Vuescan question: What does "film type" do?

[jack_lam1]

Hi,

 

I am learning Vuescan and one thing puzzles me. What's "film type"? What does it do?

 

Is it essentially an ICC profile of the selected film type? How does it affect

the image? Does it introduce a curve adjustment to the image?

 

I read from somewhere that "film type" contains the film base info. Do I get

more accurate film base setting by scanning the film leader (as per the

"Advanced Workflow)?

 

If I want to by pass all "film type" setting and just want to see the

information straight from the CCD and control the color myself, what setting

should I use? Does "None" or "manual" in "color balance" go through the "film

type" process?

 

I hope my question here make sense. I'm experimenting with Vuescan and have lots

of questions.

 

When I scanned a roll of Fuji NPS and selected "NPS 160" as the film type and

"white balance" as color balance, the image had a strong cyan cast and required

a large amount of manual adjust to make it neutral. If I want to batch process a

lot of film for low res proofing, it simply takes too much time to manually

adjust each frame.

 

Any insight will be much appreciated.

 

Jack

[edgar_njari]

It's all just image modifications, like the ones you can do in photoshop. These film profiles are nice if you are doing a lot of automated scanning, but what is more important than aproximating the look of an emulsion is aproximating what you want it to look yourself, so in the end photoshop is the ultimate tool for that.

 

The image as it comes out from the CCD is a slightly washed out flat positive scan, everything is scanned as a slide, then the software inverts the image, adjusts the curve and color balance.

If you want to have complete control over this process, you have to start from the raw positive scan, otherwise the software will do its own adjustments.

 

For negatives, this is goon when you want less contrast than automatic software would give you because reducing contrast with curves introduces artefacts, and this way you can start from a compleatly flat negative, but if you are ok with the contrast the software is outputing, then really you can use that your starting point and skip the basics (mask, inverting etc.)

[roger_smith4]

I recommend ignoring film types, using advanced workflow and setting color balance to either "white balance," setting it manually by right-clicking on a neutral area, or setting it to "none" and creating a few curves or levels settings in Photoshop for specific types of film that you use.

[jack_lam1]

Roger,

 

How can I ignore "film type" totally? Does it still kick in and affect the image when I use "None" or "Manual" as color setting? When I select "None", and then I change the "Film Type", the preview image still changes. Does it mean the "Film Type" process is still doing its thing?

 

Is there any way to totally disable "film type"? Does the "Generic" film type mean NO film type processing?

[edgar_njari]

Jack what would be the purpuse of a generic film type since it would go through same processing as any "film type"?

If you are scanning a neg, and you see a viewable image in the preview, then the software is using some kind of "film type" to process the scan, otherwise you'd just see it as you see a negative with your own eyes, so you might as well use the film type that best suits your film.

[robert_k1]

Here's a recent scanners ng thread on this (and other VS) topic:

 

http://groups.google.com/group/comp.periphs.scanners/browse_thread/thread/455b467f0032caca/1da785f6eeb4e212?lnk=st&q=%22vuescan+questions%22&rnum=6&hl=en#1da785f6eeb4e212

 

If the above lengthy link did not show or work, go Google Groups and key in the thread title "Vuescan questions". The one dated on June 06 is want you want.

[roger_smith4]

To avoid the VS film profiles, set it to "Generic color negative." This also works for B&W film. I recommend this plus color balance of "white balance," "manual," or "none."