Lab for Drum Scans

[bglick]

Bruce, very nicely designed web site.... what type of drum scanner are you using?

Glad to see so many available services to the occasional LF shooters...

[Lenny Eiger]

Bruce, very nicely designed web site.... what type of drum scanner are you using?

Glad to see so many available services to the occasional LF shooters...

I also offer drum scans. Web site is <a href="http://www.eigerstudios.com">here</a> I am working on a pile of 300 of them from a photographer in Sweden. I do offer special rates for volume...

Lenny

[Tyler Boley]

AnzaRunner, it appears you may be the only forum member who does not offer drum scans. Good luck...
Tyler (also offering drum scans, clearly at this point a profitless endevour)

[AnzaRunner]

It really amazes me how many people out there have drum scanners. I have no intention of buying one any time soon since there seems to be an art to it, and obviously they are not cheap. It seems like it's the natural progression for many photographers to eventually buy a scanner. To those that own a scanner and use it for their own personal work and not as part of a business --- Did you buy the scanner new or used? It seems like quite a few people are using some older models with great success.

[bglick]

> It seems like it's the natural progression for many photographers to eventually buy a scanner. To those that own a scanner and use it for their own personal work and not as part of a business --- Did you buy the scanner new or used?


I bought all mine new.... That's because, back in the hey days, used drum scanners sold at relatively high prices vs. new. Now, the bottom fell out of the market, mainly because they are much higher risk investments. A $3k used drum scanner can easily need $5k worth of work to bring up to spec. Most of them have no factory service or factory parts.


These are high speed machines, lots of movement, vibration, wear, etc. I buddy of mine had his Howtek 8000 tuned up by Aztek, $7k, it was 4 years old. New bearings, new motor, a few new boards where the vibrations loosened some of the electronics, etc. But considering it logged decent mileage, not too bad...


And you are right, it is a natural progression to scan your own work... when you consider the cost of LF gear... a used drum scanner is not that expensive, just another required tool for the craft.


Scanner software used to be considered complex, but that was before Photoshop became ultra sophisticated, and took over the graphics world...now if you understand PS and color management, most scanner software is not very complicated. However, if you are not well versed with PS, there can be a learning curve. Some of the posters above offer training services.... this would greatly reduce the learning curve...

[Lenny Eiger]

It really amazes me how many people out there have drum scanners. I have no intention of buying one any time soon since there seems to be an art to it, and obviously they are not cheap. It seems like it's the natural progression for many photographers to eventually buy a scanner. To those that own a scanner and use it for their own personal work and not as part of a business --- Did you buy the scanner new or used? It seems like quite a few people are using some older models with great success.

I bought a used 4500 for my first time out - just for me. I was very impressed with it, so impressed I got rid of my digital camera back and went back to film. I got so involved I decided to go back into scanning and printing as a business and purchased a Premier so that I could offer scans to folks with small and medium format film. Little did I know almost all my customers would be large format users...

There are a lot of used ones out there, some good, others with issues. In the best case scenario, funds allowing, I recommend that anyone purchasing a used Howtek type scanner have it sent directly to Aztek for tuning - first. Then when you start, you know you are working with something in good order.

Lenny

[JohnnyV]

Don't feel so bad AnzaRunner...I used to have a drumscanner...now I just moderate a high end scanner forum. 8-}

The majority of posters on this thread are members of the forum. You can't go wrong with any of them.

[IanMazursky]

To me drum scanning isnt a job anymore...its fun!
Maybe im weird but i love every minute of it. The sounds, the smells and the clients.
Its all fun for me! Even those days when nothing seems to work and I have the scanner in parts. Somehow I fix it and all is right with the world.

But Lenny is correct, make sure you know what you are buying. Its like a used car, unless you know how to fix it yourself, have Aztek give it a run through.

Drum scanners are precision machines that need proper TLC.
A fair amount of them on the used market seem to be moving from owner to owner.
I have seen the same ones on ebay sold a bunch of times. I know for a fact that a few of them that I have come across are in really bad shape but are sold with a good condition label. Or the drums are trashed.

I always say to anyone getting ready to enter into the biz, Caveat emptor.
Be prepared for anything and everything and be ready to spend the money to fix it.

[Tyler Boley]

It really amazes me how many people out there have drum scanners. I have no intention of buying one any time soon since there seems to be an art to it, and obviously they are not cheap. It seems like it's the natural progression for many photographers to eventually buy a scanner. To those that own a scanner and use it for their own personal work and not as part of a business --- Did you buy the scanner new or used? It seems like quite a few people are using some older models with great success.

I didn't really mean to imply you should get one, I was attempting a little joke, a very little joke.
Tyler

[AnzaRunner]

I didn't really mean to imply you should get one, I was attempting a little joke, a very little joke.
Tyler

I never even thought you were implying that. My question is just a straightforward observation based on the responses I've seen here.