Film scanners

Like almost everyone else I am a digital photographer nowadays but I have a huge collection of negatives and slides from a long photographic career. I want to edit out the best and convert them to digital. I have had some slides scanned at commercial labs but it is pretty expensive to get their better quality scans and I have not always been well pleased with the results. I need to buy a high quality film/slide scanner and I'm hoping you guys have some recommendations as I would rather get the opinions of actual photographer users than those of manufacturers literature, salesmen or web sites.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Robert Bunch

See if you can obtain either a Minolta DiMage or a Nikon Cool scan. Be sure their optical resolution is at least 4000 samples per inch for 35mm or MF.

I'd stay away from consumer flatbed scanners as their native optical resolution is not high enough to obtain good scans of small film formats.

--P

I had a Konica-Minolta Scan Elite II (or something like that) that did 4800 dpi scans. Kind of slow but good results. The scanner software did not work on my new Vista-equipped computer. I went back to VueScan, though, and that worked. I gave that scanner to a friend who shoots b&w film, and he's still using it quite a bit on his Apple system. The thing lasts.

I like my Minolta 5400 I have owned since purchased new but they are not available and I like my epson V750 for my medium format images. I did my own a comparison for a small group of photographers of two 35mm scans from both minolta and the flatbed epson. I didn't do any post scan work and cropped out a section from full resolution and printed 8x10. I was surprised very close 2 picked minolta, 1 epson, for both 3 others pick one for each of the two different scans. I picked the minolta but not enough difference to make buying an old one over a flatbed that could do so much more than 35mm. I did only scan from the center of the epson holder. Not sure if it matters but figured if it has a sweet spot it would be the center. I also used black out slides on the other open holders to stop all the light on the holder. The V750 has extras you may not need and the next level down may produce equally good scans. Just my observation of real scanning no techs just side by side viewing I was surprised with the epson after always hearing the negatives about flatbed scanners.

I bought an Epson V750 last year because I could not justify the cost of a high end scanner but still wanted higher quality than typical flat beds. I use it to scan my old medium format and 4X5 transparencies and negatives. The V750 comes with SilverFast Ai and EZ Color Calibration software as well as a fluid mount accessory. It has 6400 dpi resolution, 48–bit color and 16–bit grayscale, and a dual lens optical system. All that said, I can make high quality scans and am pleased with the results.

The Coolscan's real optical resolution is far superior to the Epson V750. I've got its predecessor, the 4990 and a Coolscan LS-4000 and there is a big difference between the two. Despite the jump in scanning dpi, the V750 did not make significant gains in optical resolution even with its 2 lens system. Its resolution when tested has been around the 2000-2400ppi range while the Nikons usually test in the 3200-3500 range. The Nikon adds autofocus and the ability to control the intensity of the light source to penetrate dense slides or back off on thin slides.

For scanning 35mm, I would look for scanners in this order

Minolta Scan elite 5400 II
Nikon Coolscan LS-5000
Nikon Coolscan LS-4000
Nikon Coolscan V

The biggest problem with these scanners is the availability of 64 bit drivers. Minolta dropped out of the business a while ago and their software/drivers haven't been updated in a long time. Nikonscan was never available for XP64 or Vista 64 and I don't think it works for any version of Windows 7. Its best to keep an 32 bit XP machine for these scanners. Vuescan supposedly will now work on a newer Windows 7 x64 desktop.

Mel-

I love my Nikon Coolscan V. As mentioned above, I don't believe the included Nikon Scan software will work with a 64-bit OS. But you should be able to use 3rd party software like VueScan or Silverfast.

I've been scanning slides for the past 3 years and probably have another 3-4 years ahead of me. I use an Epson V500 with digital ice technology. It only scans 4 slides at a time but does an excellent job I've had no problems printing off the scans or stock submissions.
I've scanned over 6,000 slides without a hitch. It cost me $225. for the scanner.

Its true that Nikon has not released any officially compatible and supported version of NikonScan for Vista 64, at least as of the last time I checked (November). But I've been successfully using my Nikon 9000 with NikonScan 4.03 on Windows Vista 64 Home Premium SP2 for a couple months now, to scan 645 and 67 transparencies. As far as I can tell, it works well and I haven't had a problem yet. I followed the workaround documented here, which is apparently the key to get it to work (if you don't mind running on an unsupported platform): http://www.earthboundlight.com/phototips/coolscan-vista-64.html