KAMI wet mount scanner kits

[r.e.]

I have some glycerine at home because I play around with sextants, and glycerine makes a good artificial horizon. I was thinking of trying glycerine with an Epson v750 that I just purchased. Unlike Kami, Prazio and Lumina, it is cheap (a litre is under $10), available from any decent drugstore (no shipping, etc.) and there are absolutely no issues regarding safety. Unlike mineral oil or baby oil, it is completley soluble in water, no detergent required.

I just did a search and came across this discussion: http://photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00Hr2z

What I found interesting about that discussion is that one participant in particular, a fellow named Julio Fernandez, had no substantive criticism of glycerine. That's interesting, because he is one of these guys who recommends products in internet fora while neglecting to mention that he has an interest in selling the product, in this case Lumina.

Anyway, has anyone tried glycerine?

[Dick Hilker]

Sandy, since I use my flatbed for other kinds of scanning, do you think the use of some kind of caulking compound under the aluminum frame (rather than glue) would be adequate to contain the oil?

[Doug Fisher]

I would be more inclined to do it at the scanner bed's edges just to make sure the oil doesn't ge any farther inside the scanner than necessary. When I took apart one of these and removed the glass (built a frame without glass to see if it would improve things - it didn't), the glass was attached by both some removable tabs and sticky foam tape all the way around the glass. The foam tape seemed like it would absorb liquids. If you do the caulking inside the scanner, it will allow your fluid to penetrate this foam and I don't think that would be good either in the short run or long run, especially if you are going to use an oil of some type.

Doug
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www.BetterScanning.com

[Doug Fisher]

Since this thread addresses Kami, I thought I would mention a relatively cheap source for their fluid. If you order a bottle directly through Aztek, they charge $10 extra for any order under $50 and shipping itself is $20+. Other fluid suppliers have a minimum charge of $75. Thanks to John Dean in Atlanta, I learned you can economically order a single bottle of Kami fluid for $29-ish plus $5 shipped to your door from Pitman Company (which has now bought Charette) at 1.888.274.8626 (I have no affiliation with this company!). I would suggest ordering it by phone and credit card because their website messed up my order and for some reason the customer service people are not good at tracking down website-based orders.

Doug
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www.BetterScanning.com

[r.e.]

Since it looks like no-one has tried glycerine, I'm going to try it this weekend. If anyone is interested, I'll post my impressions. If one doesn't mind rinsing negatives (e.g. one is doing a small number of scans, so the speed of using a volatile fluid that rapidly evaporates isn't necessary), glycerine may be a very attractive alternative.

[Martin]

Hello,

Where is the calibration gap on the Epson 4990? (Back near the hinge, front near the handle to open or one of the sides) In addition, how wide is the calibration gap?

What I was thinking was to use a clear acrylic sheet with Mylar hinged, then the negative sandwiched in-between with mounting fluid (baby oil). Then turning it so the Mylar is facing the flatbed glass. Is it safe to assume the baby oil is safe for B&W, transparencies, and negatives? Therefore, it would be something like this:

Clear Acrylic
Negative /w fluid on both sides
Mylar

^Shims

Scanner bed glass

Then I could use some sort of shim to bring the sandwich up to the optimal focus. How does this sound? I had read you can get somewhat better results if you had to only scan through the Mylar as opposed to the sheet of acrylic or glass.

Finally, what could I use for shims and what is the best method for finding the optimal focused height?

Here are the supplies I am looking at ordering to complete this project.

LINK

LINK 2

Thanks for your input!

Kind Regards,
Martin

[ki_]

Sorry for reactivating this very old thread, but I like to add some information.

glycerine may be a very attractive alternative.

I've just tried out wet scanning on my Epson 2450 Photo.

First I tried it with glycerin/glycerol (different name for the same thing) and putting a piece of glas on top, glycerin on both sides. As someone told before I just could not get rid of the bubbles.

Then I bought baby oil (penaten is the equivalent of johnson over here in germany) and tried it with the same setup. Again too many bubbles.

