filmscanners: Comparing Lenses - does it make a difference at 2700ppi?

["Rob Geraghty" <harper@wordweb.com>]

Well, I've tried scanning the photos I took of the USAF target.  I do *not*
claim these tests are rigorous, I just wanted to try it to see if there are
any obvious differences.  Comparisons between the Canon and Sigma lenses
weren't very conclusive, but at least one comparison showed an obvious
difference.  Comparing the Makinon 28mm f2.8 prime lens with the Sigma 28-80
zoom at 28mm, the Makinon looks *much* sharper.  I think the colours and
contrast were also better.

The attached jpeg was scanned using an LS30 and Vuescan at 2700ppi.  The
photos were taken at f8 at a distance of about 2 metres (6 feet) using
Provia 100F, a Pentax MZ5 on a tripod.  One lens is a Makinon 28mm f2.8 K
mount lens circa 1982, and the other is a Sigma FA28-80 Aspherical at 28mm.
The target was printed at A4 size on Epson Photo paper using an Epson Stylus
700 at 1440dpi using a PDF source file.

So maybe I'm stating the obvious here, but yes I have been able to see a
significant difference in the sharpness of photos taken with different
lenses and scanned at 2700ppi with the same scanner. :)

Something else I looked at was the effect of the grain reduction filter in
Vuescan. I'm currently using 7.2.4.  The grain reduction looks *much* better
then it used to, but I confess I haven't used it much.  Even at the "heavy"
setting the loss of meaningful detail (other than grain) looks minimal to
me.  At "heavy" there is a softness to the image which I actually like - a
bit like a soft focus filter, and it could be handy to take the harshness
off a portrait.  At the lower settings, softening is progressively less
although IMO there's only a big difference in softness from "medium" to
"heavy".  I'll have to try this filter on a print film - there's not much
grain in the Provia 100F slide I tried it on to begin with!

Rob

PS AFAIK the Makinon is *not* one of the world's great lenses.  Hopefully if
I can afford one that is, or is close, I'll see an even bigger difference.
:)

Attachment: Makinon28VsSigma28.jpg
Description: JPEG image