Scanography Anyone and whats the best scanner for it?

[jon_kobeck1]

I am intrigued with the art form of "scanography" or scanner art. You know, photos with no camera

or film. I would like to buy a scanner for this purpose(and also to scan photo and negatives)

Can anyone recommend a good scanner ?

[jwallphoto]

I believe any flatbed scanner will work. I've seen some amazing shots of dragonflies done that way.

[kari v]

My gf has done some stuff on our $100 Canon 4400F. It works fine for photos too, just check levels and sharpen a bit. For negatives cheap flatbeds are not that hot but it depends what kind of quality you need. Web sizes and small prints are ok, but even 8x10 is pushing it. (from 35mm).

 

Epson V700 (and newer) seems to be the best all-around flatbed as can be seen from the price tag.

[Stock-Photos]

Some flat bed scanners have a greater depth of field than others. If you plan to scan 3D objects, look into this.

 

Most flat beds focus in the area "at the glass". Objects above the glass are often out of focus.

[deborah_humphries]

Your scanner must have a CCD array rather than CCI. The new slim (space saving) scanners or those that are with a 4-in-1 printer are CCI. CCI array doesn't see beyond the flat of the glass. CCD is the more common and more versatile scanner.

http://computer.howstuffworks.com/scanner1.htm

[fotofem]

I appreciate everyone's replies - this is very useful to me too.

I would recommend the following website for scanner art/scanography:

 

http://www.scannography.org

 

I'm very happy with my old Epson Perfection 2450 Photo. I read on another forum where someone said a cheap Epson

was better than all the other brands, though I have no experience with others. I seem to get surprising depth of

field. You could interview the other artists at that website and see what they use, and it may turn out that a

cheap one from Ebay will be excellent.

[scanography]

Epson perfection 3170 is $100 or less and works great! It is often recommended by the pros especially for those of

us just starting out. I got so excited about scanning I created a site to share as much as I could learn.

 

www.scanner-magic.com

 

Mary Miller

[patri]

I'm the one who said "a cheap Epson is better than any other brand". YES it's true- but, as stated above the multi-function scan-copy-print models don't work with 3-D objects. I did have a CX5400 about 5 years ago and that scanner was not bad for scanning objects. Recently I bought a CX8400 for a secondary computer and the scanner in that model stinks! Most serious scanographers use Epson "Photo" scanners. A few artists use Microteks. I've been buying (and returning!) a lot of different brands over the past year and they don't even come close to the quality possible with any Epson Perfection model, much less the Expression models.

[timfl]

Jon,

 

I use a Microtek i900. It produces some beautiful scans. One of the nice features is that the cover is removable. So is the glass for

cleaning. Of course you should always protect the glass with clear mylar or acetate. I would also recommend SIlverfast AI instead of the

Microtek software. It's much faster and, more importantly, has much more sophisticated control.

 

You can see some of my work here: http://www.timfleming.com/scanner/scanner.htm

 

Good Luck!