The best place to start is at
Wayne Fulton's information is succinct and accurate and will give you much good
information. He also sells a book including more information, though I have
not bought it.
Optimal resolution to be sent to an hp printer is 300dpi, and to an Epson is
360dpi. A scan of a 35mm film image results, on the LS-30 at 2700spi yields a
3800x2500 pixel image, approximately. Sending that to the printer results in a
360dpi image at the 8x10 size, but only 220dpi at 11x17. If the resulting
11x17 print looks good to you, then all is well. Theoretically, a 4000spi
filmscanner would result in a better print.
The 'grain' is hard to deal with - enlarge to 100% and see what it looks like.
You may have to apply some noise filters in Photoshop or whatever image program
you are using - median, gaussian blur, dust & scratches, or whatever works. Be
sure to apply them in individual color channels only - I find it helpful to
change to LAB color space, apply the median filter in the A and B channels, and
dust & scratches in the L channel.
Banding is generally a problem in broad expanses of the same color - especially
blue sky. A way around it is to select the sky using a mask of some sort, then
apply (again) a median filter in the appropriate channels, or a gaussian blur.
This will even out the colors and inhibit banding.
Maris
----- Original Message -----
From: "John Pendley" <jpendley@alltel.net>
To: <filmscanners@halftone.co.uk>
Sent: Wednesday, November 21, 2001 11:14 AM
Subject: Re: filmscanners: Novice scanner
| At 09:42 AM 11/21/2001 -0600, you wrote:
| >First question - how large do you like to print? If larger than 8 1/2 x
| >11" then you probably should get a 4000spi scanner instead of the
| >Acer. If not then the Acer should be fine.
|
| I like prints larger than 8 1/2 x 11 if the resolution is there. I found a
| math formula somewhere that produced the number 11 for the width of prints
| with a 2720 scanner. I supposed that would mean an 11" square print, or
| maybe an 11 x 17. You don't think the ScanWit will be satisfactory at 11 x
|17?
|
| >The grain that prints out - do you see it onscreen as well or only in the
| >print?
|
| It's hard to say. When I enlarge the color image that has all the red
| dots, almost to the stage of seeing the pixels, there is definitely color
| spotting in the shadowed part of the church wall, but it's not the same red
| dots that I get in a print. When I enlarge the B&W image on the screen,
| more and more grain becomes visible.
|
| >If only in the print then it sounds like a printer problem - try cleaning
| >the nozzles with Epson's software.
|
| There's definitely some kind of "grain" on the screen, though not exactly
| what I'm getting in prints, at least in color, anyway. I have used Epson's
| three utilities (clean nozzle, etc.) three or four times.
|
| > If onscreen then it may be what is called "dust and scratches". You
| > have probably read references to Digital ICE and to Vuescan's Dust and
| > Scratches filter similar to ICE - they both help but they need an IR
| > (infrared) channel to work. Another possible reason to switch scanners
| > as the ScanWit 2720S does not have the IR channel though their 2740 does.
|
| I didn't know that Vuescan had an ICE-type feature; as you say, it would
| not help with the 2720, anyway.
|
| >There is also an article on what is called Grain Aliasing at
| > - you might want to read that.
|
| Thanks; I'll read it right after I finish here.
|
| >Despite the discussions I would not be leery of the Nikon - I have the
| >Nikon LS-30 and am very satisfied with it. I also would not worry about
| >Polaroid's problems - the price is excellent with the $200 rebate, and
| >David Hemingway of Polaroid participates in this group and has assured us
| >the product is still being manufactured and rebates processed. I tend to
| >trust his word on that.
|
| That's good to know about David. At the moment, if I were to get a new
| scanner, it would be between the Polaroid and the Canoscan 4000. The Nikon
| might be a terrific scanner, but the price is a bit high for me.
|
| >The banding problem is more particularized - when you print an image, what
| >format is the image in (PSD, TIFF, JPEG, or what?)? And what is the
| >resolution that you are sending to the printer?
|
| First, I have prints with no visible banding. They were made using the
| same settings as the prints that do show banding. I have been printing @
| 6.666 x 10, as I like the 2:3 format of 35mm. I've set the resolution at
| 300 dpi, and all prints are from TIFF files. What seems even more puzzling
| is that the slide that shows the most banding also shows bands in the scan
| on the monitor.
|
| >Good luck to you! I started late myself.
| >
| >Maris Lidaka Sr
|
| Thanks for your willingness to help Maris. I hope that my answers to your
| questions will give you some new ideas.
|
| Regards,
| John
