Scanning Film - Waste Of Time?

[photogdave]

Here's what our own Dante Stella thinks on the matter:
http://www.dantestella.com/technical/outsource.html
Although I don't have the technical knowledge Dante has, I tend to disagree with his points about poor image quality and how time consuming it is.
How do the rest of you feel?

 

[squirrel$$$bandit]

I find it fast (now that I can do whole rolls with the 5000ED), fun, and absorbing. And film still looks really cool, even scanned.

I love DS's site. I could read it all day...

 

[dfoo]

Scanning old black & white negatives is indeed dust hell. However, my scanning process now rocks! I take the film from the dyer, load it up in the 5000 uncut, and scan away. No dust, and no spotting. Awesome!

 

[calexg]

I had the pleasure of using a Coolscan 5000ED awhile back and I loved it! I don't think scanning is a waste of time; however, I do think that scanner technology is advancing in leaps and bounds as quickly as digital cameras, so I may be a little put-off in buying one because the scanner itself becomes obsolete pretty quickly, just as a new digital camera would.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

I totally disagree. Scanning is no more time consuming than darkroom printing and gives you a file you can make identical prints from years later. I scanned my backlog of over 2000 rolls, which I finished a couple yrs ago. It took 5 years doing it in my spare time. I'm young, I have lots of time. The quality, if you have a GOOD scanner, is magnificent. I see no difference from darkroom prints in my prints from scnned negs done on my Nikon LS-8000ED. I use a glass carrier and never have dust issues. If he does, he needs to clean his house.

 

[dfoo]

I had some mega dust issues. After building a drying cabinet, thankfully those are over! Of course, I also own two hairy dogs and heat my house with a woodstove in the winter.

 

[majid]

I have the Coolscan 5000 with both slide feeder and the 40-frame strip film feeder, and I agree with Dante. The scan speed is not the main factor, if you can afford Nikon's extortionate prices for the LS-5000 and its accessories - just pop in the strip film or stack of slides, set it going and a couple of hours later it's done. No, the hard part is sorting through the film. I would count at least 5 minutes per frame.
My father gave me a stack of slides from my childhood, most are Kodachromes. I am planning on batch-scanning them for backup and then handing them over to ScanCafe to get them in usable shape.

 

[dfoo]

It depends on your workflow. I develop my film, I dry the film, and I put the film in the scanner. I then cut & sleeve the negatives and put a note in the top of the sleeve with the date, scan numbers and how I developed the film. With respect to the cost, I don't think the 5000 is that expensive when I compare it to the cost of my cameras, and lenses. I payed $2500 for my first Canon 5d some time ago, and that is just a camera body. And I later dropped that in the ocean, and bought another! I'm highly unlikely to drop the 5000 in the ocean!

 

[sojournerphoto]

It depends on your workflow. I develop my film, I dry the film, and I put the film in the scanner. I then cut & sleeve the negatives and put a note in the top of the sleeve with the date, scan numbers and how I developed the film. With respect to the cost, I don't think the 5000 is that expensive when I compare it to the cost of my cameras, and lenses. I payed $2500 for my first Canon 5d some time ago, and that is just a camera body. And I later dropped that in the ocean, and bought another! I'm highly unlikely to drop the 5000 in the ocean!

My film workflow is identical, except that if there is a frame I really want to get right I may scan it again using the FH3 later, but for most purposes (i.e. small prints) the SA30 adaptor is great in the 5000. My biggest issue is that I get too many frames on 35mm, but am not yet ready to stump up for an LS9000.

As to cost, an LS9000 and Mamiya 7 is no more than a 1Ds3 iirc. Far from cheap, but out there in quite reasonable numbers. and an Ikon and LS5000 can be had for what I paid for my old 5D at the time.

Mike

 

[mh2000]

first off, if you get proof prints with your film development there is no reason to scan every image, just the very best... so time is not a problem. also, I can't understand why dante is suggesting getting lower resolution scans to avoid grain aliasing, better to scan at a higher resolution and down sample. I prefer BW400CN scans to converted digital... so it is worth it to me. Yes, touching up dust from silver negs is a pain in the butt.

"put-off in buying one because the scanner itself becomes obsolete pretty quickly..."

Huh? Who's putting out new film scanners? All I see is prosumer film scanners being discontinued with no replacement being offered. It's probably in Nikon's interest to kill off all their film scanners since they make so much more money off digital cameras.

 

[squirrel$$$bandit]

Yeah, I don't think there are going to be new film scanners, unfortunately.

Process is pleasure for me, usually. It feels good to have to go through the steps. If I had a backlog to scan, though, it would get old fast.

 

[40oz]

A good scanner is worth scanning film with. A crappy one makes it a waste, maybe.

