XPAN How do you scan the negs?

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ABarGrill

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My Xpan is kind of a garden sculpture at the moment because I don't seem to get good scans on my Canon 2400 flatbed, can't use my Canon 4000 and can't afford a non-flatbed. What are you doing to get quality scans? I'd love to know because I really want to do panoramic stuff but the technical glitch is a real pain!

Alan
 
I have not tried it, but people tell me to just scan twice ad stitch. Lame isn't it? Hell, no one in San Diego (one of the largest cities in the world) will even print the things. Frustrating. Great camera.
 
Somewhere I saw a suggestion that you can cut out one of the frame dividers off the negative carrier. I don't have an Xpan myself, but looking at my Dual IV scanner, I guess it could be done if you have talent for this sort of thing. HTH, John
 
I hadn't thought about stitching -- and as to filing the negative carrier, I am not sure that film scanners can be made to cover a broader area than 35mm (unless they are the expensive med. format ones).

Sure is frustrating!!
 
Wish they could, but Minolta never responded to my emails. Lame, have a 5400.
 
I use nikon coolscan v ed for scanning my xpan (tx-1) negatives. It is very easy using that scanner, because the negative is inserted to a kind of "loader". You still need to scan twice, but you can offset the scanning easily using the supplied software. Make sure you turn off the autoexposure feature.
 
If you mean that you have a Canon 4000 film scanner then you can certainly scan your xpan negs in 2 passes and stitch them together. This is far from ideal, I know, but it is what I am doing until I can afford a medium format scanner.

If you down load a copy of vuescan (shareware) you can scan the first part of your neg in exactly the same way that you would any other 35mm neg. Then for the second part of the panorama, lock the exposure, ofset the scan position by, say, 30mm, and rescan.

This will give you 2 scans with some overlap that can be stitched (automatically) in Photoshop Elements, Photoshop CS (not 7) or some stitching software that canon put out with an old printer of mine. there are other apps that I can't remember.

The Canon 4000 film scanner comes with film carriers that have evry other divider missing, so you don't need to take a hacksaw to them. Your Xpan neg will fit already. The limitation is the Canon 4000 software it only allows 35mm scans and no offset, so you would need to remove the carrier and move the negative. Not a good idea. Also I don't think it allows exposure locking which is vital for this type of scan and stitch work. Vuescan is exceptional.

Hope this helps. Take a look at my pics in the gallery. Not brilliant, but the join is hopefully not obvious!!!
 
Thanks! I'll look for vuescan and give it a try. I've only tried one stitch before but this seems like it will be fun to try!

Alan
 
ah ha

ah ha

Last week I discovered one way forward with this problem. First, you make a proof sheet w. a flatbed scanner if it has a transparency feature. That is a big help, especially if you have been shooting print film. For prints I scan in sections w. a film scanner and stitch. It's slow but it works. Hand stitching is better than Photoshops' stitch mode.

A local lab in Berkley however has answered my problems. They have a Neuretsou (sp?) print processer. When I turned in the roll of film I asked for prints and voila..gorgeous wide format machine prints from my X-pan. I immediatly returned with my unscanned images and placed a big order. this lab is Light Wave. great people, great work.

You might look for a good giclee print lab as well, they sometimes offer scanning services. My friend here uses an Imacon, I know that works.

other wise, pick up a good book and start your scanners.

andcolor
 
XPAN Scan

XPAN Scan

To NoTx:

In San Diego go to Nelson Photo Supplies on India Street (in Little Italy). Ask Tom or Paul to hook you up with the Canon Rep, and order another negative carrier for your scanner (it should cost about $12.00), then with sharp x-acto knife, cut out one of the frame separations.
 
Luckily, I have an Epson Expression Pro 1600 that has great 35mm negative holders. I just cut the frames individually, insert them into the negative holders and scan in their entirety.
 
