Need warnings about used drum scanners.

[Jochen_S]

I'm a unexperianced shutterbug and would really like to buy a huge

old drum scanner for sheet films and in general.

Is it possible to operate one without any experience but the manual?

Which parts use to break down? are they expensive?

What should I look for, when the machine becomes demonstrated to me?

Is there any Problem to use such a scanner with a contemporary Mac

(able to use photoshop7)

Is there any chance to use such a scanner with a pentium /IBM?

Thanks in advance, no I can't afford no modern flatbedscanner for

5x7" negatives.

[roger krueger]

Color or BW negs?? Older drum scanners have seem to have

great difficulty dealing with the limited density range of color neg

film. This is one of the main reasons "pros" shot chromes, not

negs, for so long. One service bureau near me won't even

attempt color neg on their old drumscanner.

[brian yarvin]

Jochen:

 

You must be careful with the oil immersion process and you'll need a special station for it. You might also need a GPIB interface card, depending on how old the machine is.

 

However, all this would cost far more than something like a Heidelberg Saphir Ultra which scans film up to 8x10 and costs about $400 in the US. (mine does a great job with large format, a good job with medium format and no job at all with 35MM, but what did you expect?) It works fine with a PC and a touch faster on a MAC, as all ninties designed SCSI devices seem to.

 

Good luck whichever way you go!

 

Brian

[sk_arts]

Brian is right:

 

GPIB is a BIG annoyance, and VERY expensive. They are marketted to laboratories for scientific instruments, they are useful here because you can daisy chain hundreds of devices without the need of relays or hubs.

 

But because they are marketted to laboratories, they are expensive. What industries have the most of the highest end labs? Universities and Government offices; and because of this, the GPIB folks think they can charge an arm and a leg for them. A GPIB Adaptor new for windows is $400, but can be bought used from Leafscan dealers. Leafscans are great, but only go up to 4x5.

 

The Saphire is a great scanner, and I would highly recomend it, in fact, I would highly recomend anything from heidelburg, flatbed or drum, I have always been very impressed. I have heard that older Scitex flatbeds are not that great, but Scitex has always been a leader in drum scanners. Linotype made the original Saphire, and I do not know if it's the same Saphire as Heidelburg made after the merge between Linotype-Hell and Heidelburg. Linotype drum scanners, if they even existed, I am sure would be quality instruments.

 

I understand that the older drum scanners, pre-1990, were very hard to maintain and calibrate.

 

The very old drum scanners you will have no problem finding them to run on a PC, but they are getting into a vintage I would be cautious in. I have read that at one point high end scanning equiptment was getting somewhat (before WIN NT but After 1987) hard to find on a PC, but i have also read that the first professional image editor for macintosh wasn't around until like 1987. Macs were used heavily in pagination and layout before this though, and served as front ends to image setters.

 

In either case, it should not be impossible to find a vintage 1990-1995 drum scanner for your PC, and undoubtly easy after 1995. I am very sure that there were a number of scanners available.

[brian yarvin]

Hi, there are many models of Saphir with different specs. You'll have to check the Heidelberg dealer in your country.

[kelly_flanigan1]

The GPIB cables are very expensive too; sometimes hundreds for a cable.

[rainer_viertlb_ck]

the responses seem to be qualified but they dont respond to your question:

there no problem to buy a 2.hand drum scanner, if it runs on pc depends on the software. if the machine runs well is not so easy to say especially if you dont have experience. scan in every resolution and look carefull to EVERY rare tdetail in the scans. listen ti strange noises and vibrations. go with someone who has ( much ) eperience,- this maybe is the best idea. parts for drumscanner are generally expensive. dont buy a model which manufacture broke down and for which there is nomore service available.

i would advice you actually three models, all scan around 20 x 30 cm and 4000 - 5200 dpi, which is enough:

1. howtek 4000 or 4500. mechanical very robust construction but it is loud and not very fast ( depeds on softare too). many softare exist and actual versions too, a.e. from silverfast and from vuescan.

prices from 1000$ till 4000$ , depends if there is a mounting station, one , two or more drums, the softare and the condition.

