Best scanning manager program?

[Father Kodak]

Father Kodak wrote:

Don't think it makes a diff which of Vuescan or Silverfast you use.
Get a fast CPU, at least 512Mb RAM. And the biggest disk(s) you can
afford. USB2 is a must. More later.

My current system is a self-built Dual AMD Athlon 2000+ (not
overclocked, and very stable) with 1 GB of RAM, and I'm about ready to
buy another 1 or 2 GB. System maxes out at 3.5 GB. (That used to be
a honkin' big mainframe not too long ago!)

For not much, I can upgrade it by about 40% by getting faster
processors And until you have experienced dual-processor computing,
you don't know just how "smooth" it is, compared to single-CPU
systems.

I use SCSI-320 drives (used off ebay) with a 64-bit LSI SCSI-320
controller. Very fast. I have 280 GB online now, lots of free space.
For photo work, I would probably add a SATA IDE RAID config with say
2x300 or 2x400 GB. Even at 133 MB/image, that's several thousand
images online at any time.

They can use the hardware infra-red facility but don't use the
proprietary processing algorithm.

Ah. And that proprietary processing is built into the scanner?

Reason why I went for scanners as well!
If I may offer a suggestion: go for a lcd panel display
rather than a conventional monitor. Much easier on the eyes.

My current monitor is an old-but-great Sun 20" CRT that I got when I
worked at Sun. I know it's old and won't hold color calibration worth
an ounce of spit, so I'm planning to get a decent LCD. I'd love to
get an Eizo, but they are a bit rich for my blood.

May I suggest a DVD/CD writer instead? And the best recording
media you can find/afford? Tapes are slow (unless you're prepared
to spend big), can be notoriously unreliable and usually
require specialised software to operate effectively.

I have also thought about DVD for backup, and I'm probably going to
get a DVD soon enough anyway. But everything I've read says that DVD
media is physically a lot more fragile than CD media. Another posting
in this thread talks about how to take the disk out of the holder.
Only problem is, the half-thick jewel boxes I use (to save space) have
no way to release the disk by pressing inwards on the center.

I've had very good luck with tape over the years because I haven't
tried to skimp. I don't need to restore too often, but whenever I do,
the tape always does the job.

With either Windows or Linux, DVD/CD writables are a breeze
nowadays. Pick a good long-lasting media supplier (delkin, verbatim)

Taiyo Yuden?

and you got a much more cost-effective solution. Besides,
tapes take up a lot of space.

I haven't run the numbers yet, so I can't comment too much, but 80 to
160 GB on one cartridge that is about 4" x 2.5" x .75" (in its case)
is probably more space-effective than DVD. Putting aside file
compression, that one tape can hold as much as about 35 DVDs. And
it's reuseable. (Check out the Exabyte site for the torture tests on
their VXA media.)

 

[Father Kodak]

and thats just learning how, then more pain and many more hours doing it,
then starting over as you get better.

Scanning is only worth the effort for your *chosen* images, so don't loop
the loupe just yet.

Thanks. You may be right. Maybe I'll do two rounds. First, to get
"proofs" for use on the "light table." Then a second round for a more
precise result.

 

[Father Kodak]

A discussion in another forum indicated that low-end and middle range
LCDs still don't have the color fidelity that a quality CRT has. If
you choose LCD you should consider high end units (i.e., 20" LCD in
the $2000-2500 price range!!) Me? I'm sticking with my CRT for now.

Well, I was hoping to spend under $1000 (US) for a 20" LCD. Plus a
few hundred for basic color management tools, like Monaco EZColor.

Tapes may be slow but typically hold more data than other formats.
I've had very few reliability issues with tapes and I've been doing
tape backups of one type or another for 20 years. Still have the
tapes and can still read them. For "specialized software" on either
Mac or PC, use Retrospect from Dantz.

I have been using Dantz for about 3 years now. Beats anything else it
its price range. I'm certainly not about to buy an enterprise product
like Veritas!

Also, I noticed in the original query that only Vuescan and Silverfast
were mentioned for use on a Nikon scanner. Why not NikonScan? I've

Dunno. I somehow assumed that NikonScan was an inferior product. No?
Well, I certainly want to keep an open mind on this.

 

[Father Kodak]

excuse me for being lazy, but your story is long, and my time limited.

