Is Vuescan a Good Program and Is It Fairly User Friendly

[ash13brook]

I have an Epson 4870. It works fine, but for some reason, using the Epson software, it will not scan medium format and large format negs. It just divides them where it wants.
I have the free trial of Vuescan and it seems to scan all right, but of course, now watermarks them.
Is everyone pretty happy with the Vuescan program?
Also, when I scanned the 4x5s, I set to Transparency. The program scanned(in Preview) everything on the bed including the negative holder. I cropped what I wanted, but is that how it works?

 

[wjlapier]

I've been using Vuescan for quite a while with both my Nikon Coolscan V and Epson V500. I'm pretty happy with it for 120 film up to 6x9--largest neg I have shot. Can't comment on the 4x5 negative scanning.

 

[Benjamin Marks]

Good, yes. User Friendly . . . I give it a 6 out of 10. The more flexible a program is (e.g. Photoshop) the steeper the learning curve.

 

[Jamie123]

Is it a good program? Yeah sure. Is it user friendly? Definitely not, if by friendly you mean easy to figure out.

And yes, the way it works with Epson Scan and medium format or large format is that you set the frame in the preview. I think you can also have the software crop the frames itself, but you have to set the format in preferences. However, I still prefer to just do it manually the way you described. It's not like you usually have that many frames on a strip anyways.

FWIW, I currently have a V850 and I have Epson Scan, Vuescan and Silverfast Ai Studio. If I had to put the three in order of preference I would say I like Epson Scan the best, then Silverfast and then Vuescan.

 

[sem]

Pretty perfect. I would buy the professional version. I use it for years now and get always any update. If you use a raw converter it is quite similar.

 

[analogish]

I like Vuescan and I can recommend it.

 

[Swift1]

I have an Epson 4870. It works fine, but for some reason, using the Epson software, it will not scan medium format and large format negs. It just divides them where it wants.
I have the free trial of Vuescan and it seems to scan all right, but of course, now watermarks them.
Is everyone pretty happy with the Vuescan program?
Also, when I scanned the 4x5s, I set to Transparency. The program scanned(in Preview) everything on the bed including the negative holder. I cropped what I wanted, but is that how it works?

Can't really comment on Vuescan, but with Epson Scan it's pretty simple to avoid the issue you're having. If you uncheck the "Thumbnail"box, then run Preview, you can then just drag a crop over the entire frame.

Check out my Epson Scan article here,
http://www.coltonallen.com/getting-the-most-from-color-negative-film-with-your-epson-flatbed/

 

[Rob-F]

I use Vuescan with my Epson 2450 and my Nikon Coolscan V. I find it intuitive and easy to use. No problems.

 

[ColSebastianMoran]

VueScan for flatbed MF/LF is a winner.

But, don't believe the resolution settings you can pick for the Epson flatbed. Probably 2000 ppi is the limit, so pick any number higher than that. I get excellent prints from my Epson 600 at six to eight times the linear dimension of my negative. That's 12x18 from 6x9 film.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

I've used Vuescan for nearly 20 years now. It is good, and offers a lot more control than most scanner manufacturers' software does. That said, the user interface is confusing and clunky. To me, its worth the bother because the software Nikon included with my scanner is so buggy and slow, and won;t work at all on my newer Mac.


Here are two tutorials I created for film scanning with Vuescan:


BW Film Scanning


Color Transparency Scanning

 

[markjwyatt]

Can Vuescan be used with non-scanner scanning (i.e., DSLR or mirrorless camera on a bellows, or equivalent)? I think it has to know what scanner is being using to work. To complicate things I do not have Photoshop (I use ON1 and/or GIMP). I would like to copy B&W and color negatives.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Can Vuescan be used with non-scanner scanning (i.e., DSLR or mirrorless camera on a bellows, or equivalent)? I think it has to know what scanner is being using to work. To complicate things I do not have Photoshop (I use ON1 and/or GIMP). I would like to copy B&W and color negatives.

Software for editing digital camera raw files is best for 'scanning' with a camera. I use Lightroom or Photoshop, but On1 should work fine.

 

[markjwyatt]

Software for editing digital camera raw files is best for 'scanning' with a camera. I use Lightroom or Photoshop, but On1 should work fine.

Thanks. Basically, I do not need it. The trick will be color corrections.

Do you think I should set white balance on the unexposed film to start? I have a Durst ChromaPro, so I could also dial in color corrections (I do for some old KII slides).

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Thanks. Basically, I do not need it. The trick will be color corrections.

Do you think I should set white balance on the unexposed film to start? I have a Durst ChromaPro, so I could also dial in color corrections (I do for some old KII slides).

Setting white balance by adjusting the color filters on an enlarger is not easy. I'd just shoot raw and adjust white balance in your editing software.

