It seems I have to replace what was a working slide scanner before I moved. It looks like the slide scanner market is going away. At least, there seem to be pretty limited options now. Based what I see at B&H, there are no Canon or Minolta slide scanners anymore. Available brands are Pacific Imaging (never heard of them), Microtek, and Nikon. I have a lot of old slides and I will eventually get around to scanning them, so I do want the capability. Maybe I'm just looking in the wrong place. Are there flatbed scanners that are comparable to the 4000 dpi film scanners of yore?
Pete,
the film scanners should be available very cheap now. For 35mm I would prefer that instead of flatbed.
Posted by Colin Smale on October 30, 2006 at 12:21 PM
Nikon Coolscan VED. Brilliant.
Posted by Don Bartram on October 30, 2006 at 12:33 PM
I agree with Colin, the Nikon Is a VERY good product.
Posted by Randy Beacham on October 30, 2006 at 4:26 PM
I love my Nikon Coolscan 5000. With it I can finally scan almost any high contrast slide with minor work that finally can match the slide--or even better with filling in shadow detail on some. Maybe you can find some refurbished Nikon scanners. Randy
Posted by Mark Pelton on October 30, 2006 at 9:25 PM
Check out David Brooks review of the new Epson Perfection V750-M flatbed scanner in this months Shutterbug. His assertion is that the conventional wisdom-that flatbed consumer scanners are not competitive with dedicated film scanners has been set on its head with this new scanner. Personally, I'm happy with my old Nikon Super Coolscan 4000, primarily because of the digital ice feature.
Posted by Carl Donohue on October 31, 2006 at 8:48 AM
Hey Pete
I use the Nikon LS V .. it's 4000 dpi, has digital ICE (which rocks) and is relatively well-priced. The scans from it are really sweet - I used to have the LS IV, and the V is definitely a huge improvement.
Cheers
Carl
Posted by Brent Murphy on October 31, 2006 at 11:19 AM
I love my Coolscan V. Excellent scans, easy to use, and it's never give me a single problem. Highly recommended.
Posted by Kent Staubus on November 3, 2006 at 10:29 AM
Another vote for the Nikon Coolscan V.
Kent in SD
Posted by Robert Fisher on November 7, 2006 at 2:24 PM
Canon got out of the dedicated film scanner business a few years ago, instead concentrating on producing flatbeds that could rival film scanners.... they didn't. Their FS4000 was an OK scanner but not great. Not nearly as good as the competition.
In the flatbed world, Epson is still the top of the heap and the only ones really working to make their scanners better. The new V700 and V750 are reputed to be excellent and I have yet to see a bad thing about them. The review of the V750 on photo-i (www.photo-i.co.uk) seems to indicate that it is not that far off compared to a dedicated film scanner at 4000 ppi and Vincent has comparison scans with a Nikon Coolscan 9000 to show the differences. As expected, the flatbed scans are softer initially but do sharpen up quite nicely. If the wet mounting capabilities of the V750 are used, the quality increase is marked especially for fine detail.
KM scanners are no longer made since the photo business was taken over by Sony. You can likely still find a new Dimage Scan Dual IV or Scan Elite somewhere on the net at a good price and certainly there will be used ones available on eBay or through B&H, Adorama or KEH.
Nikon hasn't brought out a new scanner in a few years. They're still producing their last iterations and those are good scanners. The only significant downfall with Nikon scanners is that they use an LED light source which is not as good for scanning b&w film. Nikon scanners have routinely suffered in this area. A cold cathode fluorescent tube is better for b&w (and just as good for colour). The Epson flatbeds use a CCFL light source.
Stay away from Pacific Image or Primefilm. These are really pretty poor.
Microtek makes very good scanners. Their Artixscan 4000tf and 120tf are both very high quality scanners. The 4000t is the same as the 4000tf with some different software. If you can find one anywhere, the Polaroid SprintScan 4000 scanner is the same as the Microtek 4000t but with Polaroid scanning software. The Polaroid scanning software was tremendous. I think (not positive) that it only used a SCSI interface so you might have to buy a SCSI card for your computer to use it. I liked the Polaroid software better than Silverfast. The Microtek scanners also use a CCFL light source as did the Minolta units.
Here are links to the Brooks review mentioned by another member.
http://shutterbug.com/equipmentreviews/scanners_printers/1106epson_instant/
http://shutterbug.com/equipmentreviews/scanners_printers/1106epson/
Thank you, everyone, for the comments. I decided to replace my dead Polaroid 4000 with a used (but live) one offered for a song by another NPNer. Special thanks for your excellent post Robert. That's exactly the kind of information I was looking for.
Discussion
10 repliesPete D.
the film scanners should be available very cheap now. For 35mm I would prefer that instead of flatbed.
I use the Nikon LS V .. it's 4000 dpi, has digital ICE (which rocks) and is relatively well-priced. The scans from it are really sweet - I used to have the LS IV, and the V is definitely a huge improvement.
Cheers
Carl
Kent in SD
In the flatbed world, Epson is still the top of the heap and the only ones really working to make their scanners better. The new V700 and V750 are reputed to be excellent and I have yet to see a bad thing about them. The review of the V750 on photo-i (www.photo-i.co.uk) seems to indicate that it is not that far off compared to a dedicated film scanner at 4000 ppi and Vincent has comparison scans with a Nikon Coolscan 9000 to show the differences. As expected, the flatbed scans are softer initially but do sharpen up quite nicely. If the wet mounting capabilities of the V750 are used, the quality increase is marked especially for fine detail.
KM scanners are no longer made since the photo business was taken over by Sony. You can likely still find a new Dimage Scan Dual IV or Scan Elite somewhere on the net at a good price and certainly there will be used ones available on eBay or through B&H, Adorama or KEH.
Nikon hasn't brought out a new scanner in a few years. They're still producing their last iterations and those are good scanners. The only significant downfall with Nikon scanners is that they use an LED light source which is not as good for scanning b&w film. Nikon scanners have routinely suffered in this area. A cold cathode fluorescent tube is better for b&w (and just as good for colour). The Epson flatbeds use a CCFL light source.
Stay away from Pacific Image or Primefilm. These are really pretty poor.
Microtek makes very good scanners. Their Artixscan 4000tf and 120tf are both very high quality scanners. The 4000t is the same as the 4000tf with some different software. If you can find one anywhere, the Polaroid SprintScan 4000 scanner is the same as the Microtek 4000t but with Polaroid scanning software. The Polaroid scanning software was tremendous. I think (not positive) that it only used a SCSI interface so you might have to buy a SCSI card for your computer to use it. I liked the Polaroid software better than Silverfast. The Microtek scanners also use a CCFL light source as did the Minolta units.
Here are links to the Brooks review mentioned by another member.
http://shutterbug.com/equipmentreviews/scanners_printers/1106epson_instant/
http://shutterbug.com/equipmentreviews/scanners_printers/1106epson/
Pete D.