[filmscanners] Re: Some findings/thoughts on the Sprintscan120 (comments verywelcome please)

["Dave King" <kingphoto@mindspring.com>]

Ed Hamrick said at one point he uses the color neg profiles Kodak developed
for Pro Photo CD.  That, and the fact the tonal range isn't compressed
unavoidably, is the secret to Vuescan.  Too bad about Insight's color neg
profiles!  It's otherwise a good program.

Dave

----- Original Message -----
From: "Simon Lamb" <simon@sclamb.com>
To: <kingphoto@mindspring.com>
Sent: Sunday, April 14, 2002 6:20 AM
Subject: [filmscanners] Re: Some findings/thoughts on the Sprintscan120
(comments verywelcome please)


I did not try Silverfast, although Vuescan did produce some better results.
I take your point about the Flextight, although I always get slides in
strips and mount them myself when I have selected the keepers.  There is a
strip Flex holder that allows up to four to be scanned at once, you need to
turn the strip around to do the last two frames of a six frame strip.  There
is also a three frame 6X6 holder (actually it is a 6X18 holder).

Obviously scanning a back catalog of mounted slides would be a headache.

I will try scanning the Portra as a RAW file and see if that makes a
difference.  To be honest, it amazes me that a £30 piece of software such as
Vuescan can produce a scan in TIFF format that is vastly superior to
Insight.  I guess Insight just got the profile wrong, but as I said, Vuescan
produces superior scans on Provia, Scala and Delta.

As part of this workflow I am looking to minimise the Photoshop manipulation
time required, and Insight doesn't look like it will allow that.  I will
download the Silverfast demo and try that too.  I do not want to open the
Silverfast Ai supplied with the scanner in case they will not take it back
should I return it.

Thanks for your reply.

Simon

On 14/4/02 10:07 am, "Lloyd O'Daniel" <lodaniel@bham.rr.com> wrote:

> I have the SS4000, but I have access to a friend's SS120. Your
> experience does not mirror his or mine. We both actually prefer Insight
> to Silverfast for routine scans, although we primarily scan chromes. The
> only negs I've done on his machine are circa 1980 Kodacolor and VPS
> 645's. In that case, I did raw scans there and did the processing here
> with Silverfast HDR or Photoshop. Results were very good. Have you tried
> Silverfast?
>
> If/when I can afford it, I might go for a Flextight Photo as well. They
> are considered a cut above, and priced accordingly. The only caveats I
> have with that scanner are I believe you have to unmount 35mm slides and
> cut negs individually or into very short strips. From a film handling
> and storing viewpoint for me, that would be a headache.
>
> Lloyd
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: filmscanners_owner@halftone.co.uk
> [mailto:filmscanners_owner@halftone.co.uk] On Behalf Of Simon Lamb
> Sent: Sunday, April 14, 2002 2:23 AM
> To: lodaniel@bham.rr.com
> Subject: [filmscanners] Some findings/thoughts on the Sprintscan 120
> (comments verywelcome please)
>
>
> I have had some private communication with Art Entlich regarding the SS
> 120 and he has been, and is continuing to be, very helpful and
> supportive.  I though I would share some of the comments that I made
> with the group to see if anyone has any comments to make.  All would be
> welcome. ____________________
>
> I have scanned quite a few slides so far and have had varying results.
> The film term in Insight for Kodak Porta 160 is way, way off.  The
> resulting scan bears absolutely no resemblance to the original neg. or
> even the prints, and required so much work in Photoshop to recover it
> that I gave up, it just seemed unrecoverable.  I think the film terms in
> general within Insight need to be reviewed.  Scanning using the generic
> slide terms when using Provia also produced bad results.  The only good
> scan I got was using the generic slide term when scanning Kodak E100VS.
> As for black and white, after over ten attempts with Scala, Delta 100
> and Delta 400 I gave up.  The scans where very dark, the black point
> stopped dead on all scans at about 30, as if all the pixels at that end
> had been pushed up against a wall.
>
> So, I moved on to using Vuescan.  The Provia scanned well although the
> colour accuracy was not too good.  My Nikon Coolscan LS30 produced a
> better scan from a colour perspective, although obviously not as
> detailed.  The Delta 100 scan was one of the best black and white scans
> I had ever seen. Absolutely perfect tonal balance and immense detail.
> The Scala was good but lost some detail in the highlights.  The Porta
> 160VC was detailed but there was a significant amount of white speckling
> all over the scan.  I assume from this, and the fact that the Insight
> term produced the worst scan imaginable, that the SS 120 just has
> difficulty with the Portra emulsion.  A shame, since my LS30 scans it
> very well.
>
> So where am I now.  Well, the SS 120  can obviously produce detailed
> scans, but I will have to rely on Ed Hamrick's Vuescan to get them,
> especially for black and white which is a big proportion of my work.  I
> am not really happy about relying on third party software because should
> Ed decide to pack it in then I will have a scanner from which it will be
> difficult to get the results I need.  The carriers are fiddly.  In many
> cases the 6X6 film does not lie perfectly flat in the carrier, and it is
> impossible to line up a strip of 35mm unless you leave the carrier
> slightly undone.  Most of the scans I did using Insight required a lot
> of work in Photoshop to get them close to what I wanted,  and some were
> just too far out to be workable.
>
> I think I will return the SS 120 and try the Flextight Photo.  I did
> find when comparing it side by side with the SS 120 in the store that
> the Photo just about always reproduced the image as near as possible to
> the original colour, contrast etc.  The built in film profiles seemed to
> be accurate.  It may take twice as long to scan, but I may save that
> additional time not having to do so much in Photoshop.
>
> Your comments on my findings would be welcomed.  I know a lot of people
> use the SS 120, so either I am doing something wrong or they just put
> the effort in to correct images post scanning.
>
> I was using Insight 5.5.1.
>
> Regards.
>
> Simon

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