Best way to scan 11x14 prints?

[Larry Kellogg]

Hello,
I want to produce final prints on 11x14 fibre paper and then digitize them for the web. What is the best way to scan them? Any recommendations for scanners? I thought I would try to copy stand them but I read that someone could not get the light right no matter what they tried.

Regards,

Larry

[jbenedict]

1. If your 11x14 prints are from digital files, use PS or whatever to make them smaller for quick web downloads and to put a copyright on them to protect their use.

2. If you have a good scanner, scan them in two pieces and stitch them together.

3. If you have a copy stand and a digicamera, give it a try. LED desk lamps are pretty cheap and, for 11x14, I'd consider 4 of them.

4. Farm it out.

[Larry Kellogg]

1. If your 11x14 prints are from digital files, use PS or whatever to make them smaller for quick web downloads and to put a copyright on them to protect their use.

2. If you have a good scanner, scan them in two pieces and stitch them together.

3. If you have a copy stand and a digicamera, give it a try. LED desk lamps are pretty cheap and, for 11x14, I'd consider 4 of them.

4. Farm it out.

Sorry, I should have been clearer, my prints are made in the darkroom. I hate inkjet prints and think they pale in comparison to silver gelatin prints. There, I said it.

No, I will not scan the negatives, so that is not a possibility.

Are there any scanners that will do a good job of scanning 11x14 prints, without stitching.

Larry

[Light Guru]

Are there any scanners that will do a good job of scanning 11x14 prints, without stitching.

There are but they will be more expensive. There is the epson 11000xl which does 12x17 but it starts at $2500

A smaller scanner is going to be much cheeper. And photoshop will automatically stitch it together for you.

[Lenny Eiger]

Larry, lots of people can get the light right. People photograph flat art all the time. Many people use copy stands. I was taught to do this by my dad when I was a kid. He used photofloods on light stands. They were plenty uneven. Instead of pointing the lights directly at the image, he pointed them across the image, almost towards each other, and used the "spill light" at the edges. To get things even, we held up a gray card and measured with a meter, moved the lights until the reading matched all around. Today we have much better lighting systems, but the long and short of it is that almost all of them work just fine. You can even get nice soft light outside, depending where you live.

This is entirely doable, with just a little care...

Good luck,

Lenny

[jbenedict]

Sorry, I should have been clearer, my prints are made in the darkroom. I hate inkjet prints and think they pale in comparison to silver gelatin prints. There, I said it.

No, I will not scan the negatives, so that is not a possibility.

Are there any scanners that will do a good job of scanning 11x14 prints, without stitching.

Larry

That's fine. You like what you like. However, since you are putting them on the web, what's the difference in scanning prints and scanning the negatives?

Here's a thread on the topic. The OP is looking to scan 11x14 drawings:

http://forum.deviantart.com/art/general/1874894/

If those suggestions don't pan out, I think you are down to #4. Farm it out.

[Larry Kellogg]

That's fine. You like what you like. However, since you are putting them on the web, what's the difference in scanning prints and scanning the negatives?

Here's a thread on the topic. The OP is looking to scan 11x14 drawings:

http://forum.deviantart.com/art/general/1874894/

If those suggestion don't pan out, I think you are down to #4. Farm it out.

I will spend a lot of time producing my final print in the darkroom, with dodging and burning, and then I would have to repeat all of those operations in Photoshop. After all that, the resulting image will not look exactly like the silver gelatin print. I have sold off all of my digital gear, and will not go back, except to somehow produce digital files for the web.

There is a copy stand kicking around the darkroom, perhaps I will adapt it for photographing my prints. Thanks for the advice, Lenny. I really don't want to buy another digital camera, though. Perhaps one of the cheap Mustek ScanExpress scanners will do a good enough job. I don't have desktop space for a huge A3 scanner. I know, I'll check if International Center of Photography in New York has one. They must. I'll use theirs. I don't usually venture to the digital dark side of the house. ;-)

[LF_rookie_to_be]

Do consider an A3 desktop scanner. Microtek 9800XL A3+ sized scanner works well for me. It was really cheap, but required a lot of cleaning of the entire optical path, as well as the filter right in front of the CCD to get rid of the dreaded streaks. Also, I had to shim the "legs" on which the top platen with the glass rests on slightly in order to get the proper sharpness. Resolution is barely 1200 dpi, and you should create your own profile to get at least close to the colours of the original, but it can produce nice scans. Works pretty fast through a Firewire port connected to an old Apple Powerbook.