Thanks for taking the time to reply.

1. RAW format applies to digital cameras, scaners work differently.
Save in 16 bit tiff or psd, providing the scanning progie supposts 16
bit scans.

Ah. didn't know that.

2. Considering you have BW silver based films a scaner with diffused
illumination would be a better choice.

Ah, again. Can you recommend a vendor/model?

3. Considering all color films - get something with infrared chanel as
well.

I assume that Nikon has an infrared channel. No?

4. try vuescan and any other progz by yourself, do not expect a
meaningful reply, unless there is another person with similar needs.
You must decide (compromise).

5. get the fastest PC with as much RAM you can afford. Double core -
why not? hard disks are cheao these days, RAM too.

Yes. See my earlier reply. I'm with you about double core, only we
called it "dual CPU" a couple of years ago. Same idea.

and most of all - how many days to retirement? It's gonna to take a
while to scan THAT amount of frames.
from my experience with Nikon LS30 on P4 - 3 hours for one roll.

Understood. I expect this to be a "scan a roll an evening" kind of
project. For a number of months of course.

 

[Father Kodak]

On Thu, 15 Sep 2005 01:04:25 -0700, Father Kodak

A question back: Why do you insist on a non-vendor program?

I'm not insisting. As I noted a bit earlier, I had assumed that
Nikon's program was not as good as these third-party programs. I
would love to be corrected, since that program comes with the Nikon
scanner.

This is a very important point. If you're just starting, no program
can replace experience i.e. you can't buy experience. And only after
you've grasped it all is when you'll be able to evaluate the programs
according to your specific needs (which will change as you learn!).

No different than doing darkroom work.

It all depends on your requirements. Unfortunately that's a catch-22
and requirements will change with time. Expect to re-start scanning
several times *if* you're examining the results carefully.

No doubt.

For pure *scanning* the requirements are very low. Any computer with
USB 2 will do. Scanners are relatively slow devices.

Now, when it comes to image editing afterwards, the story changes
completely. Get as much RAM as you can and as fast a processor as you
can! Plus a second (even a third!) drive! For example, one for Windows
scratch, one of PS scratch and one for data.

Agreed. See my earlier comments on this.

Not really related.

I'm asking because the last time I visited the Silverfast site, I was
thoroughly confused as to how any of their software would replace or
complement Photoshop. Probably my newbie-ness showing here.

Nikon - Kodachrome is a deadly combination! ;o) This is from someone
who's been struggling with it for 3 years now!

Which model scanner? How do you work around the problems?

However, it all goes back to your requirements and how much quality is
enough quality. There are two basic problems:

A generic one, regarding dynamic range. Kodachromes have a very wide
dynamic range with which even 16-bit scanners struggle (if you want
the highest quality) so you will have to at the very least multi-scan,
or better still use High Definition Range or "Twin Scan" methods.

No problem. If I can batch-scan, then I have all night, literally, to
scan the contents of the slide autofeeder, say 50 slides.

The specific one is that Nikon's Kodachrome mode does *not* go far
enough and the scans will be still have a blue cast. The darker the
original the more pronounced the blue cast in the scan will be.

Sounds like a job for PhotoShop.

 

[Father Kodak]

On Thu, 15 Sep 2005 01:04:25 -0700, Father Kodak



On thing to remember about slides. NO program or pieces of equipment
is completely reliable with auto feeders. It may run trouble free for
hours only to jam when you turn your back, or it may jam incessantly.
This is more the fault of the slides than the equipment. Paper slide
holders are prone to curling as well as edge curling and spreading.
Some plastic slide mounts refuse to feed in specific directions. I
had several thousand that would only feed backwards which is no big
problem, you just have to remember to do it.

Yes, I have been using a stackloader for years with my Kodak Carousel.
Same issues, in principle. That is why I started mounting all my
slides in PerrotColor glass/metal mounts a number of years ago.

Loved the results. Supersharp edge to edge. Great, until I noticed
that the slides were laminating to the inside of the glass. Out went
that approach, fast!

Image processing is one of the most CPU intensive operations you can
find. As an opinion, get the biggest, baddest machine you can afford
and then at least tripple the size of the drive you thought you
needed.

