I use an Epson 3490 scanner. It is very good but very slow.

 

Does 35 mm slides and negatives and super slides.

 

Wish it could do 4X5.

 

Al W.

 

 

Unfortunately it's not easy to find a really good film/slide scanner anymore. With the decline in film use, most of the major players have stopped making their scanners.

 

If you have a finite number of slides, you might be better off in having a photo lab scan them for you?  There are quite a few that advertise their services in the photographic press. You can probably find a good one in your area. Although it's not cheap, it can cost less than buying a good scanner, and you should get top quality results.

 

If you are still using slide film, and wish to scan them on a regular basis, then you might consider looking for a used Nikon Coolscan 5000 if you only have 35mm slides, or a Coolscan 9000 if you have larger formats too. (120/220 etc.). But these are not often on the market and are in high demand.

 

You can get quite good results with a flatbed scanner, but it can take a fair bit of work to get the best results. The Epson and Canon flatbeds are among the best at a reasonable price.

There are several sites on the internet that describe the building of automatic

scanners using a carousel projector and a digital camera

 

Al

You cannot get acceptable publication quality 35 mm slide scans on a flat bed scanner. Been there and done that and it simply does not work well.  I use a Nikon CoolScan 4000 to get results like this:

 

 

 

 

These photos were taken on 35 mm Ektachrome Professional by Jack Wheelihan, otherwise known as "Hot Water" on this forum. They will appear in "Great Layout Adventures 8" which will be released at York.

i use a plustek opticfilm 7600.  very good results on film (both B&W and kodacolor) and slides and affordable.  i have been using it to digitize some of my vast store of negatives and slides.  

Do not buy any of the scanners that are priced for $150 or less! I have tried several over the years and have obtained exceptionally poor results with all of them.

I currently leaning toward one of the Plustek brand scanners. I hope I have better luck!

 

I have also tried flatbed scanners to no avail. They are either out of focus, or the color balance and contrast is impossible to correct. Not worth wasting my or your time! Having said that, my 84 year old father does have one setup on his computer that has given reasonable results. Maybe not good enough for Rich, but far better than what I have been able to achieve.

 

Chris

LVHR

Rather off topic here, but talk about a shock.  I believe that's the first picture I've ever seen of 4449 while it was in Raleigh with the Freedom Train.

 

Nice choice of an image to post,

Kevin (who is about a 15 minute drive from that spot)

 

 

I think that's the key.  As Mr Webmaster said, a flatbed scanner won't do the job if the photo is going to be published.  But if you're just going to view them at home [ more or less ] and on a reasonable sized monitor, then at least some flatbed scanners do an acceptable job.  Here's an example using my V500 Photo;  other photos I've posted on the OGR Forum have been scanned using the same machine -- though I often post them at a reduced resolution.  And when I bought my V500 Photo for under $150, it came bundled with the Adobe Photoshop, which is great for cropping, changing image size/quality, etc.   You might consider the V700 if you have lots and lots of slides.

 

With best regards, SZ

The "best" equipment to scan slides?  A drum scanner, of course.  I've seen used ones that were decent go for as little as $12,000 lately.  Now, assuming you don't want "best," just "OK for the price," I have some thoughts.  I scan 35mm, 120, and 4x5.  For 120 and 4x5 I use an Epson v700 with the betterScanning.com wet mount holders.  This makes decent scans, up to a 20x25 with 4x5 sheets.  For 35mm I use a Nikon Coolscan V.  It's slow but very, very good.  Only available used and they go about $800 or so.  I've been considering selling mine and buying a used Nikon 8000ED for about $1,200.  It does 35mm and 120.  I've been shooting mostly 120 lately.

 

For you, assuming you don't want to spend the $23,000 for a new Hasselblad Flextight scanner or even a used Coolscan V, I'd suggest trying to get B&H to exchange what you have for a Plustek 7400.  It's a decent scanner.  Not the "best," but I think it will do what you want.

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/...lm_7400_Scanner.html

 

I would not use a flatbed scanner for 35mm unless you are doing them for 72 dpi web use or something.  Remember that I'm only getting decent enlargements of 5x from my v700.  That would translate to a 4x6 print from a 35mm neg, approximately.  Now to push this into an entirely different direction than the advice you'd normally get on a railfan board.  If this is to be a one time deal where you're scanning just your best slides and aren't shooting anything new on film, tell you what I'd do.  I'd buy a pretty good scanner such as the Nikon Coolscan V, or something like this would be perfect for the job:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/..._Slides_Scanner.html

 

Find a USED one on ebay, buy it, scan all your stuff, and quickly resell.  I bet you'd be out very little money and would have great scans in a short time with something like this.  I buy and resell stuff like that often on ebay.  I don't own a Nikon 500mm f4 lens any more, but if I have a special need for one I just buy a used one, then quickly resell.  Sometimes I make a little money if I time the purchase right.  The trick is to buy used, then resell in the same condition you got it in.

 

 

Kent in SD

 

My business partner is a fine photographer and has thousands of slides which he has digitized.  There are many outfits that can do the work for you at high quality and reasonable prices,  http://www.scancafe.com/ for example is a good one. 

 

I had very good results transferring slides to digital using slide projector and digital camera on tripod. The room was totally dark, slide projector very close to slide screen allowing small (approx. 2' high image)but very bright detailed image on screen. The digital camera was set to no flash, tripod located very close to projector. The digital image was remarkably very close to image projected. You can crop any slide my adjusting lens on digital camera if you wish.

 

Scan Cafe was the one I was thinking of.  I would send slides to them in batches, not all at once though.  If you are retired or have a lot of time I still think buying a used scanner, doing it yourself, and then reselling would be the cheapest way to go.