[vinny]

no need to scan the negs. I hate doing that and trying to match a darkroom print anyway. Fix a piece of galvanized steel too a flat wall in your house (or just use your fridge), get some magnet strips (the stuff that comes on a coil like tape) fix the prints to the metal. shoot them with your digital camera. two clip on shop lights will work as long as they are placed properly. I get better matches with less work doing this than scanning prints on my epson. Otherwise find an old epson flatbed that has the larger surface. I have one in storage I bought at a yard sale I've never used.

[djdister]

Consider the museum approach for flat artwork - a good copy stand setup. It is not hard to get even illumination across flat art if you know how to read a light meter.

[analoguey]

How about microtek 900? Anyone has experience with that?

Or the Epson 836 or such older model large format scanners

[Larry Kellogg]

I live in a small apartment, I don't have any desk space for a large scanner. I replaced the space taken by my Epson 3880 with photo books, a much better use of that space, and more satisfying. ;-) Thanks for the suggestions, though.

[ROL]

Larry, I am with you entirely, in spirit and in deed. It is your decision on how you wish to present your work – and scanning a negative is a far cry from scanning a finished piece. Whether that difference is significant enough to be judged by the casual viewer of your digital presentations is another matter. The internet being the pre-eminent form of communication at this point in time, and within the foreseeable future, this is an important decision.

My smallest fine art prints are 11"x14" – going much, much larger. I only show scanned prints as a matter of principle to support darkroom work (appreciated or not), so I am in the same boat as you. After I complete an edition, the last thing I do before moving on to another negative is to make an 8x10 "fine art proof", which is as close to the other editions as humanly (me, anyway) possible, solely for the purpose of scanning on my E-4990. You are welcome to go to my site (http://www.rangeoflightphotography.com), where you can see examples of print scanning in every gallery. Be aware, and this is not generally known, that my practice of making fine art proofs is not complete, some of the representations were made before I adopted the practice, and are actual proofs made before an edition was ever begun. Sorry, I wasn't able to offer a more direct solution to the issue, but there it is, as I am best able to handle it. A scanner capable of handling 11"x14" would be much preferable – as would winning the lottery.

[Larry Kellogg]

ROL,
Thanks for understanding. Nice work on your website! I can see the evidence of your skill in the darkroom, and the beauty of silver prints, in the scans of your 8x10 fine art proofs. I suppose I could go that route for the sake of getting something up there. Yes, scanning the 11x14 final print would be preferable. I was avoiding the topic of 16x20 prints, or even 20x24. ;-)

I suppose I could farm out the work, but if the prints were lost or damaged, I would have to cry. I suppose some people have no idea how much work goes into making a fibre print, and that the prints are at risk of being ruined at every step of the process, in developing, toning, drying, and flattening. It's not just pressing the print button. Still, I wouldn't have it any other way because there is something magical about the quality of silver gelatin prints.

Larry

[Vaughn]

Consider the museum approach for flat artwork - a good copy stand setup. It is not hard to get even illumination across flat art if you know how to read a light meter.

And with most alt process prints, this is the easiest way to go (textured surfaces can be difficult to manage). I did have access to a flatbed scanner that could handle 11x14, but found re-photographing the work with a digital camera a better way to go...though I have read of some work-arounds that others have figured out to deal with the paper/print texture. I have not explored these.

[jbenedict]

R
I suppose I could farm out the work, but if the prints were lost or damaged, I would have to cry. I suppose some people have no idea how much work goes into making a fibre print, and that the prints are at risk of being ruined at every step of the process, in developing, toning, drying, and flattening. It's not just pressing the print button. Still, I wouldn't have it any other way because there is something magical about the quality of silver gelatin prints.

You do make more than one copy of a final print, don't you? I am very familiar with what goes into making a fine print. I work on one particular print until I have it the way I want it and then I try to repeat it. I take good notes as I go and have developed standard procedures. I make three or four prints which are essentially identical. I sometimes decide after the fact to make some kind of change to the print and the process starts again.

I'm having a hard time understanding your existential turmoil regarding your silver prints and yet you are willing to show your work online in a way that will not come close to what you have created. In order to make them so viewers can see them without waiting two or three minutes for the pictures to load, you will have to make them smaller and that will cut the quality of the image. You will have to copyright them also so your photographs won't be stolen or, at the very least, you can identify the thief.

[Kirk Gittings]

Didn't see this above. Just do it in 4 pieces on an Epson flatbed and stitch them in PS-very easy.

[jhogan]

Lenny is right on above.

It can be done very inexpensively for prints this size: get yourself an easel or cork board, and a couple of 250w photo floods (both same brand/age/etc) screwed into hardware store clip-on fixtures. You'll need a digital camera with a reasonably good flat-field lens. You already have a tripod.

Set things up as described here: http://cuart.colorado.edu/resources/vrc/tips/photographing-2d/

Even illumination across the print is most important; you can use a DSLR in spot-meter mode if necessary. Use a tape measure to verify that both lights are equidistant from the work.

