Scanners for photo negatives

[Darth Bubba]

Does anyone have experience with or opinions on scanners that can digitize photographic negatives and slides? I'm sort of transitioning from analogue to digital photography (advanced hobbiest level), and want to be able to scan in old negatives for retouching, at-home printing, e-mailing and so forth.

Thanks, Darth Bubba

[NooNoo]

Darth Welcome to Windrivers!

How much do you want to spend?

You can get scanners from about $100 - $10,000 for that sort of work.

Decide if you want a dedicated slide/negative scanner or the lesser quality flatbed scanners with feeders.

Decide you budget.

Then start looking at what compromises between budget and quality you are willing to make.

[Darth Bubba]

NooNoo:

As you might suspect, I'd like to get the least expensive scanner that does a good job. I've seen the HP, Visioneer and a few other flat bed scanners that feature film negative (and slide) holders in the stores. I was wondering if any of them were worth the price. I already have a decent flat bed scanner, but my son wouldn't mind having it on his system if I decided that I "need" something with more features.

DB

[NooNoo]

Well I really can't recommend anything in particular because what's good for me you may not like.

You will have to do what we ALL do! Find half a dozen models you like the look of, then search for reviews at www.google.com on that model and see what you get.

If you compare the flatbad scanners with the negative addon against a dedicated negative scanner you will see there is a yawning difference in price and quality of the end product.

[mattyx]

i too am in the market for something like this.

i have read good things about the epson perfection 1660. it is $116 at buy.com. here's the link:

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.as...1&PageFormat=7

but i have just read reviews. anyone have any experience with this model??

i don't want to spend more than about $200.

[slgrieb]

Buy Epson. Get one of their scanners with a Photo designation (or an Expression if your pockets are deep). They do slides, film strips, and negatives. Even the cheaper units can do up to medium format, but spend the most you are comfortable with. See their website for a complete model listing.

One note of caution: I have had several customers who were eager to embark on projects like this, but who changed their minds when confronted with the realities of the time and effort involved. If you have boxes and boxes of material to convert, you will most likely die before you finish. If you are doing small, specific projects it isn't too bad.

[Darth Bubba]

I have cartons and cartons of negatives, fortunately I only want to digitize a few important frames.

Are there any review websites or webpages that delve into this sort of esoterica?

Thanks, DB

[Carpel]

I have two great solutions I can tell you about first hand. I too have a bunch of 35mm negatives, and 35mm slides that I wanted to scan.

I purcahsed a Minolta DiMAGE Scan Elite II. I can tell you it does a wonderful job. You can load multiple slides or negative strips into the unit at once, it can also correct faded colors, exposure, scratched film etc.

It has an easy to use interface, and supports both USB/FireWire.

Not too long after I got the film scanner, I also upgraded my flatbed scanner. I purchased the Epson Perfection 3200. I must say, if you can only get one, get the epson. Its resolution is excellent. It also does negatives, slides, and large format films. (Besides normal flatbed use.)

The interface is even easier than the film scanner, and is excellent at doing multiple images at once.

While the film scanner is an awesome unit, I must admit, had I gotten the Epson 3200 first - it would have been much harder to justify the stand alone film scanner.

If you want one unit that can do it all, I'd say go w/ the epson. If your scans require clean-up, like old negatives/slides, scratches, dust, etc, then go w/ the Minolta. It makes easy work of cleaning up images and delivering great quality.

(There is a regular Epson 3200 and a 3200PRO, the pro comes with color matching software for professional calibration that is not needed except for the most demanding pro applications. Considering they charge you $200 for the 'pro' version, I would stick to the standard 3200.)

Theres a decent review including sample scanned images from the 3200 here: http://www.photo-i.co.uk/Reviews/int...200/page_1.htm


The Minolta: http://www.minoltausa.com/eprise/mai..._Scan_Elite_II


The Epson: http://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/c...s&oid=27766185



Carpel

[hudsonsmith]

I have a Canon D660U flatbed scanner, which also came with a holder for negatives and slides. I have been disappointed w/ this feature with respect to both resolution and speed, and find that I get comparable results by simply scanning the photograph. Given the price (under $150) however I really wasn't expecting too much.

Several years ago in my prior job, we purchased a Minolta DiMage Scan Speed, which at the time was around $1,200. This is a stand alone negative and slide scanner. The speed and image quality were excellent. It required a SCSI interface -they now make newer models with USB, starting at $300 and going over $2,000.

I would say that if you plan to scan a lot of negatives or slides, to go for the stand alone unit.

[Darth Bubba]

Some research into available scanner hardware reveals that the Epson Perfection 3170 has only a couple fewer features than the 3200, but is *much* less expen$ive. Neither flatbed has the incredible resolving power of the dedicated negative scanners, but seem otherwise very well suited to all but the most critical 35mm negative digitizing work. As much as my own perfectionism demands that I get one of the dedicated negative scanners, my cheapskate nature has me checking prices on the Epson 3170.

I guess my 12-year-old son will be getting the old Visioneer scanner on his system soon.

Thanks to all that replied.

Cheers - DB

[JeffAtUCLA]

One scanner that you may want to check out is the Scanmaker 5900 by Microtek. It has USB 2.0 if you are concerned about speed, especially on high resolution images. It also has a built in 4x5 area where you simply position anything in it. Any scanner though less than about $4-500 will not give you a GREAT scanned positive or negative but enough for home use.

You can view the specs on it at:

http://www.microtekusa.com/sm5900.html

Jeff