[filmscanners] Re: Minolta DiMage Scan Dual III

["sjv" <daisydog@earthlink.net>]

On Wednesday, November 27, 2002, at 05:54 AM, Al Kiecker wrote:

> I'd appreciate some comments on the Minolta DiMage Scan Dual III film
> scanner.
>

Al-

  I am a Computer Graphics professional, but I am new to film scanning
and I have nothing to directly compare my results with. My few test
negs were shot with a Contax G2.

I just bought the Scan Dual III and used it for the first time last
night. I am running the scanner on Mac OS X 10.2.2., and have tried the
Minolta Dual III standalone scanning apps as well as the plugin for
Photoshop 7.0.

Everything seems to work nicely. No problems with the install or
getting the software to recognize the scanner. "It just worked."

There is an "Easy" version of the Dual III scanning utility that only
scans in 8 bit/channel color. Works well, but the normal Dual III
utility and Photoshop plugin allow 16 bit/channel scanning, and give
you much more control over adjustments/levels/output parameters, etc.
The GUI of both the Easy and normal version are both pretty ugly with
mediocre organization, but usable.

I tried the "Dust Brush" feature, and compared the output to an
unaffected scan. About 3/4 of the dust appeared to be retouched. Of
course, some minor scratches that were in my negs were unaffected by
the dust tool.

I  briefly compared 8 and 16 bit output, as well as 8x multisampling to
reduce noise. My test image did not have subtle tonal gradients, so the
difference between the 8 and 16 bit output was nominal. The
multisampling seemed to reduce noise slightly, at a great performance
penalty, but my brief novice assessment may have not differentiated
noise from film grain.

Detail and sharpness appear to be decent, but I haven't printed any
results to compare it to chemical enlargement. This will be the true
test, especially if you are using sharp lenses. I will post my
observations when I make some prints.

My thought process about buying a $300 scanner revolved around being a
novice and determining, through extensive use, whether the
quality/performance of the Dual III satisfied my needs. If I do outgrow
the scanner, my nominal $300 investment will not be wasted.


Hope this helps,

-sjv

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