Imacon 949 vs. Epson 4990

[Kirk Gittings]

For whatever it is worth. I have spent the better part of the summer in Chicago at the School of the Art Institute using their Imacon 949 scanner. I have to say that it is an impressive piece of equipment compared to the Epsons. Its sharpness is absolutely superb and it is incredibly fast. It does suffer from mediocre software and there is more noise in color scans than I would like at this price point. If Silver fast were available for it this would be for me the ultimate scanner package. This Imacon is not an incremental advantage over the Epsons but in another class by itself. As I have said many times before you can get an acceptable scan from the Epsons that will give you a good 11x14 and an acceptable 16x20 with intelligent sharpening, but the Imacon far exceeds this "16x20 acceptability". If I owned one I would never get another drum scan or use the Epson again. Of course I cannot begin to afford one so that is an idol threat and since I live in New Mexico I won't be using this one very often either so by and large I will continue withe the 4990.

There has been some buzz here that these Imacons were only marginally better than the Epsons and not worth the much higher price, but my experience with this one leads me to believe otherwise. I actually flew home one weekend and brought back a ton of film that I want to work on this year solely so I could scan them here on the Imacon.

[Steven Barall]

Kirk, would you say that the Imacon is a great compromise to a good drum scanner of that the Imacon is not a compromise at all but infact stands on its own?

Also, how do you sharpen? What software do you use?

Thanks.

[David Luttmann]

Same here Kirk. We use an Imacon 343. I couldn't afford the model that scans 4x5....but a freind of mine has one so we trade off work once in a while when I need a 4x5 scan. I've taken 6x7 scans up to 32x40 from a 16bit scan to Lightjet. The Imacons hold up very well. Since we obtained ours, we have not had one drum scan done. I'll echo you on the noise....but I felt it was minor.

Kirk, were you using the new V4 software for the scanner?

[Doug Dolde]

For the price they ought to be good. A less expensive and very high quality option is one of the Creo iQsmart flatbeds which can be used with their oil mounting station. Even with the iQsmart1 you are looking at $10K with the mounting station. Unfortunately the iQsmart1 only does 4x5 at 2100 dpi max. Still that is as good as the Imacon's resolution for 4x5.

I had them do a test scan of a 4x5 transparency (on an iQsmart2) that I had also previously had scanned on a Heidelberg Tango. It was as good as the Tango to my eye.

I am still in the mode of Epson 4990 for proofs then sending out the ones I want to print for a Tango scan. I use Photokit Sharpener for the 4990 and particularly like the high pass sharpener ar level 3 for that scanner. You can reduce the opacity of the sharpening layers if it's too strong.

[Bruce Watson]

You can buy a used drum scanner with all the trimmings for less than an Imacon 949. In most cases, for much less.

As to quality, drum scans still can't be beat. CCDs continue to lag behind PMTs for sharpness, dynamic range, and noise.

So if what you are after is the biggest bang for your buck, you really should to consider buying a used drum scanner and doing your own scans. It's not nearly as hard as people who have never done it would like you to think. If I can do it, anyone can.

[Kirk Gittings]

We do a ton of scans in my business. If we were to spend money on an upscale scanner, I would by the Imacon because of the ease of use and the speed of the scans and it would give us all the quality we would need.

I prefer SilverFast scanning software and find it superior to anything else out there native or aftermarket like Vuescan. It really helps maximise the potential of the 4990.

I use two sharpening plugins PhotoKit Sharpener for capture and selective sharpening aand OPTIPIX "Safe Sharpen" for final output sharpening. The "capture" sharpenining is unneccessary on drum or Imacon scans but is on the 4990 scans.

Bruce, I have gotten allot of drum scans over the years and these are comparable.

Dave, I am not sure. I do know the scanner is less than a year old and they keep the software updated.

I have to say that I was pleasently surprised by these results. I did not expect the Imacon scans to be this good! I only initially used it to humour a freind at the school.