Well, I already explained that I have a dual CPU system. Say 2 years
from now, when LongHorn is out and "stable," and Adobe will have
released a 64-bit version of PS, then I'll upgrade. Probably with a
motherboard that supports 2 CPUs, which are double-core themselves.
With say a max RAM of 32 to 64 GB.

Some claim so, I've never seen any "with the exception" of the IR
cleaning regardless of scanner can be inconsistent between batches of
Kodachrome. It's a dye transfer process which is quite different from
Ektachrome, Fuji, and others (E7).

I am aware of the differences. I didn't realize until now that these
differences had an impact on scanning.

Kinda, sorta. They have their own way of using the IR source, but
*seem* to work fine for me with the exception of some Kodachrome.


How long have your had these masochistic tendencies?
You are talking many hundreds of hours of work here.

I'm not a masochist. That's why I'm asking these questions before I
start buying a scanner and software.

There may be some you not only don't want to bother scanning, there
may be some you don't want to get in your equipment. As the basic
scanning with IR cleaning on the LS-5000 ED runs about 30 seconds and
you can easily take that well past a minute culling does make sense.

Agreed, but I have a lot of photos where getting some specific detail
right is as important as the overall image at times. Can't always
tell unless you use a loupe or project the slide.

I did the "old family photos" so every thing was scanned and I
probably have another year or two working part time to finish. I'm
past twenty some thousand and have about 70 some DVDs full with
another set as backup.

As I noted in another post, that is only 2 tape cartridges.

If you use Photoshop in conjunction with VueScan it can open the
images automatically in Photoshop for editing. Scanning a strip of
five negatives or slides takes a lot of resources. When you add
Photoshop to that and the images to it, you need a *LOT* of
horsepower. I found going from 512 megs to one Gig of RAM was like
night and day. This computer is a 64 bit, 3.4 Gig Athlon with 2 Gigs
of DDR RAM at 400 MHz. The network is approaching three *terabytes*
and will hit four shortly.

That's a fast setup.

One note on the USB drives. If you purchase the drive and enclosure
seperately you can get the very same drive and enclosure for $30 to
$50 less. This involves about 4 screws and two cables. Either way
you still have to format the drive. I leave them as all one
partition.

Yea, I figured that.

Probably not. The autoloader is a nice one, but you are at the mercy
of your slides. You learn to roll the edges of paper slide holders by
smoothing them with the back of a thumbnail or the handle of a kitchen
knife.

Agreed. If I have to restart a batch 10% of the time, I'm still
ahead. I store my slides pretty carefully.

My own preference is to stay as far away from tape drives as I can
get. My profession was computers, I have my degree in the field, and
I worked my way up to project manager so I have more than a passing
acquaintance with them. Good tape drives are expensive and do not
allow for random searches as you can do on a CD and DVD.

True about the random access. But the problem with DVDs is that you
can't do a full system backup, unattended. I have about 30+ GB of
storage in my home network now. It's a pain in the tuchus to keep
swapping tapes, which hold about 6.7 GB each. DVDs would mean even
more swapping. That is why I've started to look into "mid-range"
business tape backups, used of course. Also SCSI of course.I want to
do a full network backup, purely unattended.

So I woudln't be buying the tape drive only for photo backup.

A word of caution on storage of digital images. No medium is
permanent. Generally, magnetic media such as hard drives are
considered temporary although I'd think they have lifetimes measured
in years. If you use windows, use NTFS and not FAT 32.

That goes without saying!

"We thought" images were going to be long lived on CD and DVD, but
some strange ailments are turning up in some isolated cases. Remember
the back of the CD is sensitive to damage while the face can be
blocked with scratches and dirt. Still the information is burned into
the layer on the back. DVDs are a sandwich and are sensitive to
flexing. The writing is done between the two layers of plastic. Do
not pop them out of jewel cases by lifting on the edges. Press down in
the center and dump it in your hand, but holding it by the edges.

Which is why I am inclined to use tape. I realize that's not
mainstream, but that's OK by me.

Store CDs and DVDs on edge, in a cool dry place out of direct
sunlight.

Remember too, that no mater how good your filing system, your back up
system, and your equipment, most trashed files come from user mistakes
and not the equipment.

True enough.