He raises some good points on both sides and sticks with logic, but I disagree with Mr. Stella's conclusions. It's like a carefully structured defense of his own workflow. I like his pictures and website, so I don't think his workflow needs defending.

Obviously he does, so I have to ask, if he truly believes it a waste to shoot film just to scan, why is it so important to tell everyone? Why is he trying to convince me?

And when discussing the future of film, he mentions closing camera stores and product availability, but ignores new products like film and film cameras What's that about? Ignorance or selective memory?


It's nice that he also leaves out the main reasons people do this - convenience and to get the look of film.

Nice rah-rah advert for digital, but strange to see it on his site. He's basically trying to tell an entire market of film users that they are wasting their time and their pictures will never look very good. Insecure much, Dante?

 

[Faintandfuzzy]

What a complete load of fluff. Must be a slow day in the blogsphere.

 

[squirrel$$$bandit]

Guys, I think you need to take a step back and read some more of DS's writing. He gets ideas and throws them out there. Contradicting himself is part of the program. His essays are just good explorations of technical and artistic issues that most of us think about for a few minutes and dismiss. He really digs into them, and that's good. It doesn't matter if he's right.

He isn't trying to convince you of anything, I don't think. He's just thinking out loud, very skillfully I believe.

 

[Keith]

I think one of the problems with scanning is the perception that it's a makeshift subsitute for the conventional darkroom process ... as in some people's minds digital photography is a poor substitute for film photography. Scanning is it's own expression of the negative's stored information and if the end product is a print that looks a little different to a wet print ... so be it ... go with it!

Scanners do weird things occasionally that are all their own craziness ... a while a go I developed some under exposed HP5 in cafenol and scanned the negatives in 24 bit colour and got some very unusual results caused by colour casts. When digitally printed on art quality matt paper these scans produced something that could not be easily duplicated in a conventional darkroom process. This was when I realised that the scanning process could be used to actually create something rather than just be a means to convert an analogue image to a digital file.

I agree totally with what Chris has said here.

 

[5:00 PM]

Oh, he's absolutely right. Another article on his site led to my purchasing a Pakon high-speed scanner; with this toy there's a prayer I can get my 30+ years of 35mm into a usable state fast enough to share and enjoy it all (apologies to Douglas Adams...the words just came out that way).

New film work (mostly 120) I get scanned at processing time by NCPS. Expensive but the results are astonishingly good and I don't have to spend hours doing it myself; I can hold my Photoshop time down to the few images that are really worth the effort.

 

[squirrel$$$bandit]

Why do SOME people insist on ramming it down our throats that film is dead and scanning is wrong? This supercilious whining is getting really boring. It sounds so much like they have a vested interest in getting us to buy new gear, or are they just trying to rationalise their own 'forced' upgrades?

It also reminds of a skiing metaphor, which seems to come in handy around here. The second wave of snowboarders were always bleating about the death of skiing. Not the first wave who were mostly professional, expert, hard core riders, but the wannabes who had a massive chip on their shoulder and seemed to actually want to see the end of skiing.

P.S. I just had a good look through this clown's pics before posting. Who would post images full of dust, scratches and banding?

Journeyman, go read a dozen more of Dante Stella's articles. He is intelligent, thoughtful, a film and film-camera enthusiast, and a fine photographer, as well as a member of this forum. The idea that he's a whiner, wannabe, or clown is ridiculous. Elsewhere on his site you'll find articles that question the need for new gear, as well. He's playing devil's advocate.

A guy posting an essay on his own website, which you are not obliged to seek out or read, is not ramming anything down your throat. Go write your own rebuttal on your own website.

 

[squirrel$$$bandit]

BTW Keith, wild picture there. I like it.

 

[photogdave]

P.S. I just had a good look through this clown's pics before posting. Who would post images full of dust, scratches and banding?

No need for name-calling. DS is a well-respected member here, and of the photographic community in general. We can agree or disagree with him but we should do it with respect.

 

[felix5616]

One of the big advantages for shooting film and scanning is for wide and ultra wide angle shooting. Digital sensors are nowhere near as good as film with ultra wide angle lenses. Scanning is time consuming, but the results for certain types of shooting are worth it. I shoot 6x24 film for which there are no digital backs, even stitching would take longer than scanning. I shot a canon 1DSII and for certain type of shooting it was an advantage. I've scanned on a Nikon coolscan 9000, epson V750Pro and 2 ICG drum scanners. I now scan on a Creo/Kodak IQ3 smart scanner, both dry and wet scanning. I can combine any and all formats, scan a full 5000dpi and the results are great. The only better output was the ICG drum scanner, which i regret selling. The support for drum scanners will get progressively more difficult and SCSI devices are hard to use with newer computers, that is why i switched to the creo scanner. I have not been impressed with digital, but i do not shoot for a living.