How do you scan your 35mm B&W film?

How do you scan your 35mm B&W film?

  • I use a flatbed scanner - i.e. Epson V750 photo scanner

    Votes: 313 35.6%

  • I use a dedicated 35mm scanner - i.e. a Nikon Coolscan V

    Votes: 360 41.0%

  • I use a dedicated multi-format film scanner - i.e. a Nikon Coolscan 9000

    Votes: 86 9.8%

  • I use a professional scanner - i.e. drum scanner

    Votes: 27 3.1%

  • I send mine away to be scanned

    Votes: 62 7.1%

  • I don't care - I wet print!

    Votes: 31 3.5%
  • Total voters
    879
On the Minolta 5400, how do you keep you negatives flat when scanning? I've switched over to the Nikon 9000 and use glass to keep them flat. Also the lower scanning resolution (4000 vs 5400) and diffuse lighting is more forgiving on de-focus and scratches as well.
 
Admittedly that is one of its weaknesses, I think one has to try and keep to films which are reasonably stiff and flat. Luckily everything the lab has done for me thus far has been really flat and sits nice and flat in the holder. The holder is pretty fiddly though getting the strips both to line up nicely with the inter-frame ribs and to sit under the little tabs that put it flat. Just remembered that the most annoying thing about the KM5400 is it always seems to scan at a slight angle meaning you always end up cropping some of the frame off, this is really annoying if you have a nice and tightly cropped negative.
 
shortstop said:
I don't know which scanner is the right choice. Too much confusion. print the film still seems to me the easiest thing. Therefore vote wet printI
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...and then scan the print! For a darkroom printer, scanning film for online posting also requires trying to duplicate in post what was achieved in the darkroom. Scanning the print saved you from digital PP and allows you to use much lower end flatbed scanners with good results.
 
For 35mm I stick with the Nikon Super Coolscan 5000 ED and Vuescan. Dig the results, especially because there's no color correcting involved!

Only recently started printing negatives in the darkroom, and it's fun to compare the analog process to the results on screen (was surprised how little grain the prints show compared to the scans)
 
Easy way to see that is to do multiple scans, one straight and then multi-pass scans. I did this as a test on my KM5400 and noted that even with Acros at 5400 dpi the grain looks different and/or appears in slightly different places like its shifting around from scan to scan. This made it clear to me that the scanner isn't really scanning the grain but generating a sort of noise pattern based on the grain.
 
NJH said:
Easy way to see that is to do multiple scans, one straight and then multi-pass scans. I did this as a test on my KM5400 and noted that even with Acros at 5400 dpi the grain looks different and/or appears in slightly different places like its shifting around from scan to scan. This made it clear to me that the scanner isn't really scanning the grain but generating a sort of noise pattern based on the grain.
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It is likely that the grain is aliased, hence it moving around with the film moving slightly between passes.
Btw, multipass seems to lower the visibility of the scanning microlines you mention, likely due to the same reason: the slight displacement of the film between passes smooths the result a bit when averaging.

I scan most images at 2800dpi which is plenty for my needs; only selected shots get a 5400dpi treatment. 5400dpi seems to be an overkill for iso 400 films.

BTW, does anyone know if the holders from any other Minolta models can be used with the 5400?
 
I agree that 5400dpi seems to be overkill on the Minolta with traditional 400 speed films although I was amazed by how well Tmax 400 records fine details in the Noritsu scans the lab did for me before, I haven't compared them though on the 5400 but expect pretty amazing results. Its Acros which has stunned me the most thus far for resolving power not Velvia which is counter to what a lot of people would expect. It makes me wonder if the 5400 is that great with colour slide film, or maybe just that the 5400 is so remarkable with B&W negatives.
 
I have added a 5000ED this year. It's running on Nikonscan on Windows 7 OS.
It's a terrific machine!

It's so good that made me rescan all the negatives from my past 4 years. My regret was not getting it sooner. Imagine the time I would have saved!

I have a spare strip feeder which I modified to scan one entire roll (like a SA-30) at one go. It's a time saver - just set up, load up and scan and then go do something else and then come back with full resolution scans done up.

I still have the V700 for medium format scans.
 
After another frustrating :)bang:) session scanning Delta 400 (35mm) with my Epson 4490, I am looking on eBay for a Nikon Coolscan IV......
 
Use Plustek 7600 for 35mm and Epson V700 for MF and LF and recently got a Pakon F135 which i really start to love even the resolution is not that great by todays standards. Scanning a whole roll in one hit is just pefect.
 
Have just started using a brand new Epson V550. Very little experience with it so far but it did a nice job rescuing some ancient disposable camera film that yielded insanely weak negatives. Seems ok for 120 as well but I need to play with it more. :)
 
sailor said:
I send my B&W films to Ilford for processing and scanning. I used to have a Nikon IV but I didn't have a lot of success with it for either colour or B&W. Commercial scans were noticeably better. The Nikon was eventually destroyed when we had burst pipes in the house and was never replaced. I have recently been looking at the Reflecta 7200 because the cost of sending film away is getting to be prohibitive. Here is a sample of an Ilford Hi-res scan.

Minox 35. Ilford Delta 100.


Old Petrol Pumps by Elmer Duck, on Flickr
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Man, that's great shot.

HFL
 
I'm using my D700 with a 55 micro nikkor in RAW for slide and black/white. I started with a Pacific Image 3650u but could never get any consistent results. I copied a 35mm color slide from 20 years ago and resized it to 24x36 with ResizePro just to see what would happen. At 100% on my iMac it looks just a as good as an 8x12 from a 3600 dpi scan. I'm debating whether to get it printed to see what it looks like.
 
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