Then I found this thread and tried it with the negative, emulsion down, fixed it on one side with a tesa tape (scotch tape)
and put the baby oil under it. Then squeezed out any bubbles. This worked fine.

I wanted to make a comparison and tried the same setup with glycerin/glycerol. It worked a bit less fine. First it just did not put enough tension to keep the whole negative down. At the corners it flew off. Not really a problem, but baby oil just worked better for me.
But the main problem was, that glycerin washes off the emulsion. I kept the negative attached for about one or two hours and noticed afterwards that the rinsing water got a little bit pink. Also when I wiped off the glycerin from the scanner the napkin got pink as well. (I used Fuji Acros 100).

From the scanning results both are fine but glycerin reduces grain better than baby oil. I did not leave the negative so long in contact with the babyoil but for security reason I would prefer the baby oil. Both substances require a cleaning of the negative after the scan. This little drop of dish cleaner doesn't make the oil so much more less convenient than the glycerin for me.

Maybe I will do some testing with pure gelatine or some gummi bears, putting them into baby oil respectively glycerine to see if it behaves different.

Here are some 50 % crops (1200 dpi):

baby oil:


dry:


glycerin:


reduced sice:


Sorry, it is not a large format picture – only 6 x 6 from my Rolleiflex. But I think it is helpful anyway.

[Noah A]

...
But the main problem was, that glycerin washes off the emulsion. I kept the negative attached for about one or two hours and noticed afterwards that the rinsing water got a little bit pink. ...

For me it simply isn't worth the risk or the time spent experimenting. I know Kami is expensive. But Aztek sells cases of four bottles for $117 which works out to less than $30 each. That's a pretty good deal. And they let you split your cases between mounting fluid, drum cleaner and film cleaner. My current bottle of Kami lasted me almost a year, and I do a fair number of scans. So the cost over time is very reasonable. I just bought a case of 2 bottles of Kami and 2 bottles of drum cleaner, I expect it to last quite a long time.

Also, in purchasing from Aztek you're supporting a company that still services drum scanners, and offers good free advice on high-end scanning. I'm not affiliated with them in any way, just a happy customer. They've literally saved me thousands of dollars. In fact their free phone support has saved me the expense of shipping them my scanner for repair several times.

How much are your negatives worth to you? Using some other kind of oil that could damage your film or cause you to need to clean it excessively just seems a bit silly when you consider the price of film, processing, etc.

Just my opinion, obviously...

[polyglot]

I wanted to make a comparison and tried the same setup with glycerin/glycerol. It worked a bit less fine. First it just did not put enough tension to keep the whole negative down. At the corners it flew off. Not really a problem, but baby oil just worked better for me.
But the main problem was, that glycerin washes off the emulsion. I kept the negative attached for about one or two hours and noticed afterwards that the rinsing water got a little bit pink. Also when I wiped off the glycerin from the scanner the napkin got pink as well. (I used Fuji Acros 100).

If your acros is pink, it is insufficiently washed - not necessarily so poorly as to affect the archival life of the film, but you haven't washed all the anti-halation dyes out yet. If your mounting fluid is extracting pink, that just means the pink dye is soluble in that particular mounting fluid, not that the mounting fluid is washing off the emulsion. After all, the wash water comes out pink by removing the dye but does not wash off the emulsion.

Which is not to say that glycerol doesn't damage your emulsion - I would be wary of anything vaguely water-soluble/compatible because it might swell or soften the emulsion, or worse, bind to it. Petroleum-based mounting fluids like Kami or fine machine oils are certainly a better option IMHO.

[ki_]

If your acros is pink, it is insufficiently washed …

Thanks for your advice, I've guessed something like this already.
I water my negatives following the so called ilford method: Water in the tank, tilting 5 times; watering and tilting 10 times; watering and tilting 20 times.
Now I've read that one should let it stand for 5 minutes before pouring out the water. I never did this, maybe that's the reason for bad watering results.

@Noah A:
Of course you are right. If you are frighten, that these liquids could harm your negatives you shouldn't look for homebrewn solutions.