larry_huppert4

Whatever paper you choose, do yourself a big favor and buy a high

quality ICC color profile for that printer/inkset/paper combination.

I've found a quality profile makes a huge difference, and the

inexpensive do-it-yourself profiles (e.g. Monaco EzColor) are

relatively poor in comparison. I've had good luck with profiles done

by www.inkjetmall.com. You can also get custom profiles for your

printer via the mail/internet from places like www.profilecity.com.

re: "Where might one procure Kami oil? Can't find it on B&H's site."

<p>

As mentioned, the importer will sell directly, but I believe he wants

you to buy a case of his products (you can mix and match) which is 8

(?) bottles. Because of Kami's properties, it requires special

packaging, marking and handling when shipped via UPS. I found a

relatively local source for Kami in the Boston area, and they wanted

$20 to ship a single $15 bottle of KMF because of the shipping

regulations. A single bottle of KMF will go a very long way, so

unless you have a production shop, one bottle will be more than

enough and will probably last for years.

<p>

I didn't have luck searching the normal photography stores so it's

not suprising B&H doesn't carry it either. In your local area, try

calling around to industrial suppliers to the printing and

lithography trades. If that doesn't work, try calling some of the

local service bureaus and ask them where they get their mounting

fluids. Good luck.

Matt,

<p>

The 1680 has two focus points - 0 mm above the flatbed and 2.5mm

above the flatbed. You can choose either focus point from within

SilverFast on their vertical icon-based toolbar.

<p>

The film clip deformations are from the holders used in a dip and

dunk processor by commercial photo labs to process E6. Unless you do

your own E6 in a Jobo type machine, you end up with these clip marks.

<p>

I'd guess one of the advantages of using a mounting oil is it's the

best way to keep the film absolutely flat when scanning and not have

newton rings. The 1680 4x5 holder is OK, but it's still flimsy

plastic and it doesn't really grip the film tight around the edges.

Given that 4x5 film is pretty rigid and flat on it's own, the end

result is OK. I've seen much better holders on other scanners (e.g.

Imacon and the Umax rubber/metal holders). The Epson holder that I

really dislike is the roll film holder. It's hard to believe that

the film flatness when using their roll film holder is the same as

you'd get out of a good enlarger. Epson designed a generic 6x17

holder which they expect you to use for 6x4.5, 6x6, 6x7, 6x8, 6x9,

6x12 and 6x17. It certainly reduced the number of holders Epson had

to provide, but the one they did provide is all but useless IMHO.

I've tried the Kami on Epson 1680 technique that Howard was talking

about (although I haven't seen the discussion on Yahoo groups yet).

IMHO, it has more benefit for scanning MF material than LF. It's the

only way I've found to create an acceptably flat scan of roll film

given the natural curl of the film and the poor excuse for a MF film

holder which Epson provides with this scanner. I found it very

difficult (or sometimes impossible) to work the bubbles from the

edges of LF material. The heavy weight of the film base and the

presence of processing clip deformations at the film edges makes LF

tough to work with in some situations.

<p>

As to the scanner itself... The Epson 1680 is impressive given it's

cost, (Chris - it's not a $350 model - it's more like a $1000ish

machine) however it's not in the same league as a high-end CCD or

drum scanner. If your transparency doesn't push beyond the Dmax-Dmin

range of the scanner, the Epson 1680 can do a credible job. However,

it doesn't matter what tricks you try with mounting fluids or the

like, if the transparency has a broad range, you can't make any

scanner see more than it's capable of doing. With that said, the

coming years may be a challenge for the high-end CCD (e.g. Imacon)

scanners. The Epson 1680 is an example of a fairly well implemented

(except the film holders) lower-end scanner which is closing the

image quality gap between low-end and high-end devices much faster

than the high-end is extending their capabilities. One last note on

the 1680 - don't waste your money on the Firewire version; it doesn't

seem to make scanning any faster.

As previously mentioned, warming open shade is a good idea, but a

color temp meter still can't tell you the specific filter needed for

this given how different films will render a scene. Spending a bit

of money on experimentation using different filters would probably be

better than buying a color temp meter. I agree with the previous

post that some of the best pictures use exagerated color temp to

their benefit.

<p>

For color critical work (e.g. expensive clothing catalogs for mail

order), a color temp meter would probably be useful. I haven't tried

it, but it's my understanding that color temp meters don't really

give proper filtration information for non-continuous spectrum light

sources such as the mercury-vapor on Velvia example you mentioned.

To solve this problem a device like a spectrophotometer is needed.

210mm is very common for tabletop/product. I've know some who prefer

a 180mm instead for a slightly wider feel of being more into the

scene. From a DOF perspective, the previous reply is correct, but

the lens matters a great deal in terms of what the photograph ends up

being. It's no different than photographing objects at a distance

from this standpoint. If you take a photo of some 3 dimensional

object at a given magnification with two different lenses (moving the

camera to achieve the same magnification), the photo's will look

different because the perspective is different. With tabletop, you

really have to use your camera movements to get the focus you require.