[Kirk Gittings]

Also, This may mean something to some of the architectural photographers out there. Hedrich Blessing is scanning everything they shoot in house on the same scanner and delivering files these days to all but a few book publishers and magazines.

[QT Luong]

In fact, a used Tango goes for less than the 949, and they even sometimes a 848. One thing that bothered me about the Imacons was that the resolution drops with film size. So if you have a piece of 5x7 film, the largest file you can produce is about 230MB... this might suffice in practice, but it is not very satisfying for a scanner of that price. Of course, the Imacon won't scan 8x10. For smaller formats, they seem convenient, though.

[Ole Tjugen]

I have had a 5x7" slide scanned on an Imacon 88 scanner. The file is 322Mb, lagre and sharp enough for a 40x54" print without showing scanning artefacts or loss of sharpness at a noselength's distance. That's good enough for me :)

[Eirik Berger]

If I just could get rid of that annoying banding effect in the shadow areas of the image, I would be very happy with my BW scans from the Epson 4990.

I scan 8x10" Fuji Acros with Vuescan. I scan them with the emulsion side down and flip the image in Vuescan. I did this to avoid Newton-rings and it looks as it helped. I Have tried with 16-bit, multisampling, "Long exposure pass" and made greyscale file from only one sensor.

[neil poulsen]

I'd like to see one or more of the Imacon scanners included in the scanner comparison on this site.

[Frank Petronio]

I can't imagine needing more than what an Imacon can deliver. I suppose somebody wants 1gb files but I live in reality.

[QT Luong]

Ken Caddell/Hasselblad USA:
The FT848 scanner will scan the 5x7 transparencies at a maximum
resolution of 1600 dpi. The FT 949 will only scan up to 4x5, not the 5x7
transparencies.

[Spencer Cliss]

Just today we began our evaluation of the 949. If they only could add infrared for dust removal! We tried their own FlexTouch algorithm but it either left dust in the scan or it created artefacts.

What is the best way to remove dust from trannies before scanning?

AFAIK, there is no scanner for 5x7 and larger with digital ICE other than the low end flatbeds such as the Epson 4990. And most uf us agree these make fuzzy scans.

Kodak's list on machines with DICE shows a Durst machine doing up to 4x5.

I think the major differentiation between the 949 and a used drum scan is not primarily price and quality but speed and ease of handling. The 949 we tried today indeed scanned at about 200 MB/s as advertised but that was the pure scan process. Before scanning it wastes about 20 seconds to detect the film carrier and the FlexTouch algorithm and writing the file to disk took about twice as long as scanning! This was on a Mac mini though and the dealer promised to hook up a Mac G5 the next time we try which will be faster.

The Imacon software had a bug or two. It ignored our desire to scan at 16 bit depth in one instance. In anothe instance, it refused 8000 ppi and went no higher than 6300. On a 4x5 it maxed out at a 408 MB scan whereas we expected 500+.

My analysis woud be as follows. The 949 is faster than any other scanner able to produce 200+ MB files that produces quality close to a drum scan. The lack of infrared dust and scratch removal will be missed sorely by a lot of users. The format size is limited to 13x18 cm.

[QT Luong]

What I found most disappointing with the Epson on 5x7 is not so much that it produces
fuzzy scans, but rather that ICE would not work above a certain resolution that is much
lower than the scanner's real resolution.

[Kirk Gittings]

QT,
Is this true if you run it through Silverfast AI 6 from the desktop? That usually defeats all the size limitations.

[QT Luong]

Yes, that's what I think I've been doing on Mac OS X (I use the "SF launcher" app). I've read about the problems when using scanning software through PS, so I never do so.

[Raymond Nielsen]

Nice Discussion! I have a few questions for those of you with more experience and knowledge of Imacon 949 and possibly other high-end scanners.

I work for a company that processes thousands of images every month. We have been using the Nikon 9000ED’s for over a year, and is satisfied with both the overall quality and dust removal. However, some editing in Photoshop is required. Mainly some dust, colour correction and levels. The overall speed on the scanner is another issue, and together with the work required in photoshop, this gets time consuming and therefore, expensive.

