Steve,
I need to strongly disagree with the below statement. I would refer you to
the review by Bruce Fraser in MacWorld of about a year and half ago as well
as the recent review. Both reviews say the maximum OD from the SS4000
available with a single pass are at least as good as the other scanners with
16X multiscan.
Additionally as Ed Hamrick developed the SS4000 driver, he has said that
there is very little if any improvement with multiscanning on the SS4000.
This is because of superior components and design. If there is little or no
noise you don't have to multi-scan to get rid of it.
One of my personal disappointments has been the increased perception that
multi-scanning is good. Multiscannng is used to remove noise. If the design
does not produce noise you don't need to multiscan. You will eventually see
multiscanning in Polaroid scanners, not necessarily to produce better scans
but to satisfy this misconceived impression. Many people purchase equipment
of all types by comparing published specifications. Particularly when
dealing with scanners you can be very mis-informed.
Regards
David
-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Greenbank [mailto:steve@gccl.fsbusiness.co.uk]
Sent: Saturday, September 15, 2001 11:05 PM
To: filmscanners@halftone.co.uk
Subject: Re: filmscanners: Dust in Sprintscan 4000?
It is possible to multi-scan with the Polaroid if you use Vuescan. But the
scans invariably mis-align so the feature isn't much use. This will probably
give the Nikon a slight edge for shadow noise.
Steve
----- Original Message -----
From: "Barbara & Martin Greene" <martbarb@earthlink.net>
To: <filmscanners@halftone.co.uk>
Sent: Sunday, September 16, 2001 3:22 AM
Subject: Re: filmscanners: Dust in Sprintscan 4000?
> Steve
>
> There is one factor that I hadn't considered. The Nikon scanner gives the
> best shadow detail when 16x Multi-sampling. While this greatly lengthens
> scanning time, there is no question that it gives better results than 1x,
> which is what was used in the comparison test. Also, it is mentioned
that,
> "ED4000 4X multi-sampled images have much less shadow noise than images
from
> the SS400." That makes me wonder what the comparison results would have
> been had 16X multi-sampling been used? I'm not sure, but it's my
impression
> that the Polaroid does not do mullti-sampling. Is that so? Thus on the
> basis of this comparison, one can't say that the Polaroid has better
shadow
> detail than the Nikon.
>
> Martin
>
> > From: "Steve Greenbank" <steve@gccl.fsbusiness.co.uk>
> > Reply-To: filmscanners@halftone.co.uk
> > Date: Sun, 16 Sep 2001 02:23:40 +0100
> > To: <filmscanners@halftone.co.uk>
> > Subject: Re: filmscanners: Dust in Sprintscan 4000?
> >
> > There does seem to be a problem with the original page I posted (it used
to
> > have some buttons at the top I think). Anyway look at this direct
reference
> > (it's several MB).
> >
> >
> >
> > You can also see the more distinct dust on the Nikon.
> >
> > Steve
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Barbara & Martin Greene" <martbarb@earthlink.net>
> > To: <filmscanners@halftone.co.uk>
> > Sent: Saturday, September 15, 2001 11:18 PM
> > Subject: Re: filmscanners: Dust in Sprintscan 4000?
> >
> >
> >> Rick
> >>
> >>
> >>> From: "Steve Greenbank" <steve@gccl.fsbusiness.co.uk>
> >>> Reply-To: filmscanners@halftone.co.uk
> >>> Date: Sat, 15 Sep 2001 16:40:03 +0100
> >>> To: <filmscanners@halftone.co.uk>
> >>> Subject: Re: filmscanners: Dust in Sprintscan 4000?
> >>>
> >>> Rick Samco compared these two scanners here:
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Up until I saw this I was quite keen to trade my Artixscan 4000T
(SS4000
> >>> clone) for a Nikon largely for ICE. After all de-spotting is a
nightmare
> >>> except on very clean images.
> >>>
> >>> I have yet to find any thing other than a clone tool that removes the
> > dust
> >>> spots from my A4000T scans. I have discovered however that by not
> > looking at
> >>> your images at all before scanning (I use slides) you can minimise the
> >>> de-spotting to about 5 minutes max. Obviously this isn't much good for
> > old
> >>> slides. I have some family slides ([not] cared for by my Dad) which it
> > would
> >>> take many hours to clean up. I only have a 17" monitor and have to
look
> > at
> >>> about 40 screen fulls to check one image for dust spots, but if you
have
> > a
> >>> huge monitor this is probably much easier.
> >>
> >> I use a nineteen inch monitor and in Photoshop I use the 'Print' and
> > 'Actual
> >> Pixels' views which lead to every spot showing up looking like a
pebble.
> >> While it makes it easier to find the junk, it leads to my seeing lots
more
> >> of it.
> >>>
> >>> On examining Rick's samples I decided that the Nikon seemed to have
very
> >>> slightly better sharpness and detail but turning on the ICE made it
very
> >>> slightly worse. This was reasonably acceptable, but the Nikon seems to
> > also
> >>> produce very grainy scans and the only cure is GEM which softens
images
> >>> quite badly. I have quite enough trouble with grain so I decided to
> > stick
> >>> with the A4000T.
> >>
> >> I think it is possible to compensate for the softening by through
careful
> >> adjustment of Unsharp Mask Filter. I'd really appreciate information
on
> > how
> >> you arrived at the conclusion that the, "The Nikon seems to also
produce
> >> very grainy scans." Grainy in comparison to what?
> >>
> >> Thanks, Martin
> >>>
> >>> Steve
> >>> ----- Original Message -----
> >>> From: "Barbara & Martin Greene" <martbarb@earthlink.net>
> >>> To: <filmscanners@halftone.co.uk>
> >>> Sent: Saturday, September 15, 2001 1:41 PM
> >>> Subject: filmscanners: Dust in Sprintscan 4000?
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>> I've been told that the Polaroid Sprintscan 4000 does not exaggerate
> > dust
> >>>> and crud to the same extent that the Nikon LS 4000 does. I've
examined
> >>>> Photo CD scans and found that, while there is much less, nevertheless
a
> >>> good
> >>>> deal of spots show up. Perhaps, dust is a problem in every scanner.
> > I'd
> >>>> appreciate if users of the Sprintscan would tell me just how much
stuff
> >>>> shows up in their slide scans. With a reasonably clean slide, just
how
> >>> much
> >>>> work has to be done using the rubber stamp in Photoshop to get a
really
> >>>> clean 13 x 19 print? Also, if you use a dust removal software
program,
> >>> such
> >>>> as Polacolor, Silverfast, or vuescan, how helpful is that? If such a
> >>>> program is used, to what extent does it soften the image and can that
> > be
> >>>> restored using unsharp mask.
> >>>>
> >>>> Martin
> >>>>
> >>>
> >>
> >>
> >
>
>
