contrast, so each frame will be different. There are workarounds for this; Vuescan which I use with the Coolscan (the Nikonscan software has not been updated since 2004 and does no longer work on my Mac) allows you to fix exposure and colour. But his needs a lot more attention than just setting the camera to manual and apply the same settings in raw conversion.
Each method has its pros and cons. The Coolscan has a well deserved reputation, but it has a depth of field problem if the film is not totally flat. Even in the glass holder I used to have parts of my scans slightly out of focus. For a while I resorted to focus stacking of two or three different scans but that is not really efficient.
The K-1 with Pixel Shift offers a lot more resolution and sharpness and is unbeatable with regard to speed. However, the resolution is fixed so 35mm scans are more or less on the same level as the X1 but medium format scans are not. I'm under the impression that with the LED lightbox I am now using colours are slightly better that from the scanners with their cold cathode lighting but that needs more testing.
Finally, the X1 comes with slightly awkward software (also fairly dated) and is VERY expensive. It is slow but has only rarely depth of field issues. Colour scans (both slides and negs) tend to have more apparent grain in highlight areas than the K-1 and less in the dark areas; OTOH, when you want to pull out the darkest details there is quite a bit of sensor noise and sometimes visible banding. With very contrasty slides it has less difficulties with highlight details than the K-1 (but I might still learn how to handle that, the dynamic range of the K-1 should in theory be sufficient).
Edit: What I forgot to say: with slides it is easier for the scanner software to get the colours right, so the workflow differences are not too big.