I’m considering a purchase of one or two Imacon 949 scanners with mounted slide feeders. I’ve been invited to a dealer for a demonstration, but before I go, hopefully I’ll get some objective answers from anyone on this forum.

1. Will the scans from the 949 require less time than the 9000ED in photoshop for professional results, regarding to dust, colour correction and levels? Our ideal solution would be no (or close to) editing in photoshop, and still be able to deliver great images to customers that usually do some editing before print. The preview of the images still needs too look good with no dust or scratches, and a satisfying colour balance. On this issue, I have also read that magnum photos uses three 848’s and output the images directly to their stock archive with no editing!

2. The whitepaper suggests that the scanner will use approx. 65 minutes on 50 slides, 50MB pr. File. Can anyone verify this? We are looking at scanning 60 000 – 70 000+ images at each Imacon a year, so any experience with the speed and durability would be appreciated.

3. Is the frame detection bullet-proof? No need to set the crop if you want to scan as much of the picture as possible without getting any black borders? Croping the frames with the 9000ED are quick, but 30 seconds on 10 000 images is quite a few minutes…

4. Does the scanner accept different frames for the slides? We get the typical plastic frames at different sizes and sometimes paper frames.

5. Is there other alternatives we should consider instead of the Imacon 949?

6. Have anybody heard any news of new and better models? I don’t want to blow 45 000$+ and learn that a new model is soon out….

Any answers on this are highly appreciated, and I apologise if my questions is a little out of the topic.

Frank, have you tried cleaning the trannies with compressed air? We use that at our business, and it works great. Remember to limit the pressure!

[Michael S. Briggs]

Raymond, for your question #5, totally out of my amateur experience, perhaps a Durst Sigma scanner might meet your high volume needs.

[Doug Dolde]

After more use I am finding the Epson 4990 to be pretty much a P.O.S. I hate it so much now that I can hardly even stand using it for proofs. I'm sending almost everything out for an Imacon 949 scan from JaincoTech or a Tango scan from WCI.

The Tango scans ARE significantly better than the Imacon 949 scans but it that really any surprise? That said the 949 scans are pretty good for $14 each including dust spotting. I go for the Tango scans when I have a difficult transparency (ie strong highlight and or shadow) or I need them back fast. I get less than a week turn around from WCI and more like 2-3 week turn around from JaincoTech.

[Kirk Gittings]

Doug,

About my experience in a nutshell. How large are you printing?

[Doug Dolde]

Kirk,

Mostly only 16x20 on my 3800; occassionally larger. It's not a resolution problem rather a color accuracy, tonality and sharpness issue. The Epson is lousy on all three counts.

I have to wonder why Epson can make such great printers then flunks scanning 101. I'd be willing to pay more for a GOOD Epson scanner.

[Kirk Gittings]

What software were you using? I really only find fault with the sharpness and go for drum or imacon scans when I want to print 16x20 or larger. With Silverfast the rest is mostly my fault. Now remember the Tango and Imacon scans come with an expert scanning technician.:)

[Ted Harris]

For the most part I agree with Kirk. Color accuracy should ot be a problem with any of the scanners mentioned as long as the operator is skillful and that same expert scanning technician may be able to do more with the Imacon and Tango scans in terms of out-of-the-scanner color accuracy ... even though the capabilityis there is Silverfast Ai it is certainly not as easy or intuitive to use as the clolr management tools in the Color Genius Software for my Cezanne.

As for the tonality, there is no doubt that you will get better tonal range from the higher end scanners; the question is will you be able to see it in an 8x10 print, or even an 11x14?

Finally resolution, if by that you mean accutance/contrast/sharpness that couldwell be the case and would be atrributable to the superior optics in the higher end scanners. Again, with proper sharpening I am not sure you will see the difference in smaller prints.

All that said, since I started using the Cezanne, my 1800f sits idle for other than training and workshop use.

