 Becky Hunter |
Choosing a scanner for scanning negatives I am looking to purchase a scanner in order to scan my 35mm film negatives. I recently found out that I can develop my negatives at Wal-Mart for a little over a dollar instead of receiving photos. This would probably be wise on my part since I have a new camera I am still trying to learn how to use (most of my pictures aren't turning out well since I am trying to learn how to shoot action photos and I'm wasting a lot of money on developing). The problem is I need to be able to view the negatives in order to see which ones are print worthy and where I still need some work on developing my photography skills. :) Can anyone recommend a good scanner for this purpose? What should be my primary concerns when shopping for a scanner to meet my needs? Do I need high dpi resolution? Would a low cost flatbed scanner such as the epson 4180 meet my needs or would I need to purchase a high end scanner??? Any advice would be welcome and needed... :) Thanks
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doug Nelson |
An economical way to see how your shots are coming out is to get only one set of 4 x 6's. Contact sheets, if Wal Mart even has them, offer too small an image. Another way is to have them do a CD. They WILL NOT be quality scans, but they will be sufficient to let you know if the shot is worth any more effort. If you go the digital route, be sure the store returns fully developed intact negatives to you. Some operators do a truncated development process, ruining your negs. As for scanners, the best buy in film scanners is the Minolta 5400 II, under $500. Other readers here at BP might advise us as to flatbeds that scan negatives well. I prefer a film scanner for 35mm.
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Christopher A. Vedros |
I don't think you'll find a flatbed scanner that will do as good a job as a true film scanner.
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Richard G. Lucas |
check out the nikon coolscan 4000 ed Richard Lucas
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Justin G. |
I'm a Canon freak just because Canon has never done me wrong. I recently bought the Canoscan 8400F along with the iP5000 (printer). This is an amazing scanner for being flatbed and under $200. Obviously it's not a true film scanner but it is great. It can scan my negatives, mounted slides, and 120 film. While the file size gets pretty ridiculus I can scan a negative at 5x7 inches, 3200 dpi. This printer and scanner working together (along with Canon photopaper) can give you lab quality prints if your computer can handle it. I've printed 8x10s from a negative with pretty darn close to lab quality. You couldn't tell the difference once its framed.
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Richard G. Lucas |
I would suggest that you purchase a scanner. I started out with a scanner put out by Acer. IT cost me agrand total of 121.00.IT a flat bed scanner which can scan a rang of film 35mm to 8x10 negative. then all you would have pay for is the development of the film unless you learn to do that your self. this is some thing you should learn to do having a film camera. you have started out on the right foot. learn the basic ins and outs of photography before you go to digital. Richard Lucas
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anonymous |
I am a Canon Freak too, but must say I am very dissappointed with my Canoscan 8400F, I got my first wedding I shot on film put straight on to disc at Kodak at 300dpi for a 4x6, the clients now want a 12x18 enlargement, but when I went to scan it at 300dpi at 12x18, the quality was horrible, loss of detail (even tried it at 4x6 size and the same loss of detail). I think the scanner is good if you have an absolutely perfect neg but if you don't it just won't pick up the detail. My first wedding, the negs were great, but it still just doesn't pick up the detail. So now I have two options: Either pay mega $$ to get the 2 photos wanted scanned professional for a 12x18 print, or just enlarge the 4x6 I have, which will reduce its print out dpi to about 180 (I will test print this option).
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Justin G. |
I noticed you said you were scanning at 300dpi. 300 is a good range for 4x6's or web quality. The higher you go the better obviously. I noticed that with the scanner's software you can only scan at 600dpi max (if I can remember right). well anyways, I dont know if you use PS or not but if you do you're in luck. go to File > Import > Canoscan 8400F. You can go into advanced settings and select the DPI you want and the output file dimensions. I usually scan negs at at least 1200 and 1600. These opt for pretty decent quality prints, if your printer can produce them. Well if you don't have PS try using your current photo editor, it might have a scanning function that will find the scanner wiht a little more freedom of controls. Good luck. Justin
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anonymous |
Justin Yes, I do have PS, I'll give it a try. But I scan at 300dpi and then select what size photo I want ie, 12x18. Which is how I was told to do it. So 300dpi for a 4x6 photo takes less time to scan then 300dpi for a 12x18. With my scanner settings I can go up to 19000dpi, but I just think that is unnessary, considering the optimum output is usually 300dpi. NOw I am just confused! When you scan your negs at 1200 dpi what size are you wanting the output to be, are you putting a size in at all? As as I can can two ways, one is like the above way, or I can just choose 3200dpi (eg) if I want, but it then doesn't tell me what size print it would be until after I have scanned it and looked at it in PS. I'd love some more advice, obviously I am not using my scanner properly.
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Justin G. |
Its not necessarily that you're using your scanner wrong, sometimes its just hard to explain stuff online. Now i'm not good with sizing and things when scanning and the such but what I generally do is just click import and select the scanner. then on a normal basis I just choose the DPI that I want, knowing the obvious, the more the better (19000 being overkill!) 1200-2000 is sufficient for 5x7/8x10. well anyways I usually just select the DPI but you can on the left of the DPI box, select the size you want and then the DPI on top of that for more control. so like today, I needed 2 5x7's from negs so I went in and typed in 5x7 for the size and chose the DPI at 2400 and let 'er rip. each neg took about 5 minutes on my computer and I edited and printed in another program and got lab quality. well I hope I didn't confuse you more. if you need any more advice hopefully someone else will see this or I could help maybe! haha. or you can contact me since we're working with the same stuff and we could just do a walkthrough with something. Good luck Natalie. V/r Justin P.S. what printer are you using, canon also? I don't know what paper you use but I saw somewhere online, somebody tested the same photo with a non-canon brand paper then the same on on canon paper and the difference was phenominal. so a little random advice is keep with your canon loyal instincts and buy paper too! have fun. Justin
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anonymous |
Justin, thanks for the advice, I will give it a go. I don't have a printer at home, I use the Fiji Frontier Machine and it is amazing!!! It is located conveniently at our local furniture shop, about 3mins drive, the girls that run it are all into photography, and they said they are getting more and more pros using their printer because it is so amazing and so CHEAP!!! I can print an 8x12 for AUS$5.
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Christopher A. Vedros |
Natalie, Try to look at it this way. This is a bit simplified, but I think it will help to illustrate things. When you scan an image, you end up with a certain number of dots, and those are all the dots you get, you don't get more if you want to enlarge the image. So, if you scan a 4"x6" photo at 300dpi, your image will be 1200x1800 dots (pixels). When you enlarge it, you don't get more dots, you just spread the dots out. So if you print your image at 12"x18", you will only have 100dpi, which is not a good resolution for printing. Now if you scan the same 4"x6" photo at 900dpi, your image will be 3600x5400 pixels, and a 12x18" enlargement can be printed at 300dpi. And if you scan a 35mm film frame, you start with an image that is roughly 1" x 1.4". So to get the same 300dpi 12x18 enlargement, you would want to scan the negative at 3600dpi. The bottom line is, to achieve the best image quality from your scanner, you should scan at the highest optical resolution it can handle. Most scanning programs can interpolate to get higher resolutions, and some of them do it very well. PS can also do some bicubic interpolation to scale up images, but I don't have any first-hand experience with that. You will always get better results by just starting with more dots. Good luck!
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