Ektachrome + Nikon scanner + ICE = ?

[matej_izgrada]

I bought three rolls of Kodak Ektachrome 400X (EPL400) which expired about 2

years ago. I shot one roll, cross processed in C-41 it and scanned it.

Everything was fine.

 

<p>I did the same with second roll but processed it in a different studio, and

the scanner showed some weird watercolor-like effects in preview, but scans

mostly seemed okay (at the time I didn't inspect them in great detail, and right

now they aren't handy).

 

<p>Then I shot the third roll and processed it in C-41, but in a third studio.

<br>However, this time my Coolscan 5000 displayed odd behaviour when scanning

the film. The problem was ICE. When turned on, it made whole image appear as if

painted with watercolors. <a

href="http://free-du.t-com.hr/dnac-v1/ektachrome_iced.jpg">Here is an

example</a>. (unmanipulated 100% crop of 4000dpi scan)

<br>Also, ICE in this case did a relatively poor job of masking scratches&dust,

it even duplicated them in some cases.

 

<p>Not all images suffered from this problem (although most did), and not all

images suffered the same extent of the problem. Some were hardly affected,

others completely destroyed.

 

<p>Then, just out of curiosity, I tried scanning the film with Kodachrome

settings (and inverting it in Photoshop), thinking how there might be something

in old Ektachrome which confuses ICE. <a

href="http://free-du.t-com.hr/dnac-v1/ektachrome_2.jpg">Here are the results</a>.

This mostly worked like it was supposed to, but introduced another kind of

artifacts, visible on brightest parts of buildings in the background.

 

 

<p> <p>

Does anyone have an explanation to this problem, if not solution?

<br>Thanks!

[jtk]

I wonder if your film is reticulated? Looks like it might be in your Kodachrome scans (damaged physically by cross processing, perhaps due to poor temp control: emulsion shows physical roughness on close inspection). Controlled E6 processing would have resulted in perfectly smooth emulsion, hard to tell one side from the other. Inspect your film with cross lighting.

[nigel d]

Look at previous threads on silver retention.