Anyone tried Epson 4870 scanner?

[paul_loader]

As a 35mm and mf user this has great appeal as I see it scans both

formats and is (relatively) inexpensive. I would not be surprised to

learn that you get what you pay for but has anyone tried the 4870

with positive results?

 

Thanks,

Paul

[nikos peri]

Yup. But you would be better served by searching the archives here as this isn't a new question, really. Short answer: positive with MF, negative in 35mm.

[paul_loader]

Thanks Nicola, I'll search. Apologies for the repeat.

 

Paul

[andrew n.bra hrefhttp]

<i><<a href="http://4020.net/">4020.net</a>></i><p>

 

I have been using the 4870 for a month now (Mac OSX - Firewire). As many others have

reported, it's quite good for MF work, although you will find the standard 120 film holder

frustrating because you can only scan one 6x7 frame per strip of film. FWIW I've heard

good things about a 3rd party 120 film holder by Doug Fisher, but I haven't tried it yet:

<p>

 

<a href="http://home.earthlink.net/~dougfisher/holder/mainintro.html">

http://home.earthlink.net/~dougfisher/holder/mainintro.html</a><p>

 

Although the bundled Epson and Silverfast (lite) scanner software work okay, I hated their

tiny scan preview screens. So I bought a copy of Hamrick's Vuescan instead. It has an

irritating interface - especially for colour correction - but otherwise it works well enough

(although the built-in sharpening is hopeless).<p>

 

So for MF work you can, with a bit of fiddling, get a pretty good result. For 35mm scans

however the scanner is just barely acceptable. The scans are so soft that you have to

sharpen the hell out of them, unfortunately increasing the noise as well. The best

solution I've found so far is to scan at full resolution, sharpen a lot in PShop, reduce the

scans down to 3000 x 2000 pixels and then sharpen again. Not ideal, but the 6MP results

aren't too bad (although they are slightly softer and less detailed than those I used to get

from my ancient Polaroid Sprintscan 35!).<p>

 

So if you are scanning a lot of MF and occassionally 35mm - or else just need low-rez

35mm for the web - then the 4870 is great. But if you are hoping to do hi-rez

35mm scans for printing, then there's no free lunch and despite the Epson hype, you still

need to get a dedicated 35mm film scanner.

[jimvanson]

I use the 4870 for 645 & 6x9 B&W. Largest I've printed is 8.4 x 14 from a 645 -- looks great!<P>You're going to need a computer with some grunt to work on your scans. I'm using USB2 2 had some serious problems with the file sizes/USB2 driver throughput -- I eventually changed my motherboard.<P>I don't like the Silverfast software much, the Epson is somewhat better -- I use Vuescan 8.xx and really think it's great -- but I sharpen & adjust color post scan in Photoshop. I don't attempt it using the Vuescan controls.<P>Only thing I can add is I wish I'd bought the Pro version with the EzColor software.

[johnmarkpainter]

For the record....

 

I have done loads of 11x14 prints from 35mm Film with the 4870 and an Epson 2200

printer.

 

They looked as good or better than prints I had previously had done at a local Pro Lab. I

wasn't cropping though....

 

jmp

[db1]

I am currently in a class called "analog to digital" and we are scanning medium format negs with the 4870 and the results, in my opinion, are very impressive.

 

We are doing minimal photoshop-ing and then printing on a 2200 and 7600.

 

We are also using an incredible plug-in that allows you to "tone" the prints.

 

Go to http://harrington.com/QuadToneRIP.html

 

If you are not using this RIP, you should be.

[tony_clark]

The Epson is a very good flatbed scanner. I have printed my two portfolios from 6x7,

645 and 35mm images with very good results. The 35mm scans are borderline, but

the others are quite good. If your client requires higher quality scans, you can always

send them out to a lab with a drum scanner. Andrew, I have the SilverFast SE version

and simply zoom in after the preview scan. The image is then displayed in about a

4x5 preview. Friends have VueScan and Minolta's version, but I don't see much

difference between the interfaces. The Minolta version seemed quite slow.I do little to

no alterations on an image until it comes up in Photoshop. But, to each his own.

Everyone has their own steps of editing. Good luck, Tony

[daniel_staver1]

There are no less than three new scanners coming out now. The F-3200 from Epson, the 9950f from Canon and yet another flatbed from Epson (Sorry, don't remember the model number).

 

I read a report from a guy that had tested the F-3200 at photokina and he said the quality was somewhere in between the 4870 and a real film scanner. In other words a definite improvement over the 4870.

 

There's some info on the Canon here:

http://www.photo-i.co.uk/News/Sept04/Canon%20scanner.htm

 

I think it would be a good idea to wait for some reviews on these new scanners before buying anything right now.