Beautiful Images... What Scanning Method ?

[James Beck]

The Tango has an 18.5 micron aperture (among other sizes) which works well when scanning negs. It is NOT fixed at 11 microns.

[Lenny Eiger]

The Tango has an 18.5 micron aperture (among other sizes) which works well when scanning negs. It is NOT fixed at 11 microns.

It was in the past, however. And I am quite sure that some of the labs are still using older software and/or don't know how to modify this. Just like many of them don't know how to turn the sharpening off.

When I spoke to Cramer about this last - a few years ago, he had only figured how to do a low setting and hi setting. Obviously, this has gone farther... I am happy that you can make your scanner do what it ought to... especially since I think E6 is about to go bye bye and color users will all be doing C41...

Lenny

[Ivan J. Eberle]

Bill Nordstrom at LaserLight has one of the Tangos in question and he told me that above 8bit capture at 2800 dpi it's all hardware interpolation.

He was steadfastly NOT using Silverfast, however. (I offered to lend him my chipped B&W G4 to punch through the 200 MB file size at which his old System 7 system choked, but he declined). I never did determine whether Silverfast could address the Tango A/D converter hardware for a real 16 bit capture, or whether SF is only interpolation, too.

[ashlee52]

I'd be surprised if E6 goes away, because transparency film offers such easy "proofing" by direct inspection. I won't be surprised if someone developes an E6 film specifically made for scanning which operates like a C41 film (more linear response, lower contrast, better shadow detail).

Astia is a bit like that already.

Remember that motion pictures are still shown by projection, so there is a large underlying "market" for transparency film.

[James Beck]

I am happy that you can make your scanner do what it ought to.

Thank you, my clients are happy that I know what I’m doing too.

Confirming with a Hell/Heidelberg technician/engineer yesterday, the Tango and Primescan are essentially the same scanner. Under the operation of either Linocolor or Newcolor software, aperture selection would be based upon enlargement, resolution and scan quality factor set by the operator. From that point the operator would the have the option to override the selected aperture either 5 steps larger or smaller. If there is a Tango or Primescan with a fixed aperture I would think it would be an exception and not the rule.

Reviewing the reference and users manuals, Linocolor’s aperture control was labeled “spot size” under the correction/filter menu and Newcolor’s control was labeled “aperture”, displayed as a slider with an icon depicting and small and large iris on the main overview scan window/menu. I hope that will help the Tango-Primescan operators who were not aware of these features or got their previous information from operators who “don't know how to turn the sharpening off” or “only figured how to do a low setting and hi setting”.

Respectfully,
Jim

[Karl Hudson]

Hello LF Group,
As a hardware specialist on the Tango, Primescan, and all other Heidelberg high-end scanners, I can assure you there was never a model with a fixed aperture. Going back to the DC300B in the 1970's, every scanner they manufactured at the old Hell factory in Kiel, right up until it closed a few years ago, had a variety of different aperture sizes to choose from. Even the flatbed scanners, Topaz & Nexscan, contained iris apertures which had a coarse range but were adjustable nevertheless. R&D departments in Kiel spared no expense back in the day and equipped the scanners with the appropriate hardware for a wide variety of applications in the Printing Industry. Of course that's an application that has pretty much disappeared now, and the life of these scanners continues on in the professional photography world. It's really cool there is so much renewed interest being generated in devices I grew up with, but please remember...it really doesn't matter how magnificent the hardware is, there is no comparison to years of scanning experience. There are still people out there from the old school who possess a deep understanding of what a scanner can do, how different settings will affect the final product (before starting the scan), and they can spot a hardware problem right off when they notice results that are not what they are used to seeing. If you are shopping for a high end drum scanner, try to find one that was in a clean and cool environment where the people running it actually cared about the machine and took care of it. If you find a scanner in bad shape from being in a bad environment and from being run by inexperienced operators, then these machines will usually need the services of an experienced tech to bring them back to their original level of quality (and maybe some touch up paint too). If quality is paramount for you, I recommend finding an independent separator or digital file service run by a pro with decades of experience to scan your prized images. Karl Hudson / Hudson Grafik Services, Inc.

[Professional]

Today i will go and take my 2 films [120, still not having any large format yet], and i asked them to scan, so i will see how the scans came out and i will compare it with my scanning by my V750, i hope they didn't scan by drum scanner as my friend who uses this lab told me they scanned with normal scanner and their Imacon, so if they didn't use Imacon scanner and not film scanner as well, how come they get those amazing results? I saw my friend results yesterday, were terrific sharp and color are outstanding exactly the way we want to see, i can't wait to see mine tonight.

I will keep reading online until i know the best way to use my V750, i have Betterscanning holder + ANR as well.

[Bob McCarthy]

The Tango has an 18.5 micron aperture (among other sizes) which works well when scanning negs. It is NOT fixed at 11 microns.

Let me change the question to professional flatbeds. I'm using a Cezanne. It sounds that on a variable aperture drum scanner there are optimum aperture settings for the type (grain size) of different films. Does the same hold true with a flatbed?

Since a flatbed essentially zooms across the bed and the effective aperture size (equivalent) therefore changes, are there setting which are detrimental to the scan, picking up this (anti)aliasing effect

ie 4000 dpi on a large format or X on 120.

Heck, I'm scanning 8x10 at 1000 dpi, occasionally 2000 dpi, whats grain?

bob

[AFSmithphoto]

Back to the original question of workflow, my particular setup is on an epson 4990. I use a betterscanning film holder (Which I like for the height adjustment) with Scanscience glass (which I like because its so thin) I wet mount and place the glass in the holder with the film face DOWN, so that from top to bottom the light path goes light source > scan science glass > film > optical mylar > Epson bed glass > light sensor.

The final touch is that I drape an old changing back over the lid of the scanner before scanning to prevent any light (infinitesimal though it may be) from the room from entering the system and bouncing around between the scanscience glass and the epson glass, which I theorize would rob me of micro contrast.

If you'd like to see examples you can check out

http://pmotionfilm.com/gallery/

Not all of those are from the epson, several are 35mm shots scanned with the previously mentioned minolta dimage scan elite 5400 II, which can work wonders with 35mm. (Not that you could tell the difference at web resolutions anyway.)

[Professional]

I want to see results from V750 if possible.