What are the really professional level flatbed scanners currently available? Creo/KodaK?
What are the really professional level flatbed scanners currently available? Creo/KodaK?
Thanks,
Kirk
at age 73:
"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep"
Ideally you should talk to Ted Harris but I can mention a few. There's the Creo/Kodak, I just bought the Creo IQsmart3 and so far find it far more of a professional tool than the Imacon it replaced. It's harder to get up and running because the software and scanner do so much more. Fuji makes a professional level flatbed, Screen has one, Azek has one.
The differences between these and Microteks,Epsons, etc is huge, there's really no comparison. My Creo IQ3 does 5500 optical over the entire 13x18" bed with great shadow detail and very low noise and I have yet to try wet mounting which will yield even better results. These really are professional, pre-press tools.
You get what you pay for - to get high resolution precision motors must be used, high end optics, etc. I have a refurbed Cezanne Elite coming on Monday. Can't wait to take it through its paces. $6k. The price of a refurbed Imacon 848 or better is well beyond that. Plus I can get 4-5k dpi of quality over the entire bed. Bought an nice Apple G4 for $200.
There will be some learning curve no doubt but I have a lot of film to practice with.
Joe
I ask because I had Ted do some scans for me and they were impressive. He is out of town till tomorrow I think.
Thanks,
Kirk
at age 73:
"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep"
Brian, wonderful work on your web site. I need to see your prints.
Question for everyone: Why choose a very expensive flatbed over a drum scanner? I understand the need for prepress - a flatbed is much more productive. But I'm curious about the reasons a fine art photographer chooses a flatbed.
Don, thanks for the kind words.
The flat bed has an advantage in that it also allows one to do very high quailty scans of mounted prints, and my prints often have a high amount of optical manipulation, that is more than just burning and dodging, so I need to scan the prints themselves.
One other reason I chose a new, still in production flatbed versus a used circa 1995 drum scanner is long term parts availability and repairs. Kodak/Creo is still making the scanner I bought and by law they have to have parts and service for it for at least 7 years from the end of production and Kodak is a rather substantial company. There is a fair chance that parts for a drum scanner built in 1995 might not be available in 2014. Also service for the Creo is in house, that is they come to your place, you're not shipping some 100 pound monster somewhere.
Also my creo uses firewire, not scsi which is barely supported on Macintosh, my preferred platform. While the drum scanner might have a very slight edge, and I mean very slight, in image quality, I don't think that difference would be visible except under the condition of having to scan a truly awful negative or one that requires extremes of density range. My negs are all within a very useable range.
So that was my rationale for the Creo IQsmart 3 over a drum scanner like a used Howtek.
My own thinking is that flatbeds are easier to use, easier to maintain, and the technology is newer. Nearly all drum scanners you see on the market are fairly old and those that are being made today very expensive. By contrast, new models of high end flatbeds continue to be introduced.
Drum scanners do have one important advantage over flatbeds, and that is in the area of dynamic range. If I were scanning professionally and had to deal with a large number of color slides the drum scanner would be my choice. However, the dynamic range of high end flatbeds is more than enough to scan B&W and color negative, which rarely have a Dmax of over about log 3.0.
Sandy King
Chrome is limited in dynamic range. How much more of the extremes can be captured? Does a greater Dmax improve color fidelity or capture shadow detail that the eye will fail to detect in a print? Is there truly a dramatic difference in quality between these different technologies at the high end? I suspect there are differences but will the average eye be able to notice this? I suspect the shadow and highlight detail is cleaner with higher Dmax. Is it like comparison like the difference between a $1k stereo system and a $20k stereo system?
I am curious as a scanner novice.
The other reason I choose this technology was for reflective scanning of art. While I don't have much of that myself I am surrounded by a lot of artists and this may help pay the way for the scanner.
Joe
I'm a drum scanner guy, but here's a few links to some of the current professional flat bed scanners:
Eversmart Supreme II
iqSmart 3
Screen Cezanne Elite
Fujifilm Lanovia Quattro
Aztek Plateau
Heidelberg seems to be completely out of the scanner game, I don't see their Linoscan flatbeds listed on their website any longer.
There are undoubtedly more that I've forgotten, Ted will know. And the used market has a number of good scanners that are no longer in production.
Expect to pay considerably more for a used professional flatbed then you would for a used drum scanner. Ted can give more details. Really, it depends on your application. A pro flatbed is often the correct answer, else there wouldn't be so many of them out there.
Bruce Watson
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