Unhappy with Epson V500

heres another. I think this one really looks like its about as sharp as the scanner could get it.

dirt2lg7.jpg
 
Pherdinand, thanks heaps for the fogging tip.

I have had better results scanning with an old durst 9x2 glass plate on top of the negatives.

Actually I hate scanning, probaly me ;-(
 
Mablesound-you can still go in and tweak levels after Epson Scan auto adjusts it. I do this regularly and you can also set the amount of auto adjust.

Jeremy-the scans look alot better but I believe that usm should be applied last step. Setting usm too high at the scan stage could hamper you down the line when you bring it into PS or Lightroom.

Good luck guys.
 
Last edited:
Nice Jeremy! I think you'll be happy with the control your own scanner will give you.

As for USM, in my unwanted opinion it should be disabled in Photoshop until the owner takes an online class on its effective and ineffective use.
 
MikeL said:
Nice Jeremy! I think you'll be happy with the control your own scanner will give you.

As for USM, in my unwanted opinion it should be disabled in Photoshop until the owner takes an online class on its effective and ineffective use.
Click to expand...

I just love sharpness. And sometimes, with my Walmart scans I can take the USM up sooo much without it making the picture look any worse.
 
Im having a really hard time scanning some negs for my dads friend. The whole role is so curly that theres no way to get them to stay in the flimsy plastic negative holder that came with my V500.

1) Whats the best way to straighten out curly negs?
2) Hasnt someone said something about putting a piece of glass over the negatives to keep them straight while scanning?
 
Roll the film the other way around, so the curl cancel each other out.
Put it under a heavy stack of book for 2-3 days
You need anti-newton glass otherwise there will be weird rings all over the places
 
1) Whats the best way to straighten out curly negs?
Click to expand...
If you have a plastic developing spool, wind the negs onto it with the emulsion side out and leave it like that for a while - for freshly developed negs a few hours is sufficient, but if they've been curled up for a long time they might need to be left for a day or two.

It's more convenient with an uncut roll because you can wind the whole roll on in one go, but if the negs have been cut you either need to use more spools (one per strip) or do one strip at a time.

2) Hasnt someone said something about putting a piece of glass over the negatives to keep them straight while scanning?
Click to expand...
As Hans says, you'll get Newton's Rings - funny rainbow patterns all over images.
 
I have to share this very ausome discovery that I just made. I compared another Wal-mart scanned picture with a scan by Epson V500. The results make me very, very happy because the pictures are pretty much identical in my opinion. This is one of my favorite candid "street" pictures.

Here is the Walmart scan. All I did to this was apply an Unsharp Mask at 500% with a 0.3px radius and the threshold at 0. I also applied a slight S-curve with the RGB curves (doesn't do anything to the colors, only increased exposure and brough out the blacks).

awuslx.jpg


And here is the Epson V500 scan I made at 1200 dpi, and no adjustments selected. After I scanned I did the same unsharp mask as the Walmart scan, and the same small RGB S-curve. The only thing different I had to do was increase the greens and yellows in another curves layer with the blending mode set to "color". That was the only way I could get the same type of colors as the Walmart scan. But it was really easy to get the colors matched up pretty good.

zinjm9.jpg


The one thing I did notice was how much Walmart must have been cropping me photos. If you look at the top and bottom of the two photos, you can see that the Epson has a lot more in it.

I think this means that I will keep my Epson V500. I think the main reason I was able to get the good result that I was looking for is because I switched the Auto Exposure to stop changing whenever I moved the selection around the negative, but instead to perform its Auto Exposure technique whenever I click on the Auto Exposure button. After I did that, I started to make a selection around the center, or main part of the negative, press the Auto Exposure button then, and then take the selction around the whole frame you are scanning. So thank you to whoever taught me how to do that in this thread somewhere.
 
Jeremy, I looks like you're on your way to solving the problem. I have one issue, though. Consider toning down the colour saturation and contrast. My eye are starting to bleed!
 
visiondr said:
Jeremy, I looks like you're on your way to solving the problem. I have one issue, though. Consider toning down the colour saturation and contrast. My eye are starting to bleed!
Click to expand...

Agreed. I played with the last image above in Photoshop and it's very easy to get pleasant, natural colors out of them. (I hope you don't mind that I gave it a test touch up.)
 
Pherdinand said:
Mabelsound,

in the preferences options or stg like that, there is a checkbox "auto adjust" or something similar. It is checked by default. This means whenever you change the marquee size or position he redoes the auto adjust.
If you uncheck the box, you can drag the marquee e.g. around ONE or part of one frame, push the auto adjust button (the first button on the left above the ICE etc options) or is it called auto exposure button?:), and it adjusts for that marquee. Then you can drag your marquee wherever you want, he will NOT change the exposure/colours/etc. until you press that button again.
Click to expand...

Thanks a lot for that tip !!:):):) I often have to select frames manually (lots of photos in dark light with difficult to recognize borders) and always wondered how I can individually select the auto exposure for every single frame.

I didn't follow the whole thread but one more important thing (at least for the Epson V700): Make sure to select " Film holder" when using a film holder and "Film area guide" when placing the negs on the scanner's glass plate. Switching between "Film holder" and "Film area guide" changes the optics and focal plane of the scanner.
 
i understand now, Jeremy.
You are after the "look" the Walmart scans show, not after the "quality". That seems to be different.
Honestly, the two images you posted have VERY wicked colours. No wonder it is difficult to get them with your scanner.
They look like cross processed, or something.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom