Question: What's a good negative/slide scanner?

[Call Me Wesley]

I never thought of buying one until I recently cleaned out a closet and found all my old negatives/slides when I was (shortly) working as a professional photographer. Now I'd like to digitalize them - my darkroom is long gone.

Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance!

[NashVegas]

1. I've Had Good Luck with My Epson

1670

It's not pro-quality, by any means, but it's adequate.

[Call Me Wesley]

4. Thanks!

I'll check it out. I don't think I want pro-quality, since I'm not going to produce high-res posters with it; just digitize some of my old shots, while I pat my Nikon F2 Photomic for all what she did. ;)

I think I'll agree to pay around $200 - $300 for it, but not more.

[F.Gordon]

2. I use an old HP7400C

They've long been discontinued but I've seen them on eBay for less than $30.00. It has a slide/neg adapter and I've been very happy with it. I also use it to scan medium format negs/prints right on the scanner bed without the adapter. It has saved me a ton of money by avoding the cost of paying for prints and digitizing (CD's).

My problem is that I have yet to find all my old negs and slides. :-(

As far as a new one? I have no idea. I'd imagine that the technology has really improved so almost ANY scanner would do..... just make sure it has a slide/neg thing.

[Call Me Wesley]

3. Thank you!

The price range is quite impressive, at least here in Switzerland, where you can double the cost from what it's costs in $. :(

If your scanner is quite old, are you still happy with the results?

[F.Gordon]

5. Yes, still happy with the results

I'll usually go 600% interpolation on the scanner at 600 dpi. I can get very good prints around the 8 x 10 size on that. To go larger I'll use the pixel intercourse thing where it makes lots of baby pixels and then I can easily do sharp 20 x 30 prints....

[bikebloke]

6. Canoscan 8400F

I have a Canon Canoscan 8400F. It works well with negatives, though you have to play with it sometimes. Mostly just making sure empty spots are masked.

I have some negatives from Instamatic cameras. I think I'll have to rig something with the regular negative holders.

[Call Me Wesley]

7. Thanks,

I'll check this one out, too. :hi:

[regnaD kciN]

8. The Epson 4490 works decently...

It's probably not as good as a dedicated film scanner, but it does the job, and was reasonably priced last time I checked.

A word of warning, though: scanning a large collection of old negs and slides isn't something to do casually in a spare afternoon. Scanning each image takes far longer than you would first expect -- and cleaning up the resulting digitized images takes even longer. I still have a huge backlog of photos from 1972-1991 to scan, and will be pleased if I get them all done by this time next year.

[Call Me Wesley]

11. I'll check that one out, too.

I don't need a dedicated film scanner since I mostly want to digitize my old negatives for myself, not for professional use.

And there's no large collection either, just the best shots (you know how it is, at least for professional photography - 15 used films, one good shot ;)), so time isn't really a problem.

:hi:

[BrightKnight]

9. Lab Scanning

A photo lab could probably do the job quicker, easier, and better. Even the drugstore labs do negative scanning now.

There are also options from professional labs. The Kodak Pro Photo CD system is dead but there are newer and better systems including: Rollscan CD, Photo CD II, Pro Photo CD II and Archive CD.

Two Cat Digital specializes in this. They also scan 120 and 4x5 negatives.

http:\\www.twocatdigital.com

Before investing a lot of time and money in scanning equipment you might look into this option.

[electricmonk]

10. That can add up fast though

My local pro lab charges $2 per strip of cut negatives to scan to cd.

[Call Me Wesley]

12. Agreed,

but I really don't want to go through the hassle of marking the negatives I want to have scanned in, and since I just want them for personal use, I'd like to scan them myself. I haven't seen a scanner yet which handles 4X5 negatives, too.

Thank you! :hi: