C41 - scanning difficult?

[RaymondC]

<p>I am getting back into film because my interest are landscapes and of that I may shoot slide. Not into street style and sports or portraiture and for film I think its more harder because you need to correct WB with filters that slow you down and the grain assoc. with it and the expense of film for those mass shooting. </p>

<p>I got into this topic of trying my scanner out b/c I have the time and want to do my research before I jump out with a film camera. I do have a couple rolls of neg film lying in the freezer.</p>

<p>I agree, slide film and digital capture just works.</p>

[jamespjones]

<p>I have tried the three programs you describe though I don't think I've used Vuescan for C-41. <br>

I found that after playing around a bit that Silverfast gave me more of what I was looking for. I still put all my images through ACR (you can put tiffs and JPEGs through ACR), but by creating my own profiles and saving my preferences I get closer to my goal the first time with Silverfast. There are some weird quirks to the programs I find that that I have to be careful in my area selection as well as sometimes clicking on and off the marque for some frames. But all in all it works well. Still not perfect.</p>

<p>Out of the trio of Better/Faster/Cheaper, I would take a better/faster solution and happily pay for it. </p>

<p>Although I too want to encourage the use of slide film (mostly so it is still there when I want to use it) I end up shooting a lot of C-41. So, a good C-41 would be very nice. I like the way C-41 holds highlights.</p>

[randall_pukalo]

<p>Ray, if you are shooting landscapes, no need to fool around any longer trying to get negs to work. Basically no one (very very few) use negative film for landscapes. The colors, saturation, sharpness and resolution just are not there. Look at just about any landscape book or landscape photography magazine and all you will see are slide shots, and now, digital. I can think of only 1 time when there was a set of images shot on negative film - it was a photographer shooting large format beach scenes on overcast days, and he wanted a low saturation look.<br>

I'm not saying you CANT get good landscape shots on negative film, but landscapes are not really the area of strength for negative film. Instead, portraits and high contrast lighting situations are where negative film shines. Also great for snapshots and times you need iso 400/800 speed.<br>

Also, most negative films have reduced red sensitivity at certain (sunsets and pimples) frequencies, to improve skin tones, so beware of this when shooting sunsets.<br>

Get some Velvia 50/100 or Kodak E100VS/Elite Chrome Extra Color 100 or Elite Chrome 100 or Sensia 100 and start enjoying your slides and great and easy scan results.</p>

[Ed_Ingold]

<p><em>I'm not saying you CANT get good landscape shots on negative film, but landscapes are not really the area of strength for negative film. </em></p>

<p>Nonsense! Just because scanning slide film is easier doesn't make it better. It's a rare scene that doesn't exceed the dynamic range of slide film. Besides, "Sunny 16" situations are easy to scan regardless of which film you use, because there are no surprises in color or exposure.</p>

[greg_peterson3]

<p>Statements like "...slides scan sharper and with much less grain than negatives." are just crazy talk!</p>

<p>There are some very high resolution, fine grain color negative films that are every bit as easy to scan as any transparency film. (Assuming good equipment and an understanding of the basic principals of photographic color.)</p>

<p>Have you ever seen a Hollywood movie? If so, you've seen what can be done with color negative film.</p>

<p>Shoot a damn gray card every now and then and your troubles will vanish. (The previous statement does not apply to marital or tax problems!)</p>

 

[panos_voudouris]

<p>I've just got myself a V700 and have been trying scanning 120 negatives. I'll scan with EpsonScan, use auto adjust and then check the histogram to see it doesn't clip everything too much, but generally it is ok. I'll then import everything in Lightroom, which is where I do 99% of everything. I've so far made a preset for Portra 800 and 400VC which work ok, but these are only based on a couple of rolls each. Not sure if they'll stand the test of time, as more rolls get scanned.<br>

400NC for some reason has been trickier and I couldn't get rid of a cast, but, again, I've only scanned a couple of rolls so far which had been with flakey exposures and tricky lighting. So it might be just that.<br>

Bear in mind, I only scan for some web use, not for archiving or huge prints. I've just bought the V700 so so far haven't had the chance to scan high-res for a big print.</p>