Any news on the new Plustek 120 scanner?

[XFer]

(multi sampling support)

But is there a requirement that the code needs to live in the scanner (firmware)?

Usually scanner firmware exposes to the driver a set of commands which are relatively high level.
This has many advantages, from easier driver programming to less documentation to be given out to less chance for a bug in the driver to damage the scanner.

To move multi sampling out of the firmware and into the software (driver) you should expose to the driver very low-level commands (like: "advance film one step" - "acquire row" - "acquire row" - "acquire row" - etc.). I don't see a scanner manifacturer doing that.

Just yesterday I was goofing around on my 5400 with individual RGB gains and to be honest the difference was minimal (I don't think I would pass the blind test).

Well it depends from film type and scene captured. Without separate RGB exposure you get -2 EV dynamic range for B and you have to compensate for this by boosting the B channel during negative inversion.
It may not affect a particular image in a visible way, but may be quite important for a different image.

It's not so easy to show this because of the way scanning softwares work (you can't easily tell a software "do not use different RGB exposure" 🙂 ). With Vuescan it is doable, but frankly, Vuescan is quite limited in treating color negatives.
I should perform raw scans with and without separate RGB exposure compensation, invert the raw scans with an appropriate software (Photoshop sucks badly at that) and avoid misrepresenting the results (for example because of different color balance corrections / gamma curve corrections).

I did some tests time ago, I'll see if I can dig them out. 🙂

I can't see a scanner designer that thinks 5300dpi medium format scanner doesn't need autofocus to spend much time on providing adjustable RGB exposure times

Sadly, I think you're right. 🙁

Fernando

 

[XFer]

thank you for the great reviews

Thanks Joe! 😉
More reviews coming (Minolta 5400-II is next in line). I hope to get a Plustek 120 on loan to review it, possibly with Vuescan support.

In the meantime, the German site filmscanner.info announced that a review of the Plustek 120 is scheduled for April (they usually publish a German version first, and an English version afterwards).

I guess Plustek, understandably, prefers using the first production lots to fulfill backorders instead of giving scanners on loan to testers.

Fernando

 

[brbo]

(multi sampling support)



Usually scanner firmware exposes to the driver a set of commands which are relatively high level.

Usually.

On the other hand, Plustek scanners don't work with any scanning software without binary driver provided by Plustek/LaserSoft. After OS X Lion fiasco with Plustek scanners you would think that Ed Hamrick wouldn't hesitate to earn a few quick $$$ if driving Plustek scanners was as trivial as most of the others. So, I have my suspicions that a LOT of stuff is actually going on in driver and not firmware.

Well it depends from film type and scene captured. Without separate RGB exposure you get -2 EV dynamic range for B and you have to compensate for this by boosting the B channel during negative inversion.
It may not affect a particular image in a visible way, but may be quite important for a different image.

I agree. In theory it should make a huge impact at scanning color negatives. In reality I didn't notice much improvement. I guess typical RGB exposure ratios can be 'baked-in' (and probably are - I remember reading that even when you are scanning to raw in Vuescan you should use 'negative film', maybe this is one of the reasons). It's not like you will scan many negatives with 'orange' mask that is actually green. Basic setting should work well enough for most color negatives.

It's not so easy to show this because of the way scanning softwares work (you can't easily tell a software "do not use different RGB exposure" 🙂 ). With Vuescan it is doable, but frankly, Vuescan is quite limited in treating color negatives.
I should perform raw scans with and without separate RGB exposure compensation, invert the raw scans with an appropriate software (Photoshop sucks badly at that) and avoid misrepresenting the results (for example because of different color balance corrections / gamma curve corrections).

I did some tests time ago, I'll see if I can dig them out. 🙂

I did just that. I invert raw scans with ColorPerfect. Sadly, I think I already deleted my files as the results didn't show that it was something worth pursuing further (at least for that negative). I hope to do another test soon.

 

[XFer]

I did just that. I invert raw scans with ColorPerfect. Sadly, I think I already deleted my files as the results didn't show that it was something worth pursuing further (at least for that negative). I hope to do another test soon.

