Coolscan 8000 - histogram clipping?

[Terao]

Is this normal?
When I scan (colour) neg film the histogram starts with a large peak around value 13 on all channels. Playing with analog gain doesn't shift the histogram all the way to the left. If I do an autocontrast adjustment the channels are all over the place (particularly the red) - the curves start at zero and typically max out a little short of max highlight values to varying degrees.
If I scan a positive the reverse is true - the histogram clips at around 240, once again with a sharp peak.
I've done a full reset on the scanner, is this normal behaviour? Have my monitor and scanner both set to sRGB (monitor has a dedicated mode for that colourspace).
I don't remember it doing this previously :bang: all help appreciated 🙄

 

[joachim]

Is this normal?
When I scan (colour) neg film the histogram starts with a large peak around value 13 on all channels. Playing with analog gain doesn't shift the histogram all the way to the left. If I do an autocontrast adjustment the channels are all over the place (particularly the red) - the curves start at zero and typically max out a little short of max highlight values to varying degrees.
If I scan a positive the reverse is true - the histogram clips at around 240, once again with a sharp peak.
I've done a full reset on the scanner, is this normal behaviour? Have my monitor and scanner both set to sRGB (monitor has a dedicated mode for that colourspace).
I don't remember it doing this previously :bang: all help appreciated 🙄

Get vuescan, I did so for my Coolscan IV. To me it makes a difference like night&day in comparison to the Nikon software. You can download a simple version for free and evaluate whether it solves your problem.

Key problem is Nikon stoped developing their software to drive the scanner ages ago. Vuescan is still actively developed these days. The multiexposure feature in vuescan, which combines a dark and a bright scan is an absolute killer feature in my view.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

The problem you had is a bug in Nikon Scan that Nikon refused to fix. Ironically, they fixed it later on the Nikon 9000ED scanner but refused to do the software fix for the older scanner! This is entirely a software issue, not a hardware issue.....viewscan and silverfast scan software for the 8000 does not do the histogram clipping! I second Joachim's viewscan recommendation, its what I have used for years. Nikon Scan has always done that on both color and BW negs, so you just never noticed it before...or else you were only scanning slides before. It doesn't do that when scanning slides!

 

[Terao]

Hmm, you're right about slides - just scanned some Velvia and it didn't do it. It was less noticeable on B&Ws as I'd often adjust the curve - it shows up in colour of course because curve adjustments mess with the balance. I'll give Vuescan another go, I still haven't got to grips with its frame location stuff though. Any tips for quick batch-scanning of 6x4.5?

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Hmm, you're right about slides - just scanned some Velvia and it didn't do it. It was less noticeable on B&Ws as I'd often adjust the curve - it shows up in colour of course because curve adjustments mess with the balance. I'll give Vuescan another go, I still haven't got to grips with its frame location stuff though. Any tips for quick batch-scanning of 6x4.5?

I use only the rotating glass carrier to do medium format film, and viewscan automatically locates the frame with no problems on that carrier (it uses insert masks that automatically align the frames). I don't use the standard 120 carrier because it doesn't hold the film flat enough. I remember back when I was still struggling with it that I had to manually input a frame offset for each frame, and had to find it by tial and error for each strip of film! So..to answer your question, there is no way to batch-scan 645 quickly on this scanner with viewscan. The carrier I use only holds one frame at a time (you can insert strips but only one frame shows) so its a slow one at a time process. Its worth it though for the quality I get.

 

[Terao]

OK, thanks. Just been playing with it and get better results in some regards but worse in other (visible shadow noise). Will have to do some reading of the manual...

 

[joachim]

OK, thanks. Just been playing with it and get better results in some regards but worse in other (visible shadow noise). Will have to do some reading of the manual...

Try multi-exposure to overcome shadow noise and posterisation. Way more efficient then multi-pass scanning in my experience. Scan take twice as long though.

 

[craygc]

Try multi-exposure to overcome shadow noise and posterisation. Way more efficient then multi-pass scanning in my experience. Scan take twice as long though.

Scanning a neg (versus a transparency) you should never need multi-exposure. A neg runs a a density of around 2.0, way less than a Nikon scanner can handle. If you're using Vuescan, for each neg type, scan a clear section, lock the exposure (and mask if C41) then use that for every film of that type. This will set the black point almost exactly which will minimise the noise. For what its worth I wrote some rubbish about it, one instance is located here: http://www.filmlives.net/community/viewtopic.php?t=594&sid=75a9ce84d6058eebc2de64af3190c588

 

[joachim]

Scanning a neg (versus a transparency) you should never need multi-exposure. A neg runs a a density of around 2.0, way less than a Nikon scanner can handle. If you're using Vuescan, for each neg type, scan a clear section, lock the exposure (and mask if C41) then use that for every film of that type. This will set the black point almost exactly which will minimise the noise. For what its worth I wrote some rubbish about it, one instance is located here: http://www.filmlives.net/community/viewtopic.php?t=594&sid=75a9ce84d6058eebc2de64af3190c588

The original poster was scanning Velvia (see his/her second posting), which is a slide film. Negatives don't have a shadow noise problem to begin with, if they are dense, the noise problem is in the highlights.