Scan Cafe

I have sent out my first set of 120 negatives to http://www.scancafe.com

 

This seems like a very good alternative to this issue to me. They use Nikon 9000 scanners for medium

format, and I am getting the optional 4000 DPI scans, plus what they call the Pro Library, which is the

JPEG scan with Digital ICE, plus the original unprocessed TIFF scan. All this for 82 CENTS per scan. If

you only want the JPEGs at 3000DPI, cost is only 59 cents a scan.

 

Yes, the negatives are sent to India, but they have a $1000 replacement policy plus a year of free

scanning if anything should happen to your order. So far, they have never lost an order. Look over the

site and see what you think. Looks like a well thought out enterprise to me.

 

Has anyone used this service? The only drawback I can see is the 8 week turnaround, so if you are of

the "have to have it now" mindset, I suppose the service would not be worthwhile, plus it would not

make sense to use it for just one or two scans. I am sending 15 negatives as my first test.

 

After looking at the scan services and prices at what seems like hundreds of labs, I am going to give

Scan Cafe a try.

 

A couple of months from now, I will let everyone know the results!

 

Steve

Hi Steve,

 

Please post your results with Scan Cafe.

Sounds interesting. Please update us on your experience when the scans come back.

 

For the past few years, I was wondering how long it would take for some entrepreneur to outsource the labor-intensive business of scanning. I have my own scanners, but would often like to pay others to do the work when I'm too busy.

You bet this forum will be the first to know how my experience works out, plus just how

well the scans are. It truly appears these people have performed a world class effort to

solve the scanning issue for people. They are primarily catering to people with large

collections of slides and negatives from years past that they want scanned, but no order is

too large or too small, and their service can be a very cost effective way for us hold out

film shooters to keep our preferred capture method alive with little cost or hassle.

 

The only "problem" I have encountered so far was printing out the UPS shipping label. I

could not get it to display on my Mac no matter what I tried. I finally went to my wife's PC

and it worked fine. It could be my version of Safari is not up to date enough, (version

1.3.2), so othes on Macs with later op sys may not have any problems.

Hello...

 

Thank you for letting us know about your source of scans.

 

May I ask you to post a full frame (reduced) example and a pixel per pixel cut from one of your returned slides. I'm sure I'm not the only one who would like to see how well the scan is done by them. With the two types of examples we could see the colors in one and the sharpness/detail in the other. Please also comment on how well you think they replicated the original negative or slide color/tones and if different, was it an improvement or does it look worse.

 

I have a 9000. I'll bet they only do the one pass for 82 cents. Still, one pass is pretty good especially when compared with the better flatbeds. However the more passes, the closer it gets to drum quality, but still comes up a little short. With maxing the passes, flat film and good focus the result can compare with the Imacon quasi drum units.

 

Do they give you a choice of using the 9000 post scan processing option of ROC, GEM and SHO? Post processing and more passes can slow the scanning process a LOT. That would be make it hard for scancafe to make a profit even with foreign labor.

Yes Tom, I will try to post some detail cuts from the returned scans. They make no

mention of using any post processing options as you mentioned, only digital ICE. I also

doubt that multi pass scans are done. I know nothing more than what is stated on their

website. I would think you could probably email them and get any of your questions

answered.

 

I do not have a 9000 so I am unfamiliar with the operation of it or the post processing

options available with it.

 

I enjoy my film usage, but I do not use it enough to warrant investing in a high end

scanner, and so I am just trying to find the best quality / cost ratio scan I can find from an

outside source.

Do we have the results yet? It's been over 8 weeks! :)

All of my 120 negatives are singles. Did the take these?

<p>Wow these threads are frustrating because there is never any followup... I still can't find anybody comparing ScanCafe scans with home-grown or competitors.</p>