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Hi all!
For quite some time I've been thinking of scanning some of my old film pictures. But scanning pictures directly is painful... I recently read about film scanners and found them an interesting alternative. Any of you have experience with film scanners? What do you think?
I'm currently eyeing an Epson V500 scanner for my 120 film I shoot from time to time. It's a flatbed with film holders (all kinds of diffrent types), and I have only read good things about it
seba, unless you have a huge load of film or you are planning to start taking pictures on film, I'd just advise you to find a local shop that will scan them for you. With any luck the shop will have HQ equipment which will cost "a bit" more than $200 :)
Though I've got no idea what the quality difference is between a commercial film scanner and a flatbed with an adapter, I'm pretty sure that the specialised scanner will get you better quality.
If you are really trying to get high quality scans of film, don't rely on a flatbed scanner with a film adapter. Go with a dedicated film scanner. I have an older Konica Minolta Dimage Dual IV (started out with a flatbed Epson Perfection flatbed). Downside is as Monty points out - a decent film scanner is expensive, and may not be woth it unless you have a lot of film to scan, and even then, its a very time consuming process.
seba : depends on teh type of film you are scanning..
The average photo shop scans are not great. You will need a pro shop that does scans for pro wedding photographers at high resolutions.
I have been looking into this but have not pulled the wallet out yet. I almost bought the Epson V700. Bot its now out of production. However there is the V750. The V500 also reviews quite well. and at a very good price too.
Costco will scan film at about 6MP. I've read that some pro shops will scan in the 20+ Mp range if you don't mind sending your film in the mail (or are lucky enough to live in a town with such a shop). I'd pass on buying a scanner unless you will continue to shoot on film. Even then, the pro-shops will give you better quality than you can afford to purchase on your own (presumably).
As this is Nikon rumors site and Nikon Coolscan film scanners are top of the line that will give you around 21MPix from a 35mm film and you could get one starting at 1000$, though it is a lot of money if you are not needing it professionally.
Most pro shops are using these or similar scanners so it is better in my opinion, if you only want a couple of old film rolls scanned, to find a shop that will do it for you.
"Costco will scan film at about 6MP" this sounds promising! I don't need pro quality but I do want good quality. In fact, the pictures weren't taken with a pro camera to start with... Thanks!
A Good scanner for the money is the Canon 8800F
However to get pro quality scans you need to step up a bit and get
a real film scanner like Nikon Coolscan V
A review of the 8800F (Also compared to a real film scanner)
can be found here http://www.stockholmviews.com/canon_8800f_review/8800fpage1.html
Regards/Stefan
If this is for a large catalog, sending film out may be your best bet, as it's pretty time consuming. I have a Plustek 7500i, which does a decent job at 35mm, currently trying to figure out the best way to scan 120/220, probably going to end up with a flatbed for that.
Old thread being revisited.
There are some new scanners out there - both dedicated (Plustek 7600i) and flatbed (Canon 9000, for instance). Anyone have additional insight based on updated scanners on the dedicated vs. new high resolution flatbeds? The newer flatbeds claim much higher dpi than my old Minolta Dimage Dual IV.
I will be buying the Epson V500 in Augst after looking into scanners the past 6 months. For the price and the quality I don't think this scanner can be beat. The V700 is also great and might be more affordable now as well with the V750 coming out.
I recently bought a Nikon N90s, 35mm SLR, and just got back my first two rolls of TriX from the lab. Looking at proof sheets through a loupe leaves a lot to be desired in the digital age. So, I've been scanner shopping over the last few weeks, and the only Nikon scanner carried by both B+H and Adorama, the NIkon Super Coolscan 9000-ED, has been back-ordered for weeks, if not months. I'm in the process of switching over all of my software licenses to OS X now, but I've also heard that the Nikon 9000's driver is still problematic with recent OS X versions (even, pre-Snow Leopard releases).
Since dealing with old SCSI slide scanners in the early '90s, I've never been a huge fan of desktop scanners. Either the scanning software, or the manufacturer-supplied driver and OS compatibility always seemed to be overly troublesome, and dust is always a tedious concern. So, I'm considering drum-scanning everything at a service bureau, which is very expensive. The good thing about drum scans, is that they have much greater dynamic range than even the best CCD-based desktop scanners, and they immerse your negatives in a scratch- and dust-removing optical fluid while scanning. But due to the high cost, I'm still considering a desktop slide scanner to scan, mostly, 35mm black and white negative film, and maybe some 120.
Any other desktop slide scanners (not considering any flatbeds) worth checking out, with available drivers known to be compatible with current OS X versions, other than the unavailable Nikon Coolscan 9000 ED?
Hey i work in photolab. My recommendation, if its just your photo/negs get someone else do it for you. The cost of buying decent film scanner will be a hell of alot more then price of getting them scanned for you. Unless your planning on doing it for others and making cash on the side. Also I wouldnt recommend flat bed scanner for negs it want be the same. We use epison v700 for scanning photos but not for negs! I really recommend any fuji setup, you have to remember the film scanner used is probably worth about $20,000 in a lab. You just got to make sure the person behind counter understand what they are doing! Get them to scan it at the max dpi, be careful some places will just scan it a the lowest setting as its quicker.
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