[Baxter Bradford]

The Epson scanners have improved enormously in recent years. I had a 'Perfection 1200' which I managed to get working well with Vuescan's multipass facility to boost Dmax by minimising shadow noise. Output looked fine in isolation, but when compared with scans from my Imacon Precision II, they lack colour depth - by a significant margin. The 949 is obviously better specified than my older scanner. FWIW, both scanners had been ICC profiled.

I had a 'print sniffer' attend one of my exhibitions a couple of years ago in which there were some A3 B+W images from both scanners. He wanted to know the difference, so I politely invited him to look hard at the prints (as if he already hadn't) and identify those from the Epson and Imacon. He couldn't, and was a bit miffed that this was the case. Had the prints been bigger, or had I included colour shots from both scanners instead of just those from my Flextight, his task would have been easy.

I have long been a fan of the importance of the optics in a scanner. Pixel-packing poorly resolved data serves little purpose in my opinion other than to slow working.

Unlike some of the previous comments, I find the Flexcolor software really intuitive. Once I have film characteristics adjusted and saved as a preset, there is very little to adjust for each scan - usually just set black point from rebate and then the shadows slider.

[Charles]

This is a bit off subject but here it is FWIW...I use an older Imacon Flextight that is not natively 4x5 capable but I tried an experiment based on a hunch and I was flabbergasted with the results. I loaded a 4x5 in the 617 carrier, scanned each half of the frame (with overlaps) at 3200dpi, ran the two frames thru the panorama stitching mode in Photshop CS3 beta. I cannot tell where the stitches are made and the results are stunning. About a 1 gig file depending on exactly how Photoshop processes the two frames.

[neil poulsen]

What software were you using? I really only find fault with the sharpness and go for drum or imacon scans when I want to print 16x20 or larger. With Silverfast the rest is mostly my fault. Now remember the Tango and Imacon scans come with an expert scanning technician.:)

Is this from your medium format film?

Also, how does a medium format dedicated scanner like the Nikon 9000 fit into your workflow? Aren't the results from the Nikon supposed to be superior to the flatbeds? Is there a downside to the 9000?

[Kirk Gittings]

Neil I had an 8000 which I got rid of a few months back. I currently have a 750, 1800f and access to Imacons. I was referring to 4x5.

[Dan Baumbach]

There's a lab in Berkeley, CA, CanToo, that rents time on an Imacon. I love the scanner. I'm made a number of 32x40 prints from Imacon scans that are just beautiful. I wish I could afford on but at least Berkekey isn't too far from me and the rental price is very reasonable.

- Dan.

[David_Senesac]

One thing I'm curious about regarding the 4990/750 Epson flatbed scanner is the nature of their pre-scanning color and luminance setup software. Not that I have even the slightest interest in ever tossing more money down a flatbed hole as I've long been firmly entrenched with drum scans. I have an old Epson 2450 scanner that for each subsequent scanner model, Epson has changed and likely improved on their interface. When the 2450 was released, the Epson software controls were roundly condemned with a fair amount of users instead opting for installing the Silverfast controls. A friend of mine bought the next major Epson scanner released but what little I saw of that, did not impress me much. Of course their are more issues with these flatbeds than just the software, but I'll leave that alone here.

Basically the main problem at least with the old software was crummy controls. Considerable color balance problems might occur each time any setting adjustment was changed. Of course each scan depending on the nature of overall tones in order to center the sensor to medium tones requires adjustment of white/black/gamma and my experience was the resulting color non-linearities that one would end up with were so unpredictable that I'd waste a lot of effort trying to get that right within a quite compressed low Dmin/Dmax range of output data. Thus getting the color right back then had little to do with having expertise with pre adjusting the software because the software was abysmal. Now hearing about Doug's nausea in using the 4990/750 whatever is in there I'm wondering if anything has actually improved? ...David

[Ron Marshall]

David, my 4990 came with Silverfast Ai, which after a few practice scans I found simple to use and fairly easy to get a good scan with. I mostly scan b/w and don't print larger than 11x14, so the 4990 is fine. Anything larger I will rent time on an Imacon or send out for drum.

