mattb1

IMO, forget film. If you are not seeking the film grain look, you should stick with digital. I have some nice MF cameras,

but they do not get out any more.

As several have already pointed out, printing large has a lot more to do with technique than total pixels. Mirror lock up,

delay timmer, f stop/DOF,focus, focus planes, composition, subject and so on are all going to play huge parts in the final

image. Something that looks good small can look like a train wreck when it is enlarged because of some flaw in

technique. Good gear is secondary, knowing how to get the most out of your gear is more important. Like, what are the

best f stops for your lens or what ISO's are best for your sensor.

Digital is a very clean tool when exposed well. It can appear very sharp, and be pleasing when enlarged.

IMO, skip up sampling. Capture all the pixels that your camera has, and give that to the printer. If it is a good shop they

will know exactly what their hardware needs. You will most likely not know. Now, if you use a kinkos or Costco, you will

need to experiment and maybe upsample. As they will not have knowledgable people working the printer.

I signed up a year a go, if I take into account each product I use it is actually not too bad of a deal.. I use PS, Lightroom,

and dream weaver. But, now I can use all of their products. If i were to upgrade each on a two year cycle, which I was

doing , then CC is still more expensive. But, now I am more current and do not misout on the new tools. So, It kind of

works out for me because I can now use the products that I could not afford before.

Sure, had a couple of hiccups with signing on to CC but have not had to call customer service yet. Of course, I am not a

pro who depends on CC every day. So, take it in the light that I am a casual user.

I understand the issue, it is nice to know that you own a copy. And, it is a financial burden to stay current. I hope Adobe

makes allowances for those of us who can not make that large of a financial commitment. For those that can I would say

take a look at your upgrade history and see if it makes sense to subscribe.

Still, we need to complain until Adobe takes care of everyone.

Scanning not only takes a lot of time, but there is a significant amout of skill involved. It will take a lot of practice to be

good at it.

IMO, send them out. The B&W will take much longer and will require a lot of manual touch up. You will have more than

enough work just getting everyone's name, date and location right.

Well, actually, for me I want the most out of a scan. So, what I really want from a scanning service is the best scan they

can make. That will different for different scanners, ask for more will not get you any more detail. So, talk to them and

find out what they would do to get the most out of the film.

It really is not a simple subject. I have seen sites quote MBs, MPs, dpi and ppi. A lot of times dpi and ppi are used to

describ the same thing, usually you can get what they are talking about from the context. If talking about scanning and

they say dpi without saying the print size they are talking about the ppi of the scan.

It use to be that the print resolution was kind of important, but any more using a good print driver or RIP will take care of

the resolution for you. Just send what you have and tell it the print size you want.

I would suggest sending a test scan to the service and see what they can do.

I wanted to not like the 24-105 L kit lens. But, I still have it. It is the lens I use the most, and it can make good images. I

really like it for video, the IS is great for video and so is the focal range.

I doubt that most people sell it after using it a while. Are there better? Definitely.

IMO none of the Epsons are worth my time. I had one for a couple of years and have only a handful of scan to show for

it. I was better off saving money and buying a dedicated scanner. I wish someone on this forum had warned me.

They can do web stuff and small prints if you work long enough. IMO buy any other band and you will get better results.

What is compelling about cloud services is pro grade archiving, and ease of use. Access from the Internet is not the

biggest factor. You could make a home server and expose it to the internet.

There are several reasons why I do not use a service. First is company longevity, too much turn over on the net. Next, is

a change of service agreements. Or, a company may just decide to get out of the storage business to do something

more lucrative. And, the interfacess and strategies are geard towards the non-photographer who has relatively small data

storage needs. Last, is what has been stated here, the typical Internet connection is just too slow and limited in allowed

bandwidth.

Will this change? Yep, and it may be more attractive soon.

IMO any optical disc is too fragile for archiving. With the price of external hard drives you could store those off site at

about the same price.

All digital capture needs some sharpening.

Can not give you any settings, have not scanned for a while. But, the initial sharpening should be minimal. Restoring the images natural

local contrast will help a lot with the perceived sharpness. Most sharpening is done at output time and will vary with the output medium.

IMO no. Why not send them out to a service? I hated my Epson, and never got a MF scan that I was happy with. But,

you may shoot different subjects and have different expectations, so it could work for you. Just prepare yourself for a lot

of post process work. I was happy with every other scanner I tried. IMO, if a coolscan is out of budget, then send them to

a service.

Just felt that a dissenting opinion was needed. Had hoped someone would have warned me before I spent time on

Epson.

