The OFFICIAL Plustek 120 post your scans

[Kamph]

Tested one at work on some Pro 160NS (6x7), doesn't touch the Flextight, but it is very good for 120, and still quite capable for 35mm. I think I got up to 70 lp/mm off it at the extreme end.

In which way did you find the Flextight better? I've tested mine against a Flextight II, an older model I know, but the Plustek had more resolution than the flextight. The Flextight had better shadow detail though, and flatness of the negatives was less of a concern.
You sure you didn't test a scanner from the first batch? They had focus issues.

 

[Athiril]

In which way did you find the Flextight better? I've tested mine against a Flextight II, an older model I know, but the Plustek had more resolution than the flextight. The Flextight had better shadow detail though, and flatness of the negatives was less of a concern.
You sure you didn't test a scanner from the first batch? They had focus issues.

I guess it could be a very slight focus issue, but its still about 70 lp/mm which is very respectable.

But yes, resolution and dMax. Flextight 949 is a lot higher.

Plustek would probably be better on distortion imho, at least with film that's flat once loaded in the holder. Distortion is the achilles heal of the virtual drum design of the Flextight.

Scans from a Flextight have the image contracted and expand in different areas... so you can see this by making two scans, and taking a crop, and overlaying them and align, then switch between the two quickly, you'll see the image distortion.

In dMax, I noticed that one of the channels on the 160NS neg scan (scanned as a positive) was maxed out on one side already, maybe a setting in Silverfast, but I thought I was making as neutral/non-altered scan as possible.

 

[Kamph]

I guess it could be a very slight focus issue, but its still about 70 lp/mm which is very respectable.

But yes, resolution and dMax. Flextight 949 is a lot higher.

Plustek would probably be better on distortion imho, at least with film that's flat once loaded in the holder. Distortion is the achilles heal of the virtual drum design of the Flextight.

Scans from a Flextight have the image contracted and expand in different areas... so you can see this by making two scans, and taking a crop, and overlaying them and align, then switch between the two quickly, you'll see the image distortion.

In dMax, I noticed that one of the channels on the 160NS neg scan (scanned as a positive) was maxed out on one side already, maybe a setting in Silverfast, but I thought I was making as neutral/non-altered scan as possible.

Respectable indeed, but I still think something might be wrong. Tim Parkin tested his Plustek 120 and found that it had between 4500 - 5300 true dpi depending on the scan direction. That would put it ahead of the Flextight which "only" does 3200 dpi scans of anthing larger than 6x4.5 in medium format (correct me if I'm wrong).
I have no doubt that the flextight has better Dmax, I have seen some fantastic scans from a single pass scan made on the Flextight, wheres the plustek would require multiple passes to record the same detail in dense areas of the film.
I'm sure the flextight is the better scanner on most respects, but then again, it should be given the price! 🙂

Edit: Now I should add that what I'm writing is based on the Flextight II, an older model than your 949, but it was my impression that not much had changed between these scanners, and that they used the same superb optics. I saw that you found the Plusteks optics poorer in comparison in another thread, which seems entirely possible, however you also stated that they were inferior to the Coolscan 9000, and this I find quite puzzling. I have found my scans consistently sharper than the ones from a friends 9000. Do you have any way of testing the focus on the plustek? Would it be possible for you to make a comparison of the PLustek and the Imacon/Hasselblad, and upload the RAW files?

 

[Athiril]

Respectable indeed, but I still think something might be wrong. Tim Parkin tested his Plustek 120 and found that it had between 4500 - 5300 true dpi depending on the scan direction. That would put it ahead of the Flextight which "only" does 3200 dpi scans of anthing larger than 6x4.5 in medium format (correct me if I'm wrong).
I have no doubt that the flextight has better Dmax, I have seen some fantastic scans from a single pass scan made on the Flextight, wheres the plustek would require multiple passes to record the same detail in dense areas of the film.
I'm sure the flextight is the better scanner on most respects, but then again, it should be given the price! 🙂

Edit: Now I should add that what I'm writing is based on the Flextight II, an older model than your 949, but it was my impression that not much had changed between these scanners, and that they used the same superb optics. I saw that you found the Plusteks optics poorer in comparison in another thread, which seems entirely possible, however you also stated that they were inferior to the Coolscan 9000, and this I find quite puzzling. I have found my scans consistently sharper than the ones from a friends 9000. Do you have any way of testing the focus on the plustek? Would it be possible for you to make a comparison of the PLustek and the Imacon/Hasselblad, and upload the RAW files?

The Coolscan should def beat the 35mm Plusteks, probably not the 120 if one in proper condition is getting 4.5-5K

3200 dpi max for medium format holders (higher for 645 on the sideways 645 holder that holds it on the short edge). One can simply stitch xpan holder scans, but I cbf. I have used the xpan and 35mm holder to take higher res crops to check charts before though.

The Plustek 120 is already gone, I was just given the duty to check it's in operating order. I wasn't expecting a focus issue since I considered ~70 lp/mm high res, and about in aline with their 35mm models.

The 949 is next to my workstation however, so I can provide from that easily.

I think I saw about 95 lp/mm off some Rollei Retro 80S I developed and scanned on the Flextight.

I did scan the chart crop at both the ~11k and ~5k settings on the 120.