 

 

Kent in SD

I tried using a camera mounted slide duplicator - it is 1 to 1 however if you do not have a full frame  DSLR it ends up zooming in on the slide.

Photo of Slide using Nikon D90

 

 

 

Ok thanks. I did lose a few of family photos that were in the basement the photos melted together and we lost them. I put a dehudifier in and now all is better I need to do something. I am not retired (a few more years) to go. What type of scanner would you recommend. I think saving them to a hard drive would be a good option, we have tons of photos trains and family.

Thank all of you for your helpful replies!

I guess I should clarify a little.  I will be borrowing and scanning slides from my uncle who has thousands of slides.  This will be an ongoing project.  As much as I would love one of those scanners that you can load a carousel in and let it go, I can't justify the expense. 

 

The Wolverine is a 14mp fixed focus digital camera in a box basically.  Here it the review that got me excited about it.  This review is for a model below mine that just does slides.  They have the same sensor 

http://www.amazon.com/review/R...mp;store=electronics

 

B&H will cover return shipping on my unit and exchange it for another one at the same price. The sale and free shipping had ended so that was kind of a big deal.  I was set to do that but I got looking at one of your recommendations for the Plustek OpticFilm 7400 Scanner.  It is on sale at B&H.  I will have to read up and think about this for a while.

 

Thanks again

 

 

 I had an email exchange with Wolverine last week.  Last thing I heard from them they asked for a copy of my receipt. I emailed it to them and never heard back from them.  Today I find a box on my porch from Wolverine Data.  It is a replacement scanner.  Good thing I had not shipped the other one of yet huh?

 

Here are some random slides I got cheap on ebay for test purposes.

I can't find any place where I can post the pics at full resolution.  I tried Photobucket and here.  Any suggestions?

 

The process of scanning could not be easier (unless it was automated).  I'm trying to make up my mind about the quality.  I did not take canned air or anything to these so ignore the dust.  The file size (in megabytes) of the scanner pics is almost half  the size of pics I take with my 14 Megapixel camera.   The size in Pixels is very close.

 

I will keep looking for a place to post full resolution pics. Then I would appreciate you guys doing the "Pepsi Challenge" between my scanner and what you use.

 

Thanks

Here is the last 2 cleaned up with a microfiber mitt and pointed the right way.

More, you know for science, not that this is becoming an excuse to look at train pics or anything .

 

 

 

 

 

 

I tweaked this one with the on board editing tools.  The original was very dark as you can see at the bottom.

Garfield, I  hate to say it, but these slide scans you have posted are a perfect example of the lousy results you get when you try to do this on the cheap. If there was ever an area where you get what you pay for, this is it.

 

The shot of the Big Boy above is probably the worst example. The color balance is WAY off and there is no shadow detail at all. The blacks are all  "blocked up" and show as big, black areas with no detail. Same for the C&NW diesel shot. The SP freight shot right above this post is another example of shadow detail gone and color balance off, although only slightly. It shows as magenta in the ballast at the bottom of the shot.

 

You end up with these results because cheap slide scanner hardware cannot handle the contrast range of the film. If you set the scanner to get properly exposed whites, the shadow detail is all gone. If you set it up to get good shadow detail, the whites are all blown out and over-exposed. A good 35 mm scanner can deal with the high contrast range of the transparency film. I would bet that if I scanned these same slides in the CoolScan I have, the results would be like night and day.

 

Here's what I would suggest if you are on a budget. Find a good used Nikon CoolScan 4000 on Ebay and buy it. Scan your slides and when you're all done, put the thing up for sale on Ebay again! You may not get what you paid for it, but you will end up using it for almost nothing. And after you see the results, you may decide to keep it!

 

Here is the BigBoy after messing with the buttons on the scanner.  You can at least now tell why there is water standing on the ground.

FWIW I've had good results scanning prints with a flatbed scanner, even 3x5 prints usually come out good (well, assuming the original picture was good!). I've thought about looking into whether it would be cheaper to send out slides to be professionally scanned, or to have them printed and then scan them myself. (Plus that way I would have a 'hard copy' backup in case the scans were lost in a computer crash or something.)

I don't mind at all! Thanks as a matter of fact. That does look worlds better.  These are slides from some one's cull pile I got cheap of off ebay.  The pic is from 1968 before the era of auto everything cameras.    I'm encouraged that the $112 scanner can make repairable scans.  One thing I don't like about this scanner is it is JPG only. 

 

I'm temped on the Plustek Opticfilm 7400 but all the reviews say it can tax even a powerful modern computer.  Mine isn't.  Likewise my newest computer does not have firewire or a way to add it.  That rules out the Nikon even if I could afford it.  From what I have read, parts are getting hard to find for those.  So If I bought one intending to sell it when I was done and it breaks, I have a $500 boat anchor.

 

  I'm going to keep researching over the weekend.  Who knows? I might find an amazing deal on a new computer.  Baring that I think I will ship back the dead scanner and keep it's replacement.

 

It is a split between getting the highest quality image I can the first time so they don't have to be scanned again later and what I can afford.

 

Thanks for your help every one!

I was looking on eBay for just that reason, I think I'll do that very thing.  For $400-500, I don't think I want to keep it, but I do have about 3,000 slides that I'd like digitized.

If you are doing 3,000 slides, I'd look for a scanner that can do auto batch scanning with some sort of feeder on it.  It takes about a minute for a scanner to scan a slide, with handling call it two minutes.  That's about 5,000 minutes of time doing something very monotonous.  Go to the www.dpug.org forum for scanners and see what they suggest for a used batch scanner that might show up on ebay.  I wouldn't scan every slide, just your best 25% or something.  I would scan 100% of any family photos.


Kent in SD

I believe the Nikon mentioned here has a slide feeder.

 

You're right, I'd probably only actually keep about 1,000 of these slides, but that's still a lot of work.