slide (and film) scanner (supporting batch scanning)

Hi,

I've been using the HP S20 slide and film scanner for the past couple of
years.
Because bulk scanning of slides is now standard even for (cheap) flatbed
scanners and because the quality is probably better than with my old S20,
I'm thinking about finally buying a new film&slide scanner.

What I want to do with it? Scan slides and negatives for playing around in
Photoshop, putting them on the web and maybe making a A4/legal size print
out of it.

I'm not a pro so it the price must be reasonable. I'm thinking 400,- USD
(or 330 EUR) tops!

- Should I buy a dedicated slide & film scanner or will a flatbed do just
fine? (I'd like to have quality at least a little better than the HP S20
scanner)
- I really would like bulk or batch scanning! (The S20 could only scan 1
slide at the time)


Any advice on what model I should buy? Other tips? Experiences?

Thanks!!
Kris

 

It all depends on the quality you want from your scans. Figure that no
flatbed scanner that you're likely to ever see for sale, much less afford,
will provide more than 1500-2000 ppi. This means that if you want to
produce a print at the standard resolution of 300 dpi, you're not going to
even make 8x10. Unless you accept less that 300 dpi for the print, that
is.

The reason for this is that consumer flatbed scanners are intended for
multipurpose use, and no matter how fine the optics, they just won't top
2000, no matter how many ppi they claim. Yep, you can see all the pixels
they claim, but where the detail is, it simply blurs. Check out the tests
for the Epson Perfection 3200, which is one of the best flatbed scanners
out there.

Dedicated film scanners are designed to cover the area of the film only,
where flatbed scanners have to cover at least 8 times that area. This
means that the resolution they are able to provide is several times that of
the flatbed scanner. If we accept that a flatbed scanner will actually
resolve 1500 ppi, then resolution of a conservative 4 times as much can be
expected of a dedicated scanner, and indeed some approach that mark; it
takes the scanning hardware (sensors) necessary, of course, but the design
of the optics train makes it possible.

Now, you need to decide what you might want to do with the images you scan.
Do you have many that might do well being printed at 11x14, 12x18, 16x20?
If so, you need the dedicated scanner. Else you simply will not have the
resolution necessary to produce acceptable prints of that size. With more
resolution, you can simply send the file to a digital printing place, and
get the print of the size you wish for a few dollars!

Now, as to batch processing. Many will do that readily, and to some extent
it depends on the software you use. I have the Minolta DSE5400, one of the
best now available. I use Ed Hamrick's "Vuescan".

I can take a six frame neg strip, decide which frames I want, tell the
software which they are, and click start. The scanner will do whatever I
want with those frames without intervention. If I know that I really do
want a frame, I can set the scanner to do raw scans of each, saving them as
a file to be rescanned (much more quickly, of course, from the hard drive).
I can decide that I want 8x10s of each frame without cropping, set the
software for full frame scan at 2400 ppi, hit start and go about whatever
else I'm doing.

Other scanning software can do much the same thing, of course, so it's your
choice.

One thing to consider, though. Because you have the film, you can elect to
try an inexpensive scanner of any kind, and decide what you think of the
results. If you don't like them, get a better scanner and scan them again!
Can't do that with digital files from digital cameras..... <grin>

There is much much more to this than I've touched on here. Try comp.periphs.
scanners for further information.

Bill Tallman

 

Bill,

Thanks for the info!

Mean while, I've decided to go for the Epson 4870.
An amazing scanner for its price so it seems! Take a look here:
http://www.photo-i.co.uk/Reviews/interactive/Epson 4870/page_1.htm

Cheers,
Kris

 

Seems impressive. What price?