What kind of subjects do you shoot? Can you live with quarky camera? I just picked up a Sigma DP2 Merrill, I have high

hope for it. The sample pics at the review sites blew me away. It has a APC sized sensor.

I was looking at the mini server, on that one the ssd is only $200 which is kind of a good deal. On the base one you could

save a little by doing it yourself, but may not be worth the risk.

The Nikon scanners are good. I would get it and give it a try, you could sell it if you do not like it. But, I think you will find

that it is a better tool.

Shadows are troublesome, just because we can see detail does not mean that it will ever be picked up in a scan. A HDR

type of approach can get you some results, but a lot more frustration. But that also means that the a wet print would also

have extreme issues with it as well. It sucks, but not much to be done. A different exposure technique can help. Try not

to loose highlights, but expose the shadows more and it will be easier to scan.

Grain, grain = detail. The nature of film, it does not equate well to digital. The better the scanner, the better it can capture

grain. Which means you see more of it. Grain reduction software is about all you can do.

Digmypics Is another low cost option, the guy who runs it has been on photo.net and seems to care abut results. I have

not used them, so no idea if they are good.

Scanning is just like taking a photo, Actually harder as it requires skill and some experience to get constant results.

Finding someone you can work with is ideal.

Good luck

Ubuntu, skip Wimdows. I setup a home server and have it running Raid 10, so it is duplicated and fast. Just install the

desk top version and then install the file server. It is actually pretty simple doing it, as long as you do the desktop version.

I would get server grade disk drives as well if you are going to leave it running a lot, if not then normal drives are fine.

Do you love the process? Or do you love taking photos? Or printing? Large displays? Yes, people use film a lot. But,

it may not work for you. Scanning can be frustraiting and counter productive if you do not have a natural tendency for that

type of activity. It can also be magical like working in a darkroom. It takes a lot of time and learning to get good at it.

Film can be rewarding without scanning yourself, you can have the film scanned at the same time as developing. Or

send out old negatives/slides to a service, just send out small batches or select frames to keep the costs down.

But, if you are more into taking photos, then look at a high end point and shoot or any of the cameras that are not DSLRs.

You will be surprised what you can do, a DSLR is not a requirement for great photos. This past year I have been really

productive with my little $100 canon, more than with my 5D II. Doing just fun stuff and family photos.

Depends on what you want to do, but any scanning is expensive in terms of time. The better the scanner the less time in

the digital darkroom.

List what you want to do besides save money. Do you want to print? How big? Do you want web only?

Processing in adobe is good, just prepare the final in sRGB. Do get their ICC profile and use soft prof to visualize the

final print.

Are you giving the labs a sRGB file with a ICC profile? Some print services have color management options, so pay

attention to that as well. IMO experiment and find a work flow that you like. Getting a Spyder is most likely not what you

need right now.

Finding a good print service is not trivial, in film days I gave up and went to slides.

Sorry for your situation. I lost a 450D a few years a go the same way, got caught in a rain shower. I had a plastic bag

and backpack that I put it into as soon as the shower started. I had thought that I had done a good job of keeping it dry.

But, when I got in my car and took it out of the bag there was about a teaspoon of water in the bag. The 450D was

completely dead, I tried drying it for day's and such, but no luck. Took it to a local camera shop hopping they knew

someone in town who could look at it, because it was a cheap camera and knew it would not take much to total it. But,

they sent it to Canon who said it was a complete loss. I always wondered if it really was, but it is better to just suck it up

and get a new camera and start taking photos again. I lost a few months of photos, which in retrospect was the real loss.

Skip the Epsons, they are ok for web and small prints, but IMO not up to the task of commercial work.

The DSLR idea is a decent idea, I have had better results with a great point and shoot than I did with an Epson. The

Nikon scanners are good, and you don't have a lot of touch up to do post scan.

But, I would suggest sending them out to a service. They will be able to scan faster and better than you. You will most

likely have enough to do with retouching and cataloging.

The learning curve is huge, and even harder with less expensive tools. Unless you really like the idea of spending a lot of

time scanning, You might be better off having an expert do the work.

Scott, why limit the question to Nikon? What about the Pentax 645D? I would love one of those, not much more than

your estimate for switching to Nikon.

Giving the Mk III more exposure really does through off the results. I know that under exposing even a little can cause

noise to become unacceptable with the mk II. But,even so, the Mk III looks to be better. But, not enough for me to

spend that kind of cash. If it really was two stops it might be worth it.