Vuescan advantages over Nikon Scan 4.0??

[rob t.]

I have been playing with my new Nikon Coolscan V for the past week

or so. I am new to the digital darkroom, and I have been very

impressed so far! I am using a Epson 1280 with the MIS UT2 inks

(CFS) as I still love Black and White photography.

 

It seems that many people prefer using Vuescan instead of the OEM

software that came with their scanner. I am curious as to what

advantages Vuescan has, particularly vs. Nikon Scan 4.0. Nikon Scan

4.0 does have curves and several other useful tools. So, what

advantages would Vuescan have over Nikon Scan 4.0?

 

Thanks in advance.

[johann_fuller]

Nikon Scan clips the highlights on negs and the shadows on tranny - reason enough to use vuescan IMO!.

[steven_clark]

One aspect of Vuescan I think people seem to overlook is the interface and workflow. Sure it's a little to get used to to start out with, but once you do Vuescan takes very little interference to operate. Once I have everything set up the right way I can scan an entire roll of film to numbered files in a directory without even having to touch the keyboard or mouse, I just have to reload the film holder, insert it, and Vuescan just keeps scanning. Also having learned Vuescan for one scanner makes it very easy to learn to use it on another scanner.

 

Currently my pet peeves are the instability of the Minolta SDIII low-level drivers that causes things to freeze periodicly, and the printer calibration system which is giving me a profile that results in a severe magenta boost.

[asimh]

do you still have access to ICE4 controls, etc. (like in NikonScan), with Vuescan? thanks.

[will_perlis]

How does CPU usage compare with Vuescan vs. Nikonscan 4? I can do other things on the computer while Vuescan is going through a box of slides but Nikonscan 3 practically locks it up until it's finished.

[rob t.]

"Nikon Scan clips the highlights on negs and the shadows on tranny - reason enough to use vuescan IMO!."

 

 

On what do you base this assertion?

[Craig_Cooper11664875449]

First thing to understand is that Vuescan doesn't/can't make the hardware do anything new over Nikonscan. However, Nikonscan appears to assume itself as the beginning and end of digital processing with all its incorporated tools and assumptions. Vuescan provides control in a slightly more intuitive sense from a photography perspective and doesn't assume the settings for important parameters - it provides control over them.

 

For functions such as curves and levels, if you consider this manipulation in the scanning software OK then Nikonscan is the tool for you; if you just want a good (information packed) scan, for stronger software, use Vuescan.

 

As for clipping, I agree Nikonscan has this characteristic but I still dont know why, just look at the Nikonscan histogram of your scans. I also cant ascertain if Vuescan manages this through sofware or hardware manipulation of the analogue gain. But either way Vuescan is the only way I can achieve good scans of traditional B&W negaives.

 

regards

Craig / Beiing

[emre]

<blockquote>On what do you base this assertion?</blockquote>

Come on mate, <A href="http://www.marginalsoftware.com/LS8000Notes/NS_neg_scanning.htm">do your homework</a>. I do not know whether the latest version has the problem though.

[rob t.]

Emre-

 

Thanks for your ever so helpful post.

 

I apologize for asking the question, and failing to "do my homework".

 

Oh, wait. I guess you didn't answer my question, did you? I am specifically referring to NikonScan 4.0, and you admit that you don't know whether it has this problem.

 

So, have I really failed to do my homework???

[emre]

How hard is it to simply test it? The bug was blatantly obvious in previous versions. You do not need someone to tell you whether it exists or not.