filmscanners: Re: CanonScan 2710 and Vuescan

[Roger Smith <rsmith@unb.ca>]

At 11:14 AM -0600 11/26/01, dbdors wrote:
>My problem is that I am getting soft scans.  Even at 2710 
>resolution, the scans seem to be a little out of focus.  What I am 
>doing is scanning and then comparing the scans to the slide on a 
>light table.

        I used a Canon FS2710 for a year or so - it is a good 
machine. Scans almost always look a bit soft straight out of the 
scanner - they need some Unsharp Masking in Photoshop, as I'm sure 
Tony Sleep's article said.
        A good way to test the focus/sharpness of a scanner is to 
take a blank slide and score a big X on it with a razor blade. The 
edge of the cut will be far sharper than any film image. I got this 
idea from Tony Sleep, and it works well. I could tell from my scan of 
the razor cut that the Canon focus was right on.
        As far as VueScan is concerned, Ed Hamrick recommends using 
the Device>Image setting for slides and the default settings under 
the Color tab, at least for your first attempts.  If you are finding 
that the highlights are overexposed, try lowering the White Point % 
to 0.1 or 0.01. White Balance is the setting I usually use for colour 
balance, but Auto Levels works well on some slides.
        I have VueScan set to focus on Preview, which seems to work OK.

Regards,
Roger Smith