good scanners...

<p>Can you please post your examples without downsampling?</p>

<p>Also, Gabor, please don't sharpen and please do all post-processing identically on the two files (set white point, black point and mid point to make them look as similar as possible- you might need to use a program like Vuescan or Silverfast to do this if you can't keep your scanner software from clipping image data).</p>

<p>Also if you can provide the comparison on a high resolving low speed BW neg would be best.</p>

<p>thank you again.</p>

<p>From everything I've seen, the Coolscan captures 4 times the detail of the Epson with negligible noise and ultra wide DMAX. </p>

<p>In my opinion, piling hours over years of scanning with an Epson (unless you are scanning 4x5 or 8x10) is a very wasteful.</p>

<p>Comparison of the 100% crops posted:</p><div></div>

<p>Mauro and Roger, tomorrow I will scan a photo taken on Acros100 (rated at 80ISO and developed in Rodinal 1:50) with both, my Epson V700 and Nikon Coolscan 4000LS and upload the unsharpened (only white, grey, and blackpoint set) files to my pBase account in original size. Then I will provide a link here at this thread.</p>

<p>What is the main advantage of the Nikon 9000 over the Nikon 5000 if one is definitely only intending to scan 35 mm negs/slides?</p>

<p>I think that it is about 4K in price.</p>

<p>The Nikon CS9000 is $2K. The light source of the 9000 is more diffused allowing it to avoid scanning the bubbles in the emulsion, better ice performance and natural grain rendition.</p>

<p>What would you mean by "un-natural grain" rendition as opposed to natruarl grain rendition? I have yet to see any bubbles in my scans or perhaps they are there I just don't recognize them -- what would they look like in a scan? I almost never use the maximum settings for ice under VueScan.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Bruce, what you set in Vuescan for ICE like - Low, Medium and Maximum...? I usually set it to Medium or Maximum but don't understand how it will affect the quality of the image data...?</p>

<p><strong>Request to Mauro</strong> :</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Comparison of the 100% crops posted:</p>

</blockquote>

<p><img src="http://static.photo.net/attachments/bboard/00T/00TKEG-133707584.jpg" alt="" hspace="5" vspace="10" width="700" height="900" /> <br /> <strong>Request to Mauro</strong> :<br /> Mauro, you compared nicely by taking my Canon 8800 scanned image with your previous experiments but you took the DOF part in your comparison so I request to you that please take the 'focused' part in your comparison work, which are leafs. That would be nice for us. In my image, the pipe (Which you cropped and took in comparison) is at the ground floor and the plant is on the first floor, so the pipe blurred.</p>

<p>Here:</p><div></div>

<p>Mauro, I've seen better results from the V750 than you are showing here.<br>

I have also seen better results from the 9000 than you are showing here.<br>

The takeaway is it all comes down to the operator. Forget the numbers and technical-marketing hype.<br>

It takes time, patience, and skill to get the most out of any scanner, be it a Canon, Epson, Nikon, or Imacon.</p>

 

<p>Nikon offers the best performance for a reasonable price - the imacons and drum scanners are only marginally better and cost much more. I have both the 5000 and 9000 (long story) and the 9000 is the better scanner of the two if you can afford it. I find that there is very little difference betwen a 2880 DPI and 4000 DPI scan as you have hit the resolution of the film (2880 is about 113 lines / mm) but that 16 bit colour makes a difference - especially with Velvia</p>

<p>I have found Sascha Steinhoff's book "Scanning Negatives and Slides" (second edition) helpful. He discusses the issue of selecting a scanner in detail and even has sample scans on the dvd that comes with the book.</p>

<p>I don't have personal experience to comment, since I have not used a range of scanners, but the book and the scans on the dvd seem to agree with the general thrust of the comments here. Steinhoff favors the Nikon, although he mentions advantages of other choices.</p>

<p>It seems that Nikon has discontinued the 5000 with no replacement announced, so if you want one, you might want to get it soon...</p>

<p>Timothy, please point us to the V750 results you quote.</p>

<p>Derick, where did you see the Nikon 5000 has been discontinued?</p>

<p>It's being discussed on the Lieca forum. It was mentioned in the book I suggested above....</p>

<p>Isn't that book over two years old?</p>

<p>No, it was published this year, 2009. You might be thinking of the first edition?</p>

<p>So from now on Nikon will only sell the CS9000?</p>

<p>I have managed now to scan one frame, taken with ACROS100 (Leica M7, 90mm Summicron-M with UVa filter, ~f/5.6) and developed in Rodinal (1:50). The settings for the scans were 4800dpi and 6400dpi (V700) and 4000dpi (Coolscan 4000ED), saved as 16bit grey JPG. Sharpening OFF and greypoints set identical in Vuescan (used for both scanners). Since I have uploaded the files in original size to my pBase account (~ 11MB !) here are only the links:<br>

Coolscan LS4000ED, 1 pass<br>

http://www.pbase.com/gsamj/image/112572792<br>

Coolscan LS4000ED, 16 passes<br>

http://www.pbase.com/gsamj/image/112572793<br>

Epson V700 (GT-X900 in Japan), 1 pass, 4800dpi<br>

http://www.pbase.com/gsamj/image/112572794<br>

Epson V700, 1 pass, 6400dpi:<br>

http://www.pbase.com/gsamj/image/112572796</p>

 

<p>Thank you Gabor. Have you looked at the film under the microscope and evaluated how much data is still left in Acros100 than the Coolscan 4000 didn't capture?</p>