I'm (very slowly) developing a negative inversion utility (from raw scans), because even ColorPerfect did not cut it, for my tastes.
When it becomes a bit more useable I'll have the tool to do that kind of tests again, in a more meaningful way then I did at the time. I'll report back. 🙂

Fernando

 

[visualbassist]

i use colorperfect too. for me it's still the best/most time efficient method. imperfect though. i do have trouble creating consistent colors from throughout the roll.

 

[mani]

One more vote for ColorPerfect - it's the best there is so far...

I'm (very slowly) developing a negative inversion utility (from raw scans), because even ColorPerfect did not cut it, for my tastes.

... but this I would very much like to see! Work faster! 😉

 

[brbo]

Work faster and let us be your beta testers!

 

[johnny.moped]

i use colorperfect too. for me it's still the best/most time efficient method. imperfect though. i do have trouble creating consistent colors from throughout the roll.

Did you contact Christoph (the developer) through his website or via flickr?
I always got very consistent colors.

 

[beezil]

Ed Hamrick is still waiting for a scanner on loan to add support for it.
I imagine Plustek will send one after the preorders are fullfilled. Let's hope it's as soon as possible. 🙂

Fer

i swear....if i run into a bunch of bs with the current software and/or drivers, and ed is still having trouble getting one of his own, i'll ship him MY scanner!

 

[XFer]

Too bad I can't click "Like" 🙂

 

[XFer]

Work faster and let us be your beta testers!

😀 I'd love to share this software, but it's really complicated to use in a meaningful way.
For each film, it requires two calibration shots (one with an IT8 target), plus certain calibration scans for each film+scanner combination.
I'm developing it for myself, just because I'm a scanning nut, but I would not recommend it to anyone else! 😱

Fernando

 

[beezil]

finally cleared the decks so I could have a day to use my new plustek.

I really want to post up some scans....

but i can't

I can't get past "processing scan" after the scan phase.

I've lost count on how many times silverflake has crashed.

not fun.

 

[Bob Parsons]

.................................. I can't get past "processing scan" after the scan phase.

I've lost count on how many times silverflake has crashed.

not fun.

I've noticed there is a LOT of disk activity while the scan is being processed, and that's with 32GB of RAM in the machine and a large chunk of it available 🙁. Are you sure you're not running out of disk space? Have you tried scanning at a low resolution so that the output file that has to be generated is much smaller?

Bob.

 

[clayne]

Vuescan does a similar thing when it runs out of diskspace while writing to the temp file used for a scan. Definitely verify you have enough diskspace because SF might just not be handling the error condition gracefully. One way to verify this indirectly is to scan at a low resolution - if there's no issue then its probably a problem with the amount of projected space a high resolution scan needs.

 

[sny]

finally cleared the decks so I could have a day to use my new plustek.

I really want to post up some scans....

but i can't

I can't get past "processing scan" after the scan phase.

I've lost count on how many times silverflake has crashed.

not fun.

In your preferences, try to increase the amount of RAM Silverfast can use.

Regards,

S.

 

[beezil]

In your preferences, try to increase the amount of RAM Silverfast can use.

Regards,

S.

hmmmm....

i see the default setting is 3072 MB

I am using an intel based 3.1ghz core i5 iMac running os 10.8.2 and 16GB (4x4gb) memory.

do you have a recommendation on what i should allocate? 8000MB (8G) too much?

thanks a ton,

b

 

[sny]

hmmmm....

i see the default setting is 3072 MB

I am using an intel based 3.1ghz core i5 iMac running os 10.8.2 and 16GB (4x4gb) memory.

do you have a recommendation on what i should allocate? 8000MB (8G) too much?

thanks a ton,

b

I also have 16 Go of RAM and have allocated 10 Go to Silverfast, this functions very well.

Regards,

S.

 

[cabbiinc]

Any news? Anyone? Bueller?

Such an innocent question.

 

[beezil]

I also have 16 Go of RAM and have allocated 10 Go to Silverfast, this functions very well.

Regards,

S.

hey, thanks so much for that tip.

we're workin!

 

[beezil]

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?p=2073655#post2073655

started a new thread on tips tricks, trouble shooting etc......