Sounds if a drum scanner

[Steven Ruttenberg]

There is the nice little purring whir it makes when everything right in the world.

Then there is the slapping noise of tape coming loose.

And finally the gut wrenching noise of the cylinder banging around because you didn't quite get lined up and secured properly.

A drum scanner is deceptively simple to use, but unlike a flat bed when you screw something up, you just ruin the scan.

The drum scanner wet mounts easy enough. Just use plenty of tape though. But there are so many ways to screw it up using a drum scanner and damage you drum scanner, one needs to be laser focused on the task at hand, less you end up with 10000 dollars worth of paper weight.

[Andrea Gazzoni]

I know what you're talkin'about Steven.
In my case, years ago, nothing major occurred. Just one scrap negative destroyed.
Hope your scanner is not damaged.

[Steven Ruttenberg]

No its fine just freaky moment

[sanking]

Then there is the slapping noise of tape coming loose.

And finally the gut wrenching noise of the cylinder banging around because you didn't quite get lined up and secured properly.



Happened to me once when scanning a sheet of 12X20" film with a Howtek 7500. The noise was indeed gut wrenching, but in the end the scanner came out unscathed. The sheet of film, however, was torn into many small pieces.

Turns out, however, that I had made a back-up shot of that particular scene. It was not my practice to make duplicate shots with this format so I was very fortunate.


Sandy

[Steven Ruttenberg]

I have gotten the tapping down. Not sure I like the bottle applicator for putting fluid on. Way too much. I like the spray bottle for applying. One thing I am also finding out is that doing all the color conversion, adjustments, etc in the scanner software, this case, Aztek's DPL is not all that it is cracked up to be. I think the bigger thing to focus on, is getting a proper scan that can be inverted outside of DPL, or making adjustments to a slide to get it close. Lot of work to color balance and do inversions even of black and white is difficult.

One thing I really like is how you can make adjustments in the software, save those as CMS files. The use that file to scan the film again and get what you want thru hardware instead of software. Ie, your CMS file tells the the PMTs how to act when scanning so you get a linear output file that is close to what you want. Makes it easier to work in PS or other program.

Just be careful that after you have done the adjustments and saved the CMS file, that if you use the detail file set it back to original state or you end up double adjusting your image and it is worthless. Another option is to select your preview and do your detailed view or HiRes scan from there using the CMS file you created.

Overall, I like using the scanner, not hard at all and not much more time consuming than the Epson V850.

AND, a drum scanner is not the magic bullet or silver bullet. If your neg/pos is crap, no amount of scanner skill is gonna save it even using a 10000 dollar plus drum scanner (30k-50K back in the day).

[SergeyT]

Black and white should be a no brainier regardless of scanner type.
After inversion and tones adjustments put a channel mixer layer on top of the stack and set it to grayscale.

[Steven Ruttenberg]

After all corrections etc. if I use channel mixer, I will use it as three separate layers and paint in or out adhustments. Kinda like using variable contrast papers. Finally, I may use NIK Silverewfxpro2.0, NIK output sharpener and NIK Define.

But this is rare to use NIK plugin. It works awesome, but like every tool it has limitations.

[Steven Ruttenberg]

I find bw deceptively simple. On the surface seems straight forward, underneath, boundless opportunities and complexity.

Color us kind locked in to repetitive adjustments, but can yield hidden gems if you work at it and outside the box.