 

[nailer]

On Thu, 15 Sep 2005 21:30:59 -0700, Father Kodak

*On Thu, 15 Sep 2005 09:05:36 GMT, nailer <[email protected]>
*wrote:
*
*>excuse me for being lazy, but your story is long, and my time limited.
*
*Thanks for taking the time to reply.
*>
*>1. RAW format applies to digital cameras, scaners work differently.
*>Save in 16 bit tiff or psd, providing the scanning progie supposts 16
*>bit scans.
*
*Ah. didn't know that.

real RAW is a direct dump from light sensitive elements (array)
without processing. usually, but not always in cameras. In scaners
some progs will let you dump RAW, but it has no advantage over 16bit
tiff (processed).
*
*>2. Considering you have BW silver based films a scaner with diffused
*>illumination would be a better choice.
*
*Ah, again. Can you recommend a vendor/model?

i like my Nikon, but it has LED based illumination which makes all
scratches and dirt very visible. Silver based images couldn't be
ïmroved" by ICE technology, so expect long hours retouching.
Scanners with diffused light "suppres" dirt/scratches, like printers
in minilabs. Sometime it is easier to flat-scan a print than a neg in
good film scanner.
*
*>3. Considering all color films - get something with infrared chanel as
*>well.
*
*I assume that Nikon has an infrared channel. No?

yes, it works well in Nikon scanners on dye based films.
*
*>4. try vuescan and any other progz by yourself, do not expect a
*>meaningful reply, unless there is another person with similar needs.
*>You must decide (compromise).
*
*>5. get the fastest PC with as much RAM you can afford. Double core -
*>why not? hard disks are cheao these days, RAM too.
*
*Yes. See my earlier reply. I'm with you about double core, only we
*called it "dual CPU" a couple of years ago. Same idea.

not exactly, you can have a mobo with two sockets for two CPU or one
socket enabled for dual core single cpu.

*>
*>and most of all - how many days to retirement? It's gonna to take a
*>while to scan THAT amount of frames.
*>from my experience with Nikon LS30 on P4 - 3 hours for one roll.
*
*Understood. I expect this to be a "scan a roll an evening" kind of
*project. For a number of months of course.


gee, large number. have fun. BTW notall DVD blanks are equal, get
something reliable, even if it costs more.
*>

 

[Noons]

My current system is a self-built Dual AMD Athlon 2000+ (not
overclocked, and very stable) with 1 GB of RAM, and I'm about ready to
buy another 1 or 2 GB. System maxes out at 3.5 GB. (That used to be
a honkin' big mainframe not too long ago!)

That should be plenty.

For photo work, I would probably add a SATA IDE RAID config with say
2x300 or 2x400 GB. Even at 133 MB/image, that's several thousand
images online at any time.

Yup, I'd say favour size over speed. Have gobbled up all the GB
I could find and *still* not enough...

Ah. And that proprietary processing is built into the scanner?

The algorithm itself no, AFAIK. It's usually done by licencing
the algorithm from its owner (Kodak, I believe) and adding it
to the native scanner software. Which the scanmakers can afford
to do and the third party software can't. But I reckon what
Vuescan and Silverfast do with the infrared channel is good.

If I have a very difficult negative, then I use the scanner's
native software which has the licenced D-ICE thing in it: it
certainly does a superb job. For the vast majority of work
third party software's seems to be plenty enough and faster.

My current monitor is an old-but-great Sun 20" CRT that I got when I
worked at Sun. I know it's old and won't hold color calibration worth
an ounce of spit, so I'm planning to get a decent LCD. I'd love to
get an Eizo, but they are a bit rich for my blood.

I remember well those Sun monitors! They used to be all the rage
for CAD stuff. Won't venture lcd brands. But since I've
left my Viewsonic behind and gone to a 19" LCD, it's been a
lot easier on them olde eyes! Particularly the absence of
any noticeable flicker. Also, the lcd colours on turn on
seem to stabilise faster than a conventional crt.

I've had very good luck with tape over the years because I haven't
tried to skimp. I don't need to restore too often, but whenever I do,
the tape always does the job.

As a friend of mine says: it's not a matter of *if* you'll need
a backup, it's a matter of *when*...

Taiyo Yuden?

Don't know them. We only got the major names here in Australia.

