You could say that. I say that I'm making an exact fit to my negative each time, which is what I think a good scanner operator should be doing.
If you want a series of B&W negatives to all exhibit a consistent density range, and the SBR varies widely as it often does for landscape work for example, you have to do the work somewhere. To get a given density range you do the work in developing (aka Zone System style expansion and/or contraction). I find it's simpler, easier, and gives me better results to do the work in setting the black and white points for each negative. With my scanner software, this takes less than a minute. But if you want to call it "re-inventing the wheel" I guess you can.
What this is, is a fairly large religious debate. There are people on both sides. Some say to profile scanners, some say that profiling scanners is a waste of time. I think that profiling scanners for trannies might be interesting, but that negatives vary too much to make profiles very useful.
In other words, I don't think "one size fits all" is the optimum way to get the most from a scanner when scanning negatives. But if it works for anyone else I say go for it. Whatever floats your boat.
Bookmarks