Negative Scans and then what?

[Spriter]

I would like to share my last experience with you. I am nearly 50 years old and did had a life before the Digital photography. As such I did accumulate near 10,000 negatives, all properly stored in their sleeves.

I considered scanning them but found that negatives scanners was too pricey. And I did not trust sending these away to have the job done.

Lastly I have seen this Canon 8800F flatbed scanner with it’s film scanning capabilities. I was reluctant, at first, but when the seller told me that if I was not satisfied I could bring it back, hey! For only 199$ I had to try.

I was surprised by it’s performance and ease of operation. Up to 12 35mm negatives or 8 slides in a scanning pass with a good menu to select the one that I really want to scan. The quality is quite good. I am sure, some do a better job but this is enough for me for “souvenirs” type of pictures.

There is noise and the usuals imperfections associated with negatives scans. Since I will have 10,000 negatives to process to remove that noise and maybe reduce some of the smallest imperfections I wanted to know what automated tools would you recommend to automate some of the work.

Thanks all for your valuable input.

P.S. I own Lightroom and Photoshop CS3

[Marko]

Honestly, depending on what you want to do with the images, the flatbed may or may not do the trick.

I would do a test.
Scan a neg on the flatbed and make the largest enlargement that you are ever likely to make.

Then take that same neg and have it professionally scanned and make the same sized enlargement.

Compare and see if you are happy.

This is a test that I too will do in a few months. For me, I don't think the flatbed will cut it, but that's me. It all depends on your particular needs.

marko

[Spriter]

Honestly, depending on what you want to do with the images, the flatbed may or may not do the trick.



marko


Well, I did not made myself clear enough on that. Flatbed yes but with a specific lightsource desinged in the cover to achieve the required quality.

The quality is probably near what Nikon coolscan 4000 or 5000. I too was quite surprised.

But my question was more in line with what could be done in an automated way to reduce the noise and remove some of the imperfections

Can you provide your opinion on that part.

[Marko]

Ok - I'm still sticking to my suggestion though ;) Most flatbeds can't touch a professional scan. But to answer your question - in my experience, this can be done through scanning programs in a general way, but the scanner can't know what you think is an 'imperfection'. It can smooth over a noisy/imperfect neg. (But why would your NEGS be noisy anyway or imperfect if they were all kept in sleeves)

It's a tough one because you don't want the scan 'smoothing' over the good stuff, just the bad stuff. The best results will come from scanning negs one by one or scanning batches of negs that look similar and fixing them in pshop, not during the scan.

Anyone else care to give some input?
Thx - Marko



Well, I did not made myself clear enough on that. Flatbed yes but with a specific lightsource desinged in the cover to achieve the required quality.

The quality is probably near what Nikon coolscan 4000 or 5000. I too was quite surprised.

But my question was more in line with what could be done in an automated way to reduce the noise and remove some of the imperfections

Can you provide your opinion on that part.

[Spriter]

Ok - I'm still sticking to my suggestion though ;) Most flatbeds can't touch a professional scan.

Could you do me a favor, it will take only a few minutes of your time.

http://denisgrenier.com/BlogPhotos/IMG_0071.jpg

Download the image.

Quality of the scan is good enough for me. 30mpix, you will see some out of focus on the face but there is areas where focus is really sharp. The scanner won't improve what's wrong.

Since CCD is being used there is some noise, not that much and I can certainly find a setting to fix it.

I am looking at a program that might be able to do what ICE from Nikon was aiming to do. Supposedly, ICE was able to recognized white spots (associated with dust on the negative) or black spot (associated with Diapositive dust) and would selectively blend these white spot with the surronding areas.

If you hear about that, I would be very gratefull. I can't imagine hand fixing up to 30 spots on 10,000 scans by hands. There should be a way.

[Marko]

I'll try to find a good program for you.

Not to belabor the point, but you say the scan is good enough for you, have you made a print from it (min 8x10)?

[Spriter]

I'll try to find a good program for you.

Not to belabor the point, but you say the scan is good enough for you, have you made a print from it (min 8x10)?

Thanks for challenging me. Altough I am still in the "good enough for me", I understand better the differences. I have reviewed some articles, available on Web Site and found much more info on this piece of equipment and others like the Nikon Coolscan. I understand the superiority of the Nikon.

I also found that there is an hidden option to remove Dust and Scratches at scan time. This is in the advanced interface. It seems to work well. Probably not as good as Nikon ICE but good enough for me.

I think I will be ok. I might try the VuScan software and should I do so I will report my findings here. I did try the Silverfast. Did not like it.

Thanks for your support and have a great week.

Keep on shooting

[Marko]

I think I will be ok. I might try the VuScan software and should I do so I will report my findings here. I did try the Silverfast. Did not like it.


Of course we would love it if you also posted your results as many people WILL find a good flatbed more than enough for their needs.

I did some quick research as well and most good scanning softwares do have a 'duct and scratches' setting during the scan. Keep in mind that these things are not perfect but they will often help.
Marko

[Spriter]

I did some quick research as well and most good scanning softwares do have a 'duct and scratches' setting during the scan. Keep in mind that these things are not perfect but they will often help.
Marko

I found this articles that (http://outdoorimages.blogspot.com/2008/08/nikon-coolscan-ice-or-no-ice.html) is very interesting.

ICE from Nikon is rather different that other Scratches and dust removal done in software. The Nikon Scanner is doing a pass with infrared light and map the dust and scratches this way. This enable them to turn on "software" dust and scracthes removeal only where there is effectively dusts or scratches. Interesting. This means that the rest of the pictures is not affected.

The include article go into deep review of the process and I found it very interesting.

Since I am just archiving souvenirs... the current scanner software combination will do the job for me.