I haven't run the numbers yet, so I can't comment too much, but 80 to
160 GB on one cartridge that is about 4" x 2.5" x .75" (in its case)
is probably more space-effective than DVD. Putting aside file
compression, that one tape can hold as much as about 35 DVDs. And
it's reuseable. (Check out the Exabyte site for the torture tests on
their VXA media.)

Ah yes. But the entry-point prices?...
I'm on a budget, so I have to stay with DVD.

 

[nailer]

-------------------------------------
*> Taiyo Yuden?
*
*Don't know them. We only got the major names here in Australia.
*
*
it is a factory, you should have them in Ozland :-{)
just translate into a brand name. Hint - google.

 

[Noons]

nailer apparently said,on my timestamp of 16/09/2005 7:39 PM:

it is a factory, you should have them in Ozland :-{)

I wish. Not all of them

just translate into a brand name. Hint - google.

Nope, still never seen it. Maybe it's just starting?
Not in the major retailers anyway.

 

[David Blanchard]

Well, I was hoping to spend under $1000 (US) for a 20" LCD. Plus a
few hundred for basic color management tools, like Monaco EZColor.

This is anecdotal information -- I don't yet own an LCD at home to
make the comparison. It's quite possible that the mid-range LCDs are
good enough for all but the most critical color proofing. I certainly
hope this is the case because I want to remove my beautiful but big
CRT off my desk and replace it with an LCD.

Dunno. I somehow assumed that NikonScan was an inferior product. No?
Well, I certainly want to keep an open mind on this.

Out of the box using default values, I believe that VueScan will
typically produce better results than NikonScan. But once you get over
the learning curve, you begin to learn the strengths and weaknesses of
each. That's why I keep both around and use both apps.

-db-

 

[David Blanchard]

Deadly? Not really. Troublesome? Certainly, but fixable if you are
patient. It's not just the dynamic range but the thickness of the
emulsion that causes problems. But because NikonScan can increase the
exposure time through analog gain (and newer/current versions of
VueScan now do this as well), you can penetrate the emulsion. As also
noted, there tends to be a blue cast to Kodachrome scans. This, too,
can be fixed with settings on the analog gain.

A good solution has already been mentioned by Don using multiple scans
at different exposures and then combining the results. Easy to say,
time consuming and often difficult to do. But more than 90% of my
slides are Kodachrome and I've been able to get quality scans using
both VueScan and NikonScan and a lot of patience.

-db-

 

[RunningMan]

I have also thought about DVD for backup, and I'm probably going to
get a DVD soon enough anyway. But everything I've read says that DVD
media is physically a lot more fragile than CD media. Another posting
in this thread talks about how to take the disk out of the holder.
Only problem is, the half-thick jewel boxes I use (to save space) have
no way to release the disk by pressing inwards on the center.

I've had very good luck with tape over the years because I haven't
tried to skimp. I don't need to restore too often, but whenever I do,
the tape always does the job.

Just curious why you don't simply archive to multiple hard drives,
given how cheap HD space is? I have about 100 GB of images, and they
are always on my main hard drive, on a second internal hard drive, AND
a third external USB drive. I use a free app called EZBackItUp to
compare directories and copy over the new images every night. My
images (and other stuff I back up) are ALWAYS in three different
places, all immediately accessible. Barring a triple failure I'm
covered, without the fuss of tape drives and proprietary backup
software.

I worked in IT for several years. Our tapes (Super DLT) were very
reliable, but unless you need to keep several days revisions as you
might in an enterprise setting, why bother at home?

 

[Don]

You might consider putting the stuff on sourceforge and see whether someone
takes over.

I might still do that, because I did find out some interesting stuff
especially with my TwinScan merge program which is not dependent on
any one scanner and why I made it a separate entity.

Did you get sufficient accuracy with that?

It's a bit of a hit and miss for a number of reasons which is why I
tweaked it a lot. Even though the algorithm is supposed to be immune
to exposure difference I find that my drastic exposure jump by +4 AG
did affect it. So I had to narrow down the correlation to exclude the
extremes. But the biggest problem is the uneven nature of the
misalignment. Instead of just shifting the image by a fixed amount, I
actually ended up transforming the image in order to align it.

Fortunately, in this case the frog was poison proof and is making heaps of
profit from its effort.

Yes and Apple failed in everything else too.

