Re: filmscanners: Review of the Nikon CoolScan 4000

["Dave King" <kingphoto@mindspring.com>]

I scan at max res on a Nikon LS-30 (2700), bi-cubic interpolate in one
step up to live area size, 20" wide letting length fall (about 30"),
never crop for the big prints, and print on Crane Mueso with spectro
profiled Epson 7000 running Generations Enhanced ink at the minimum
dpi for good quality, 240 dpi.  The result looks great even with the
nose pretty close to the print surface.  I'm nearsighted, and never
loupe the prints.  :)

Dave

----- Original Message -----
From: Michael Moore <miguelmas@qwest.net>
To: <filmscanners@halftone.co.uk>
Sent: Sunday, April 08, 2001 11:06 PM
Subject: Re: filmscanners: Review of the Nikon CoolScan 4000


> Dave: Please explain what process you are using to get from negs or
trans
> to a 24x36 ( I assume photographic) print? What scan DPI, print DPI,
print
> process, etc.
> Thanks.
>
> Mike M.
>
> Dave King wrote:
>
> > Tony,
> >
> > You're to be commended for bringing this problem to our attention.
> > I've mulled it over a bit and come to some conclusions.  I could
be
> > wrong however, so with that in mind, here are my opinions.
> >
> > It seems to me from eyeball guessing that my LS-30 is resolving
grain
> > in 100 ISO films at roughly 40-80% distortion, which looks pretty
bad
> > on the monitor at 100% view.  800 speed color neg film does much
> > better at what I would guess to be roughly 25% distortion.
> >
> > The silver lining to this cloud is aliasing distortion (with the
> > LS-30) looks worse on screen than print, IMO.  When the ink hits
the
> > page aliased grain looks more or less like analog grain, being
worse
> > in certain tonal areas than others.  Personally I don't find the
> > actual image degradation objectionable, even all that noticeable,
in
> > prints of full frame negs up to 24x36 inches with slight
interpolation
> > to reach that size.  Perhaps this explains in part why this
problem
> > hasn't assumed greater weight in the work a day world.  Still,
other
> > things being equal (they never are), I would prefer less aliasing
> > distortion.  But I suspect that when aliasing distortion levels
are
> > kept under about 100%, the effect in print will be *relatively*
> > negligible.
> >
> > Dave King
> >
> > PS - Just for funsies I recently printed a max res file from an
Fuji
> > S1 digital camera to 24x36.  While the image was remarkably good
in
> > many respects, and completely grain (pixel) free in areas of even
> > tone, image resolution was far less than from even 800 speed neg
film
> > scanned in the LS-30.  For the time being at least I'll take the
> > grain, aliasing and all.
> >
>