Imacon 848 scans - is this OK ??

[Matus Kalisky]

Hello,

I just got a few scans of my 4x5 negatives and chromes that were made with Imacon 848 at the highest resolution available for 4x5 : 2040 dpi.

The scans are so call raw scans - no adjustement - color or sharpness - as they were delivered. I jsut converted them to sRGB. Maybe an unnecesasry commet - they were really cheap of only ~ $10 each.

Bellow I include scans of one crome (E100VS) and negative (Pro160S) that were taken both at the same time and place and camera/lens settings (apart from the exposure) at fstop around f/22 with my Fujinon 125/5.6 CMW.

My question: - is the quality of the scans concerning the sharpness and nois waht one can expect or it can be done better with this scanner? The negative/chrome look sharp to me with 4x and 8x loupe but more magnification would be needed to decide.

Fist photo shows the whole frame and then there are two cutouts at full resolution.

1) E100VS

[Matus Kalisky]

2) Pro 160 S

[Don Hutton]

Matus

150kB jpegs are not going to give any insight into your scans. You really need to put them up elsewhere at full res and post a link.

[Ted Harris]

Waht Don said. However, I'll go a bi tou ton a limb and note that there should not be as much difference in the color values between the two films ... but that could be the way you shot them as opposed to the scan. Finally, at $10 a pop I would imagine you got a fairly or totally automated process with little or no human intervention for even the most minor adjustments .... just let the software do everything.

[Bruce Watson]

My question: - is the quality of the scans concerning the sharpness and noise what one can expect or it can be done better with this scanner?

IMHO, sharpness and noise are probably as good as this particular scanner is going to deliver. At this price, as Ted says, you are probably getting a mostly automated service with limited operator intervention. But if the scanner is running "flat out" at maximum resolution, an operator can't get any more resolution out of it.

You can get more out of a high-end flatbed scanner, and certainly more out of a drum scanner. But the real question you should ask yourself is: do you need more? If your output is going to be 50 x 40 cm prints from 5x4 film, even the Imacon is probably overkill. On the other hand, if your output is going to be 125 x 100 cm prints, then you might want to consider drum scans. It all depends on what you need.

[gr82bart]

You really need to put them up elsewhere at full res and post a link.Matus,

I would not do this. I would seek out a couple people you trust here and send them the link via an e-mail or PM. Posting a link in public, if that's what Don meant, will only allow an unscrupulous copyright violator to download your hi-res image, make any PS corrections themselves (your scans are ideal for single image HDR techniques for example), and have a very nice print without you ever knowing it.

And I agree with Ted. At $10 a pop, you probably didn't get the 'best' scan, but I have seen deals, so I could be wrong.

Regards, Art.

[Helen Bach]

Here are some scans and unresampled, unsharpened (ie -120 sharpening setting) crops made with a 949 (or maybe an 848). The 848 and 949 should be the same quality. Pro 160S scanned at 2040 spi.

Image #1 (210 mm Symmar-S) (http://gallery.photo.net/photo/4921836-md.jpg)

Crop from the above, converted to B&W (http://gallery.photo.net/photo/4944823-lg.jpg)

Image #2 (400 mm Apo-Tele-Xenar) (http://gallery.photo.net/photo/5106265-md.jpg)

Crop from #2 (http://gallery.photo.net/photo/5158822-md.jpg)

For cost comparison, I can do about ten or eleven 4x5 16-bit 2040 spi scans an hour on an 848, including basic curves adjustments, and opening them in Photoshop to check the file integrity.

Best,
Helen

[jetcode]

Here are some scans and unresampled, unsharpened (ie -120 sharpening setting) crops made with a 949 (or maybe an 848). The 848 and 949 should be the same quality. Pro 160S scanned at 2040 spi.


Pretty amazing detail in these images, nice presentation too.



For cost comparison, I can do about ten or eleven 4x5 16-bit 2040 spi scans an hour on an 848, including basic curves adjustments, and opening them in Photoshop to check the file integrity.


That's fast! The best I could ever do on a 646 was about 32 images in a 4-5 hour period without PS analysis. Of course the 646 is not exactly a speed demon.

[Stephen Best]

My question: - is the quality of the scans concerning the sharpness and nois waht one can expect or it can be done better with this scanner? The negative/chrome look sharp to me with 4x and 8x loupe but more magnification would be needed to decide.

They've probably got Flex Touch wound all the way up to save time on dust busting. The results you've posted look pretty unremarkable to me. My 848 scans are considered pretty cheap but nowhere near the $10 you're being asked. Shop around.

Here's a "detail" from one of my scans at the same resolution taken from a 3F (raw) file at 100%:

6695

[Matus Kalisky]

- Don -

The first photo shows the whole scan, the next two little crops are without resising (== full res) to show the detail and sharpness the scanner delivers. They are rather kindly compressed (level 10 in PS). Would you lear more from full size full res picture of 200 MB?

- Ted -

yes - you are probably right - but the guy does only Imacon 848 and Nikon Coolscan 9000 and Coolscan 5000 scans - he does not offer any other lab work or so. (http://www.digitalcopy24.de).

- Bruce -

you are right - I am not about to print 125 x100 cm as there is nobody to buy it :-) I will limit my print size to max A2 (cca 40 x 60 cm) by now, so the scans are then actuallly downsized to print at this size at 360dpi (thought not that much).

- gr82bart -

Hmmm, what is the Single image HDR technique ?

- Helen -

it seems to me that your scans are cleaner and sharper as well. May I ask about the other settings of the scanner ?