Well, neither the scorpion nor the frog are renowned for their beauty. Other
designs like the R3000 might have been cleaner, but were are they now? (in
your dishwasher, maybe even in your scanner )
Anycase, this is more a topic for comp.arch

Yup!

Don.

 

[Don]

Again, I asked you two questions about your KNOWLEDGE,

And I answered them. Several times!

both of which can
be answered by facts (if you had such facts, which it is now clear that
you don't): "How do you KNOW that the algorithm is simple?" where the ONLY
factual reply would be "Because I've seen the algorithm, and it's simple";

What more do you need?

and, "How do you *know* it's a unversal problem?" where the ONLY factual
reply would be "Because the alogorithm and subsequent problem can be shown
to be device-independent." Neither was your reply, and what you did come
back with is completely subjective and unprovable.

That just doesn't make any sense whatsoever. I explained it twice
already. One last try:

Determining where to crop is *not* device dependent! You're just
dealing with an image which has a well defined border you want to
eliminate. That has nothing to do with where the image originated.

Here's two data points for you:
1) VueScan's cropping works exactly as expected with my scanners, and I've
never noticed a problem of any kind with this aspect of the program.

Great! Enjoy!

"Works for me" has nothing to do with objective evaluation of facts.

2) In looking at the list of changes to VueScan on Hamrick's site, I
didn't see one reference to fixing a "cropping problem". If it were a
"universal problem", it would probably be mentioned.

So, to you, what Vuescan site says is etched in stone? Well, if you
think that there's no point in continuing...

Quite the contrary. He's too embarrassed to admit it. It wouldn't be
the first time e.g., can you find any reference to the TWO YEAR long
Minolta stripes there?


Anyway, you just seem to be argumentative and respond to everything
with "no, it's not" and "how do you know" without any facts or
evidence, ignoring all facts and evidence provided to you.

Don.

 

[Don]

I'm not insisting.

Sorry, it was just a phrase...

As I noted a bit earlier, I had assumed that
Nikon's program was not as good as these third-party programs. I
would love to be corrected, since that program comes with the Nikon
scanner.

NikonScan is actually very good and you may find it does what you
need.

My advice would be start with NikonScan to get some bearings. After
all, as you say, it comes with the scanner. Then, with the knowledge
you gain from that, give the other programs a spin (if you find
NikonScan lacking or are just plain curious).

No different than doing darkroom work.

Exactly. Or anything else one is just getting into.

I'm asking because the last time I visited the Silverfast site, I was
thoroughly confused as to how any of their software would replace or
complement Photoshop. Probably my newbie-ness showing here.

No problem. You should see the questions I asked when I joined here 3
years ago! ;o)

Even though most scanner programs do offer some image editing features
you can do all that afterwards (and much better too!) in
post-processing with Photoshop.

The built-in scanner software image editing features are usually very
rudimentary and do not offer the multitude of tools a dedicated
program like Photoshop does. They are really aimed at people who do
not want to purchase a separate editor or bother editing the image
afterwards.

Which model scanner? How do you work around the problems?

It's not related to any particular model. There is no workaround as
such although Nikon does provide a Kodachrome option. However, it just
doesn't go far enough.

In the end, I personally, Twin Scan and then merge the two scans to
handle the dynamic range problem. But it's a very time consuming and
labor intensive process. Regarding the notorious blue cast, that's
even more difficult because this cast is non-linear. However, setting
the gray point will eliminate it to a large extent. But choosing this
is (for me at least) excruciating. I would prefer an objective method
and don't like guessing. What rubs me the wrong way is that I have to
do all this just to get the scan to look like the original i.e. get
back to square one! And that's before you even start the actual edit!

Sounds like a job for PhotoShop.

Definitely!

If you haven't taken the plunge yet, you may want to look into Minolta
5400 *Mark II.*, the one with the white LED. Maybe someone else here
with that scanner can post their experiences with Kodachromes?

On, the other hand Nikons are really very good. The separate RGB LED
light source is fantastic (color purity!) for all other media but, for
a variety of different reasons, it just doesn't get along with
Kodachromes at all!

Don.

