Can't comment on VueScan vs. Silverfast, but can on VueScan vs. Polacolor on
the Sprintscan
120:
I have some extreme contrast negatives (night shots with large scene contrast
and very
bright areas with detail on Pan F) that the Polaroid software completely blows
out.
Vuescan handles them perfectly, with no need for extreme measures. He claims to
have
single-pass multi-sampling implemented for this scanner, but on my beige
OS9 G3 it just crashes the machine. Different OS's may well yield different
results.
My experience is that with the actual exposure time accurately controlled, as
Vuescan does,
but the Polaroid software does not, there is little need for multi-sampling
with this
scanner.
I have found that I have problems with bands of softness that are related to my
Polaroid
having color registration problems (and I sent two back that were worse), it
seems to just
combine all three colors for BW, giving a soft image where the colors are out
of register.
I've had much better luck scanning as color slide, inverting, applying gamma
2.2 (which is
done automatically in the neg workflow) and picking the best looking channel.
Since I'm
only using one channel the softness due to misregister issue is gone. Note that
you can't
avoid the invert step by scanning as color neg because it exposes the channels
differently
to compensate for the mask. The result on BW is usually overexposed red and
underexposed
blue and green.
Also be aware that VueScan takes MUCH longer to generate previews than the
Polaroid
software. The tradeoff is that with an accurately focused and higher resolution
preview it
can make more intelligent decisions about exposure time.
On a scanner like this without IR (not that it would work with silver anyway),
cleanliness
counts!! I use an Ilford anti-static cloth and canned air, but still get some
dust. I guess
a HEPA filter is next on my wishlist.
Bard Martin wrote:
> I hope someone out there can help me with a problem I have scanning black
> and white negatives.
>
> The first film scanner I bought, a Minolta, a couple of years ago, was
> inadequate when it came to recording detail in the dense (highlight) areas
> of my negatives. I realized I had to go elsewhere when the only thing a
> Minolta tech rep could suggest to solve the problem was to shoot with a
> different film. Perhaps they have improved their product since then.
>
> I now have a Polaroid SprintScan 120. Using this device I have much better
> success with the highlights in my negatives, but the problem does persist
> with some of them, to the extent that nothing I do with my SilverFast
> software helps. I haven't tried Polaroid's own software yet, but I suspect
> that the problem will persist.
>
> Confronted with a dense highlight when working in a traditional chemical
> darkroom, I could easily deal with it by "burning it in" on the print. On
> the scans, however, however far I take the highlight density value down from
> 255, either in the scan process or in PhotoShop, the scanner has given me no
> detail at all to work with.
>
> Any suggestions? -- Bard
>
> > From: "Julie Cooke" <julie@lightdrawing.com>
> > Reply-To: filmscanners@halftone.co.uk
> > Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2003 23:33:30 +0100
> > To: bardmartin@earthlink.net
> > Subject: [filmscanners] Re: Nikon Coolscan LS4000 not recognised
> >
> > Help! My scanner is no longer recognised, If I go to Control Panel, System,
> > Hardware, Device Manager under Windows 2000 I know longer see Scanners
> > although the firewire interface is listed. When I switch the scanner on I
> > just get the flashing LED, so I guess it's either a hardware malfunction or
> > a connection problem.
> >
> > I haven't used the scanner since installing a PCI modem for ASDL, does
> > anyone know if that would cause a conflict?
> >
> > Thanks
> >
> > Julie
> > ---
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> >
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