A few more things:

-make sure to include a color correction/white balance card within the camera's view but not touching your print. You will crop it out once you're done making corrections in PS or whichever editor you use.
-work on a properly profiled monitor.
-convert the files you wish to display on the web to sRGB colorspace once you're done editing.

One more important thing: No matter what you do, you will never get the digital versions of your prints to look identical to the physical versions for the simple reason that one is expressed to your eyes via a transmissive light source, versus the other which is expressed via reflected light. With some work, however, one can usually capture the "feel" of a print fairly well.

Good luck. ~J

[ROL]

I'm having a hard time understanding your existential turmoil regarding your silver prints and yet you are willing to show your work online in a way that will not come close to what you have created. In order to make them so viewers can see them without waiting two or three minutes for the pictures to load, you will have to make them smaller and that will cut the quality of the image. You will have to copyright them also so your photographs won't be stolen or, at the very least, you can identify the thief.

That just isn't true. Although the transmissive digital representation will never look just like a reflective fine art print, the goal is to get on most users' device screens in the most representational way possible. That means 72 DPI (320, if you're super anal about hi-res retina screen technology – which few have) at anything far less than 11"x14", probably less than 800 px on a side. At a resulting file size of less than 300 Kb per image, a whole page full should load almost instantaneously at common DSL speeds. Posting any larger file than this, anywhere on the internet is an invitation to copyright (http://www.rangeoflightphotography.com/pages/webmarketing#netproofing) infringement. My images average around 100 Kb – including those (sometimes the same) posted here.


Regarding PS stitching, that is an option I have not investigated as it seems just as easy to make a scan print while in the DR, and I no longer use PS. I use Pixelmator and Aperture and am unaware of stitching functions available in those programs. DSLR copying is also a reasonable, if you have that facility/ability.

[Light Guru]

Didn't see this above. Just do it in 4 pieces on an Epson flatbed and stitch them in PS-very easy.

Multiple scans and stitching them I'm photoshop was actually talked about in the first few responses. The OP does not seem to like that idea.

[ROL]

How about microtek 900? Anyone has experience with that?

Or the Epson 836 or such older model large format scanners

Thanks for providing links (not). These appear to very old scanners with archaic connectors. At least in the case of the Microtek, the flatbed appears to be 8.5x14, not getting us very far.

[Kirk Gittings]

OK. It works very simply. I just did it. Took about 5 minutes in no particular hurry. Far simpler for me than setting up lights and camera. The scanner is always ready to go.

[Darin Boville]

If it is for the web the scanner/stitch is by far the easiest way. Copying with lights and camera works too but usually better reserved for larger works. Just aim the lights at the far side of the painting for evenness. Open shade does a good job, too for non-gloss prints/paintings.

You don't want to scan the negs, my god. As you point out, you'll have to redo all your work, with different tools (photoshop vs darkroom). Sounds like a nightmare.

For high-resolution copies things get trickier but the same basic ideas apply.

--Darin

[tgtaylor]

I usually (but not always) start off with an 8x10 work print to determine the paper grade, filter pack and general printing flow to produce a print that I'm satisfied with. Then I live with a for a day or so and if it survives that test, I'll print it larger if a bigger print is what I want. Going that route I will always have an 8x10 to scan on my ancient Epson 3200 scanner.

Thomas

[Larry Kellogg]

Thanks for all the help. I don't have any angst, I just want a relatively easy way to capture some of the quality of silver gelatin prints. Hopefully, ICP has an A3 scanner.

If not, would those bar type scanners do a good enough job on an 11x14 print?

Larry

[enneffe]

Another vote for the 10000xl; just make sure to get the photo version in case you ever wish to scan film.

[Ashly85]

I should have been clearer, my prints are made in the darkroom. I hate inkjet prints and think they pale in comparison to silver gelatin prints. There, I said it.

[djdister]

For posting on the web, shooting a picture of the photo with any digital camera of 10MP or higher is more than adequate. Buying a flatbed scanner or even an oversize flatbed scanner (if you don't already have one) would be foolish for your stated purpose.

[mdarnton]

Do you have ANY digital camera? It seems like you need to treat this the way I treat old family pix: put them outside on the windowsill and shoot a digital photo of them. No fuss with lights, slow shutter speeds or anything. On one-offs, I line things up visually, no tripod, and it works fine. If you use a LF camera, you know how to get things parallel and straight, by eye. It's easy enough to try, and you should try. I've even done this with my phone, with surprisingly good results.

A digital camera is just a small scanner that doesn't handle the alignment problems automatically. Otherwise, they're functionally the same.