[ageorge]

David, my 4990 came with Silverfast Ai, which after a few practice scans I found simple to use and fairly easy to get a good scan with. I mostly scan b/w and don't print larger than 11x14, so the 4990 is fine. Anything larger I will rent time on an Imacon or send out for drum.

I find that with proper sharpening I can print up to 6 times enlargement (i.e. 24x30) with the 4990 or basically a 2400 dpi scan printed at 360 dpi without much loss in print quality. Sharpening with multiple passes at various pixel widths and strengths depending on the image content using PS smart sharpening filter. The negative must be bang on focus and the defraction of f45 and smaller will probably not work out well. It takes quite a bit of sharpening and has to be done with care. No predefined sharpening workflow will do. You must adjust sharpening for each image and may require multiple printing attempts to get just right, but it can be done.

[40moses]

Answer to QT Luong


Solution could be:
Imacon with rodenstock lens is a point for scanning.
The more you go out of center of the scan line (direction borders) the more the lens point is distant (line is horizontal).
Hence the mask of all formats is always longitudinal (panoramas) to avoid decentration.
But on the borders (left & right) with their greater distance you are leaving the DOF of rodenstock (or you must produce an Imacon with some little curvature in the third dimension like an "u" and insert the film not plan but little u. (because the DOF is just -under 1 mm thickness- leaved).

[Dave Jeffery]

Thank you for resurecting this thread from 2007 40 Moses. I'm very interested in curvature in the third dimension so please keep us posted.

[40moses]

I am not sure if my guess is right.

But when it is right, it exist absolut no remedies !
Because the imacon rolls the film just like a drum; hence you could not curb the horizontal line on the drum like a little "u" in the direction of right-lift.
Ths would distort the film (it would be mechanically impossible).

Anther guess could be:
with the distance of rodenstock short or long , the DOF is different and hence...
We must know the design of lens, motion of lens and photo element to understand the very cause.

[40moses]

It is the same problem as flatness:
when the film is not flat on every scanner you have immeditely bad results. 1mm is sufficient.
This avoids the Imacon and is his principle.
But because the rodenstock is fixed during a scan (a point), you have the mentioned DOF problem with extended formats.

[Lenny Eiger]

The best way to get rid of dust is to wet mount. For 4x5 you can't beat the Howtek 4500. I'm with Bruce Watson on this one... As an Aztek fellow pointed out to me recently, the drum scanner knows where it is within about 1-2 microns. With flatbeds, this number is about 30. It's the difference between starting with a blurry image and sharpening it or starting with a sharper image.

Of course, my real problem with Imacons has to do with the claims they made about some of their specs, huge dynamic range, etc. They aren't the only ones that play this game, use number of pixels as resolution and call it optical resolution, etc.

Howtek's go for less than 5K these days. Can't beat it with a stick. You get 20,000 good pixels off a 4x5, that's enough to do just about anything (a 40 inch print at 500 dpi, etc.)

Lenny

[Jose Amado]

I own an Epson 4990, and last week I did several scans with one Imacon 848 and a Kodak iQSmart3. I was thinking buying the Hasselblad X5 because of promotional conditions valid until May, 31, 2009. My conclusion is that iQSmart3 scans excels 848 and 4990 ones. And 848 excels 4990 too.
I don't know if Howtek sells its scanner in Europe, it would be interesting compare it with the IQSmart3.

[Matus Kalisky]

Well just my two cents on this topic - some time ago I asked the lab to san for me a 35mm slide with both Imacon 848 and Epson 4990. The difference was so large and obvious that I decided not to get a cheap flat-bed scanner only if the time would bring a significant improvement (well, that did not happen up to now). In the mean time I moved and changed the lab (the old one closed :o ) and the guy has Imacon X5 - the resolution is the same, but the noise is much less. I had a drum scan (OK, it was a "dry scan", but no Newton rings appeared) done elsewhere but the slight difference (mostly in shadows) would not justify the cost difference for me (hobby only) now.

I may post the results if interested (4990 - v - 848).

[kander]

I second your feelings about the Imacon. A great piece of kit!