 

[Don]

Deadly? Not really. Troublesome? Certainly, but fixable if you are
patient. It's not just the dynamic range but the thickness of the
emulsion that causes problems. But because NikonScan can increase the
exposure time through analog gain (and newer/current versions of
VueScan now do this as well), you can penetrate the emulsion. As also
noted, there tends to be a blue cast to Kodachrome scans. This, too,
can be fixed with settings on the analog gain.

The trouble is Analog Gain is linear while the Kodachrome blue cast is
not (the characteristic film curve). This means that Analog Gain
adjustments can correct a small range but not the whole image. For
example, if you examine dark shadows of such a scan (e.g. boost red
AG, cut blue AG) the shadows will have a red cast. Now, this may not
be objectionable in the big scheme of things, but it's there
nevertheless.

A good solution has already been mentioned by Don using multiple scans
at different exposures and then combining the results. Easy to say,
time consuming and often difficult to do. But more than 90% of my
slides are Kodachrome and I've been able to get quality scans using
both VueScan and NikonScan and a lot of patience.

Patience and a lot of elbow grease is indeed key!

What I find so frustrating is that I have to put in so much work just
to get the scan to baseline level (i.e. make it look like the slide).
And that's just the beginning! After that you still have to do the
regular editing. While, I don't mind the dynamic range trouble so
much, that ugly blue cast really gets to me...

As I wrote in my previous message, I wonder how does Minolta 5400
*Mark II* handle Kodachromes? Looking at the PDF of the manual it
doesn't even have a special Kodachrome mode which I (optimistically)
interpret as meaning it doesn't need one i.e., it does not produce the
blue cast like Nikon does.

Don.

 

[T Shadow]

nailer apparently said,on my timestamp of 16/09/2005 7:39 PM:


I wish. Not all of them


Nope, still never seen it. Maybe it's just starting?
Not in the major retailers anyway.

--
Cheers
Nuno Souto
in sunny Sydney, Australia
(e-mail address removed)

http://www.digitalfaq.com/media/dvdmedia.htm


http://www.digitalfaq.com/dvdguides/buyerguides/buymedia.htm

 

[Roger S.]

Quote:

Don wrote about Vuescan:
"However, if you don't care for quality and just want a quick a dirty
web scan it just may do the trick"

Roger S. responded:

This is not the only conclusion one can draw from the "facts" that VS
has and has had bugs. So Vuescan is only okay to use if you want a
"Quick [and] dirty web scan" and don't care about quality?

Don answered (truncated to save space):

"Correct...
objective fact: When you scan for Web you use very low resolution and output in >JPG. Only a *tiny* fraction of original (or "potential") data is still
present in such an image.
Given all that, it's *impossible* to tell a Vuescan JPG web scan from
the "best scanner program in the Universe" JPG web scan."

Well, I agree that this is correct- on the web low-resolution flatbed
scans can look acceptable. This doesn't prove that this is all Vuescan
is good for, only that Vuescan or any other program is more than good
enough for this purpose. The original poster didn't specify what the
scans were for by the time of Don's first reply.

Objective fact: I have an 8x12 on my wall from 35mm film done with
Vuescan.
Conclusion to be drawn from this: Vuescan can also be used for large
prints.

Here's a corollary to Don's assertion that VS is fine for web work. I
would state that if you do care about quality and want fairly large
enlargements from 35mm film, Vuescan may work as well for you as it has
for me.

 

[HvdV]

On Thu, 15 Sep 2005 20:53:43 -0400, Roger


True about the random access. But the problem with DVDs is that you
can't do a full system backup, unattended. I have about 30+ GB of
storage in my home network now. It's a pain in the tuchus to keep
swapping tapes, which hold about 6.7 GB each. DVDs would mean even
more swapping. That is why I've started to look into "mid-range"
business tape backups, used of course. Also SCSI of course.I want to
do a full network backup, purely unattended.

So I woudln't be buying the tape drive only for photo backup.

Which is why I am inclined to use tape. I realize that's not
mainstream, but that's OK by me.

In contrast to what most people think, the higher quality drives like the DLT
you have are actually quite fast, in the 5-30MB/s range, depending on the
model. I use an older one in combination with the (free) xfsdump software
which goes together with the very reliable XFS filesystem. Needs Linux
though. It allows you to easily select a file or directory from the tape for
restoring, usually after a 'human error'.

Good luck with your project, Hans