 

[ash13brook]

Thanks all, for the responses.
Colton- your fix about unchecking "Thumbnail" saved me 90 bucks.
Chris - I'm going to have to buckle down and go through your B&W Scanning tutorial. My scans clearly need a little punching up.
I may still get the Viewscan later, but for now I'm fixed.
Thanks again.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

I don't think Epson software would auto frame MF. I don't think it is at issue. Especially for 6x9 🙂.

I have tried VueScan with Epson V500. It was nothing better, if nothing good.
But I purchased VueScan to use with re branded cheappo scanner sold by BH, which is somewhat German apparatus. The software it came with was with spelling errors. It was trashy and crashy. So, I had no choice by VueScan.

 

[markjwyatt]

Setting white balance by adjusting the color filters on an enlarger is not easy. I'd just shoot raw and adjust white balance in your editing software.

The Durst Chroma Pro is a slide copier, specifically. I was able to adapt my Fujifilm XT-2 to it, adapt a 75mm enlarging lens, and it works great for slides. For older slides with strong yellow shift, dialing in a correction helped a lot. For good quality slides I do not need it. I was thinking to do white balance on a blank negative perhaps to negate the orange cast on color negatives. I either need to do auto white balance or custom on something (halogen light source virgin on the diffuser or through the negative).

In any case thanks for your help and thoughts. It may make the most sense to just correct in ON1. I have heard that the effect of the orange cast is variable with negative density, but not sure any single correction will fix that. For now, I will copy all the (35mm and 127) slides I have, then look at 35mm B&W negatives. Then 35mm color negatives (and 127). Then I will figure out how to handle 6x6 cm and up. This last part may move me away from the Durst (maybe 6x6 will be possible).

 

[willie_901]

VueScan is great.

It is not exactly user friendly. However once you figure out how to produce flat tiff files, VueScan Raw (non-inverted flat tiff file with gamma equal to 1) or VueScan DNG [a], life becomes simple. You can use your favorite raw rendering platform to produce the final image. This avoids limitations often encountered using the scanner's native software for rendering. Another option is to use VueScan's internal rendering tools.

If you have experience working with digital camera raw files, using VueScan Raw or VueScan DNG avoids having to learn VueScan's rendering workflow.

I use VueScan DNG with Photoshop and Lightroom. In PS The C-41 negative colorcast is easy to deal with. I use the following workflow:

○ Import VueScan DNG image into LR
○ Open it using the edit in Photoshop plug-in.
○ Invert it.
○ Now there will be an orange color cast negative image in Photoshop.
○ Create a curves layer.
○ Go to the red channel and alt-click on the black slider and move it until it just starts to clip or slightly before that. Do the same for the white slider.
○ Then do that on the remainder of the channels.
○ The center adjustment slider below the histogram controls contrast

Then I save the PS Tiff into LR and convert it to a lossless compressed DNG file. Now you can render and crop the image in LR as if it was a digital camera raw file.

a. "Output | Raw DNG format (Professional Edition only) This specifies whether to write raw files in DNG (Digital Negative) format. This allows VueScan's raw files to be read by the Adobe Camera Raw plugin or other programs that read DNG files. These DNG format raw files can also be read by VueScan when you set Input | Source to "File".

 

[cz23]

There's definitely a VueScan learning curve, but it's all knowledge that's important to good scanning practice and well worth learning. Once you figure out each scenario, you can save those settings as a preset.

I only scan BW and don't adjust much in VueScan. As long as tones fit the histogram well, I'm good and will make any curve adjustments in Lightroom.

John

 

[Godfrey]

I've been working with VueScan since 2000 and have used it with at least a half dozen different scanners. It does an excellent job.

It is a complex application. The first versions were a bit difficult to figure out, the latest versions are vastly improved in that regard. Also, when it first came out the user manual was terse and difficult to follow, at best; since then, the manual has become much easier to use and understand, AND there is a book (or two) written by a decent technical writer that explains how to use VueScan to best advantage. So it's a lot easier to use than it once was, but I'd never say it was "easy" ... It's too powerful and has too many complex options to call it easy.

I scan B&W and color negs, transparencies, and prints with it using both Nikon Coolscan V and Epson 2450 scanners these days. (I've sold my Epson 700 and my Nikon 9000, didn't use them enough). My goal in scanning is always the same, B&W or color: obtain as much data as possible and leave the finish rendering to more sophisticated image processing tools. I usually have VueScan output DNG encapsulated TIFF data, and sometimes VueScan raw data too. The latter is useful if I have difficult originals that might benefit from having multiple different scanning parameters applied; having the VS raw files allows me to 'rescan' them without having to setup the scanner and run the originals through multiple times.

I haven't used any other scanning software since I started using VueScan, eighteen-nineteen years ago. I don't see the point: none actually do a better job, and few are any easier to use if they allow me to get what I want.

G