Film inexpensive scanner and monochrome negatives

One other thing to consider is the format you save your scans in. In the example you posted above the first image is positive and the second is negative. You should be able to select positive or negative output in your scanner software. If you save it as a positive image you can then go ahead and edit in your program of choice. If you save it as a negative you first need to invert the tone curve to produce the positive. So if you invert the tone curve on the second image above you will end up with the first image.

I generally save B&W film as negative TIFF files and save colour film as positive TIFFs. I prefer to let the scanning software convert the colour negative to positive because it is tricky getting rid of the strong colour casts in colour negative film in post processing. Other than that I don't do any adjustments via the scanning software because Lightroom is much better for this and TIFFs give me maximum scope for adjustment.
 
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I don't understand. Is one better than the other and why? Which scanner should I use? The vignetting is from aps-c lens on 35mm film sensor. Was it a funny? Why are the backgrounds aka vignetting diff colours? The 1st one is Black and the second one is White. That might be the key, Have to play around some more. Just got the negatives today
One (top one) is a positive, the other is a negative. It still needs to be converted to a positive.
 
Thanks to both, I cannot do Tiff's. This thing is generic. I did see 135 Negative and Black and White. So I should set it to Black and White. I tried the tonal curve thing I don't like it. I'll make a preset off the first image and just use the basic preset for that batch of images. The Black and white option must be for Positive. Will try that, no news means good news
 
The first image is a positive and the second image is a negative. You scanned a negative, and must have inverted it for the first image.

People have used fish-eye lenses and other lenses that give image circles that do not fill the frame- for a long time. It is not often used these days. It works well in your image to give the look of an old camera.
 
Edited and cropped. I can save as a Tiff in lightroom but I don't see any image improvement. The jpeg is 6.7mb and the Tiff is 92mb. Why is the text backwards? Did I miss something in post? This output is unacceptable. I'm going to try Dslr method. Later today




PICT0001.JPG
Join to see EXIF info for this image (if available)
 
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You probably need to turn the negative the other way when using it on the scanner. You can just reverse the image.

Nothing wrong with saving an image as a lossless JPEG, ie at the highest setting. The image is stored efficiently, The TIFF- probably stored an uncompressed bitmap.
 
Lucien, you won't see any difference in output between TIFF and JPEG on screen. You would use TIFF if you plan to do a lot of post-processing. As Brian noted you can also use loseless JPEG, though this will not compress your image as much as lossy compression.

It's hard to comment on the image without more information but, while a scanned film image does not look like a digital image, this does look bad. (For comparison take a look here. The first six images in this gallery are shot on film and scanned on my Plustek scanner. You can see they are different from the rest of the images which are digital but athey are still useable and printable.)
 
nice, what are the price range's of these scanners and how many dpi's did you get? And why doesn't everyone go the scanner route then?
 
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nice, what are the price range's of these scanners and how many dpi's did you get?
I have the Plustek 8200i SE which these days goes for around $400 in the US. It comes with SilverFast scanning software which I used for a while. I eventually switched to VueScan software instead which is around $50. The software has several editing options and a series of presets for specific film stocks, but I tend not to use any of this and do all my editing in Lightroom.

The Plustek has a theoretical maximum resolution of 7200 dpi (Plustek use dpi rather than ppi) but I stick to 3600 and use the maximum avaiable bit depth.
 
Thanks, At that cost I might as well have them send me the 15mb scans by email. It's a cost per use/need issue. I'm going to try Dslr again. If it doesn't work out fine. I save enough on the bulk film to pay for the proper scans from the store.
 
I have the Plustek 8200i SE which these days goes for around $400 in the US. It comes with SilverFast scanning software which I used for a while. I eventually switched to VueScan software instead which is around $50. The software has several editing options and a series of presets for specific film stocks, but I tend not to use any of this and do all my editing in Lightroom.

The Plustek has a theoretical maximum resolution of 7200 dpi (Plustek use dpi rather than ppi) but I stick to 3600 and use the maximum avaiable bit depth.
If you are going to spend $400, I would only go the flatbed route if you're scanning multiple film formats. Flatbeds do alright with 120 film because the native resolution in the film is greater than 35mm. But even though more money equals better resolution in a flatbed, if you're shooting 35mm you'll get better results from a dedicated scanner by Plustek or Pacific Image. I got by with a cheaper flatbed for a while, which I spent $150 on (Epson V550), but it never satisfied with the focus imperfection and low resolution. If it's all you can budget for a scanner, though, it'll get you by (just carefully store the negatives so you can up-res them later on with a better scanner if you decide to go that route).
 

This is what I used for the image shown.

It comes down to what you want to do with the scanned image. Post to Internet- works well.

Want to scan and send to friends/family- works well.
 
thanks, I'll have to weigh the costs via diff techniques, Including the in store scans from the negatives. 2 samples from the above samples. These are the best I could get. I lost alot of pixels fixing the image circle and borders.
 
I think there was a misconception. I've been using my Dslr to capture the negatives but my first attempt was mediocore. A learning process. As I've gotten experience the files have improved. I'm not going to fork out 400 on a flatbed. I might as well have the store scan for me. The cheap negative scanner didn't have the option of saving to tiff, it didn't even have software for it. They advertised a max of 10mp resolution, coming out of a 5mp sensor. Now that I've come to understand how things work. I should look for resolution not mp's.
 
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I think this is as good as I can get without big bucks. And I tried out 3 different lens that day to see which perform good. I'm pleased, technique will improve over time. I shot these with a Minolta Maxxum A7 and 3 different lens that day.
 
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