Glad to hear solutions are being found. AndColor, the machine your lab has is a "Noritsu", a major brand widely found. But what a lab chooses to do with the equipment makes a big difference, so good for LightWave!
 
I bought an Epson 4870 flatbed for XPan and 645 scanning as I was not happy to scan twice and then stitch...for web publishing it does a more than an adequate job with 35mm as well. For Xpan and MF it is fantastic.
 
Re: XPAN Scan

Re: XPAN Scan

rovnguy said:
To NoTx:

In San Diego go to Nelson Photo Supplies on India Street (in Little Italy). Ask Tom or Paul to hook you up with the Canon Rep, and order another negative carrier for your scanner (it should cost about $12.00), then with sharp x-acto knife, cut out one of the frame separations.
Click to expand...

I have a Minolta 5400, not canon?
 
I just registered, and this is my first post. I love my TX-1 with 45mm Fujinon lens. I saw that some of you have been having problems with scanning the TX-1 frames. I have two approaches that work and a gleam in my eye for the future. 1st approach. Get my friendly local Fuji DPE shop to scan to CD-ROM, but do it twice for each neg--once from the left and once from the right. Since there are fewer frames, they don't scan much more than they would for a standard 35mm cassette. Superimpose in PaintShop Pro, and Voila! The colour balance isn't always consistent from half-frame to half-frame but it works often enough to be a real saver of time and effort. Of course, only good enough for smaller prints and web displays...

The second approach uses my Epson 2450 flatbed scanner with transparency adaptor. At least I think that's the product number it goes by outside Japan--we here have a different set of designations. This will automatically scan and correctly size the frame in most cases (not perfect, but then what is?). The scanner is supposed to be 2,400dpi, but I don't notice any improvement going above 1,200dpi and the files rapidly get VERY much larger. This gives results a cut above the CD-ROM scans, and is fairly trouble free if the auto framing function works, which it usually does. Some negs throw it, though.

The gleam in my eye is a new Epson moving-bed film scanner. At 3,200dpi, interleaving to 6,400dpi, it can take uncut strips of 35mm negs, a total of 12 standard 24 x 36 frames or--and this is an additional attraction for me--it can take 6 x 18cm MF panorama negs. I also shoot with a rotary camera that produces negs this size for 360-degree rotation, so I HAVE to have one.

The estimated price in Japan is US$400, or about 44,000 yen. "Estimated" because they aren't in the shops yet. Any day now, though. That's a good deal cheaper than the MF competition. I think Epson will make a killing with it!

Oh yes. This scanner can be plugged into several of the latest Epson printers without needing you to possess or even touch a computer. That might be nice. <sigh> I sure do a lot of "touching" now...

Roger
 
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I also love the panoramic format and have run into the same dilemma, scanning the 24 x 65 frame. I purchase a bunch of Provia 100 film to try. It appears that the NIkon Coolscan 8000 and above has carriers that will hold a neg/transparency of that size and will scan it all in one pass otherwise you must scan twice and stitch in photoshop. I don't believe that the resolution qualtiy of the flatbeds does the photos of the xpan justice.
 
The gleam in my eye is a new Epson moving-bed film scanner. At 3,200dpi, interleaving to 6,400dpi, it can take uncut strips of 35mm negs, a total of 12 standard 24 x 36 frames or--and this is an additional attraction for me--it can take 6 x 18cm MF panorama negs. I also shoot with a rotary camera that produces negs this size for 360-degree rotation, so I HAVE to have one.

The F-3200? It sure looks promising at around $800. I'll give the 3170 a shot at first. Doesn't seem too bad for both 35mm and MF. Plus it's cheap right now. Might get a Scan Dual III/IV later on for my regular 35 mm work.
 
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I just purchased a Canon 9950F. My first scan seems to have turned out well.....I will give it a more intensive workout after Thanksgiving. I figure that if I have a negative that is really worthy of a top-notch scan, I send it over to one of the pro labs around here.

I'll let you know how it works out.

Alan
 
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