2. screen 1030 ai. very good quality scanner, but very old software, anyway it works very well, if you know to use it. important is that you bua the AI version of the scanner. software works well only for mac. prices 2500$ till 4500$

3. scanview scanmate 4000 or 5000. fast drumscanner with modern design, very good software for mac and pc from colorquartet ( not cheap ). so look for that at least vers. 4 is included with the scanner.

 

what was written bout neg scans is not true. all depends if you learn to write good profiles for your neg.software and to use your software well. than not any of this drumscanners has problems with negs. the reason why prof work with cromes are that you can see without miss-interpretation the image and its colors,- your client also. in many ways its more comfortable and give less possibilities for horrible interpretations or colorshifts if they are scanned.

[daniel_hill]

I know that I recently read that you can optain refurbished leaf scanners

directly from their website, although I don't have a clue if you can run them on

a PC. I do have a queston for Rainer, I know that you have extensive

knowledge of the Polaroid 45 Ultra. I would appreciate any advice that you

could offer on getting the maxium quality out of it. Specificaly I have read that

it is NOT advisable to scan at less than it's optimal resolution of 2700 dpi, yet

that would give one a file size of well over 600mbs, not a practical situation in

Photoshop 7. Also I noticed that 16 bit files are also not extremely practical in

Photoshop 7, Layers does not seem to work, any downside to using 8bit, and

how did you approach it, did you scan in at 8bit or convert after? Hope that

this response may be of interest to others.

[rainer_viertlb_ck]

you should scan only with the physical resolution of the scanner,- this is the full resolution, the half of it a quarter of it and so on....

bout 16bit scanning: i use it sometimes, if i see that i have to make extremely contrast, gradation or color changes, which i cant make directly in the scanner software. after scanning with 16bit i make this drastical changes in the 16bit mode in photoshop, than i go on in 8bit to have the full possibilities of layers and so on. but as i said before: i dont use 16bit often, cause normally you wont see a difference.

[roger krueger]

While I'll agree with Ranier about negs not being a problem for

any of the scanners he mentioned, there are early 90's and

before scanners that DO have a problem. And if he's looking for

a drumscanner cheaper than a modern flatbed, this is precisely

the market he may end up heading towards. (I've now found a

second local lab that won't drum scan color neg.)

 

Re: 16-bit --I always scan in 16-bit, but once I get any gross

gamma/curves work done I go to 8-bit. 16-bit layers would be

nice; I'll cross my fingers for Photoshop 8. I work with 700mb

files all the time, on Photoshop 6 and a 400mhz G4 with 1GB

memory. Open up 8 files (a roll of 6x9, scanned on a Polaroid

120) at a time. I try and do as much as I can as batches--set

precise crops on all 8, and run a batch to crop, rotate and save.

Everything I do, I do in batches. (And surf photo.net on my other

machine while it's running!)

[Jochen_S]

First thanks a lot. I see I didn't ask my question clear enough. I was thinking about something old from the 1980ies and of course quite cheap, about some few hundred Euro or $. I'd like to scan b&w LF negs and maybe some MF slides. I don't know if I'll go this way, maybe I'll suffer the whole next year from buying a DSLR...

[roger krueger]

Two corrections, neither very important:

 

First--Rainer--sorry about mispelling your name.

 

Second: I erred it saying the Screen 1030 wouldn't have a

problem with negs--it's only an 8/24 bit scanner. Screen offered

an OPTIONAL neg kit--not sure exactly what it did, but Screen

themselves understood it wouldn't work for negs as originally

configured. Interestingly, its big brother, the Screen 1045, is

16/48 bit, and does claim built-in neg capability.

[rainer_nagel]

found this old thread with keyword SCANMATE 4000 ($30'000 class)

it is now renamed:

http://www.esko-graphics.com/ for ColorQuartet and Drum scanner Firmware updates

in Switzerland

http://www.amdigital.ch/support/downloads.htm

 

hope this helps anybody, Rainer3