Plustek 120

Flextight

Flatbed for reference

 

[Kamph]

Athiril, thank you for the comparision! I'm guessing the plustek is scanned at 10k dpi in your reference, this would introduce some upsampling to the equation as the Plusteks optics are limited to 5300 dpi supposedly. Looking at the scan, however, it shouldn't look that blurry I would say. I haven't shot a film where the plustek couldn't resolve the grain eg. Tmax 100. Was this shot on micro film? The flextight scan is, as expected, wonderful.
It's concerning that the Plustek has such inconsistent results, maybe they should focus more on quality control, but that's out of our hands any way.
I can't speak for the 35mm Plustek scanners, I haven't tried them, but it was my impression that they are somewhat budget scanners, and of lesser quality than the 120 - the price should reflect this as well.

 

[Athiril]

It's Rollei Retro 80S, I find it about as sharp as T-Max on my gear, but with a different look.

Yep 10k scan, I did the same crop at 5k to see if there was a difference, because scanning at 10k really blows. I couldn't tell any difference with the 5k scan of the Rollei film.

As for the 35mm scanners, had to test a Plustek 8200i once. It was pretty decent. Great option for 35mm only shooters.

 

[Pete B]

 

[rerush]

My University has a 8200i, and am very satisfied with the speed - it's about a 1 minute 20 seconds process from start, preview and scanned for 2400dpi jpeg and 1-2MB file. With my computer's SSD and processor, maybe it would be even faster on my computer. ANYWAY, can someone please give me some SPEED TESTS with the same setting/different settings? Vuescan vs. Silverfast 2400dpi? As far as I can see, no one really breaks it down if the automation is worth it or as fast as the 8200i. If it can do 5 slides at a time, how much time does that allow me to step away and do something? I'm looking to purchase this maybe on Sunday. THANK YOU.

 

[goffer]

Here are a few from my Makina w67:

67w_TRIX_0007 by akagoffer, on Flickr

67w_TRIX_0009 by akagoffer, on Flickr

 

[luuca]

efke50, 35mm

ektar100, 35mm

 

[kanzlr]

When I did a few formal tests earlier this year I noticed that film that is not perfectly flat gives very uneven sharpness across the field. When I contacted Plustek about this, they offered to adjust my unit and pick it up at my flat.

Two weeks ago I finally agreed to that offer and yesterday my replacement unit arrived.

And really, even far from flat negatives now scan perfectly with uniform high sharpness and detail across the frame. Given how uneven that APX100 and TriX was that I fed it yesterday evening, I do believe that the depth of field is sufficient, even without autofocus, as long as the scanner is adjusted correctly.

I am really happy with the unit now, even with problematic film strips.
Also, the new unit is way less noisy than the old one, which I never used during the night due to that.

 

[hanskerensky]

When I did a few formal tests earlier this year I noticed that film that is not perfectly flat gives very uneven sharpness across the field. When I contacted Plustek about this, they offered to adjust my unit and pick it up at my flat.

Two weeks ago I finally agreed to that offer and yesterday my replacement unit arrived.

And really, even far from flat negatives now scan perfectly with uniform high sharpness and detail across the frame. Given how uneven that APX100 and TriX was that I fed it yesterday evening, I do believe that the depth of field is sufficient, even without autofocus, as long as the scanner is adjusted correctly.

I am really happy with the unit now, even with problematic film strips.
Also, the new unit is way less noisy than the old one, which I never used during the night due to that.

Glad that your Plustek problem is solved at last 🙂

 

[kanzlr]

I bought one of the first units and should have contacted Plustek earlier, but most scans where fine and better than what I got out of my Nikon 4000, thus I thought everything must be fine, but it wasn't.

great service from Plustek, btw.

 

[luuca]

my scanner has a serial number beginning with 1A313xxxxx, do you think is an earlier unit?
I think the scans are ok, but I can't do comparisons...

 

[luuca]

here is a sample at 5300dpi

ektar 100 35mm

crop 100%

do you think it's ok?

and this is from a 120 roll

crop 100%

 

[kanzlr]

looks fine to me.

the real optical resolution is said to be slightly less than the advertised 5300 dpi, more like 4500 or so, and if you downsize the image slightly, you will notice the 100% crops look crisp.

 

[Pete B]

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showpost.php?p=2354322&postcount=1128

Pete

 

[luuca]

looks fine to me.

the real optical resolution is said to be slightly less than the advertised 5300 dpi, more like 4500 or so, and if you downsize the image slightly, you will notice the 100% crops look crisp.

thank you very much.

 

[Retrolux]

Your scanning results look great Luuca.
I am struggling already with the third replacement unit and every one has the same chromatic aberrations caused by different focus planes of the lens for each color.

Check out the test scan below and inspect the 100% crop in full size. Notice how the red channel is way out of focus.

 

[James1]

Your scanning results look great Luuca.
I am struggling already with the third replacement unit and every one has the same chromatic aberrations caused by different focus planes of the lens for each color.

Check out the test scan below and inspect the 100% crop in full size. Notice how the red channel is way out of focus.

Interesting.

I usually scan black and white, so I did a few tests to see which was the sharpest channel on my OP120 - it turned out to be Green. The sharpest channel in my previous Canon FS4000US was also Green, and for that matter in the Epson 4490 that I used for medium format.

I have no idea if this is behaviour common to all scanners, though I have seen a number of articles on the internet (for example here) indicating that one channel might be sharper than others.