- Stephen -

That's definitely sharper that the hair/dust on my scans (I forgot to mention that I did remove dust before posting the photos and it was not this sharp).

I know nothing about Imacon 848 settings. May I ask you at least about the general settings for the Imacon scanner you use? The guy that makes the scans seems to be quite communicative and next time I may ask him to set some particular settings differently than he does normaly.

thanks

[Stephen Best]

That's definitely sharper that the hair/dust on my scans (I forgot to mention that I did remove dust before posting the photos and it was not this sharp).

I know nothing about Imacon 848 settings. May I ask you at least about the general settings for the Imacon scanner you use? The guy that makes the scans seems to be quite communicative and next time I may ask him to set some particular settings differently than he does normaly.

Other than leaving autofocus off, upsampling to greater than the native resolution or using aggressive FlexTouch settings, there's not a lot you can do to REDUCE resolution. I don't use FlexTouch. I have a Wacom to clean up scans manually. (This incidentally is one benefit of the more diffuse lamp in the 949/X5 over the 848, though whether it sacrifices resolution I don't know.)

The reason why I showed the hair rather than the scanned result is because the latter depends a lot on the original. If you're stopping down to f/32 or f/45 (as I'll often do) a significant contributer to softness in the scanned result is diffraction. Getting good scans done (namely using anything better than a consumer flatbed) or doing it yourself can tell you a lot about your camera technique, film etc. I wouldn't worry about diffraction though as it's easily counteracted with sharpening. It's what the print looks like at the final size that's important.

You may want to get your scanner operator to do some tests to check whether the scanner is out of alignment, or focus is uneven across the holder. If he's amenable and offers scans at this price it would be worth your time to figure out what the problem is before moving on. Don't get suckered into paying for drum scans if you don't need them.

[Ted Harris]

Matus, the bottom line is that you WILL see differences in prints from an Imacon scan v. a scan from a high end flatbed or drum scanner when you are printing at 16x20 and larger (maybe smaller too). I have done side-by-side comparisons from a 6x7 original and the differences are clear. That said, the Imacon will still give you somewhat better results than any of the 'prosumer scanners.' The biggest drawback to the Imacon is its limited DMax.

[gr82bart]

- gr82bart -

Hmmm, what is the Single image HDR technique ?HDR = high dynamic rage.

This is an overly simplified explanation when you only have a single image ... try this when you get a chance:

Open the file in PS
Copy the file and call it [filename].jpg
Adjust the curve to make the image brighter - enough to bring details in the shadows (assuming they are there)
Save that image as [filename]-bright.jpg
Now adjust the curve to make the image darker - enough to bring out details in the highlights (assuming they are there)
Save that image as [filename]-dark.jpg
Open all three of them in PS or another program like PhotoMatrix and merge the three images to HDR

Once you get the idea what you're trying to do here, there's a whole bunch other settings and stuff to really punch the image.

Since I still take a lot transparencies, I have experimented with taking three images at +1, 0, -1 or thereabouts depending on the light. Scan the three in and use PS or PhotoMatrix to create the final HDR image. The problem I have is registration of the images, but that's a whole other thread.

A digital camera of course helps as you can take several images at various exposures and merge to HDR with few issues of registration - assuming you shot the images on a sturdy tripod that is.

Anyway give the above a try and see if it produces anything decent. Post the result. I'd love to see it as I can see by the image you posted it's a good candidate. Well, for me it is.

Regards, Art.

[jetcode]

The biggest drawback to the Imacon is its limited DMax.

followed by resolution limits for LF formats

2040 - 4x5
1800 - 5x7

[Stephen Best]

followed by resolution limits for LF formats

2040 - 4x5
1800 - 5x7

The 848 (and later) all use an 8000 pixel trilinear sensor which limits 4x5 to 2040spi, 120/220 to about 3500spi etc. This equates to 22" at 360ppi on the short side. If all you're ever going to print to is a 24" inkjet (which is what I do) the delivered resolution is ideal. IF you need larger files THEN you'll need a different scanner.

I've been using Imacon scanners since the original Precision. The current model scanners are more capable than many give them credit for. Isolated data points, web comparisons are pretty well useless. The same for scanner specifications. I urge everybody to shop around to see what you can get. The relationship with the person doing the scan is probably more important than the hardware used, at least at this level.

[Muzyka]

Have you considered using the imacon's 3F functions? You can tell your scanner operator to scan in 3F, which would allow you a great amount of flexibility in what you want out of the scan. Basically 3F is the imacon's version of a raw file, with the file extension .fff, hence the name, and by scanning in imacon's 3F mode you can scan 4x5 up to 3200 ppi. Also, Hasselblad offers the Flexcolor software for free, so you can download it, take the raw scans from your imacon operator, and effectively change curves, USM, levels, etc. to your desires.

[Kirk Gittings]

3f is not a raw file. It was supposed to be but H never developed it. 3f is just a tiff. Try it-just change the .fff to .tiff and they open right up as tiffs in PS or any image editor. 3f is a myth.

[mcfactor]

You can also scan a 4x5 in two sections using a 120 holder then stitch them together in photoshop, this will give you a max resolution of 3000 dpi, rather than 2040

[sgreenberg]

Is there a hardware limitation for the 2040 dpi on the 4x5 scans? I'm wondering if there's a way to edit the software to that Flexcolor can be fooled into scanning at higher resolution.

[mcfactor]

I believe the resolution is limited because the ccd sensor is only so large. The only way to get a higher resolution is scan using a smaller holder then to manually stitch.

[Greg Miller]

Hopefully the OP has already figured out the problem, since this thread is almost 4 year old now :p