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A modern 35mm film scanner for home

soke.engineering

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Re: A modern 35mm film scanner for home

#91

Post by joshvm »

Brian-Puccio wrote: post #79
felixfurtak wrote: post #65

RGB LED backlight is a terrible choice. Wide gamut but terrible color rendering.

Can I ask why it will produce terrible color rendering? In addition to commercial scanners that used narrowband trichromatic (RGB) light sources, hobbyists are creating their own RGB light sources to digitize color negative film claiming superior results and putting forward arguments why this is better: https://jackw01.github.io/scanlight/ (NB: Most film I shoot is slide film, which I’ve been told doesn’t benefit fro…

RGB should be fine, especially if you use a genuine ultra-high CRI source. A few companies make them, I think Waveform is one of the more well-known. If you really want to spend money, the optics suppliers like ThorLabs sell broadband LED sources. In an ideal world you could calibrate the image sensor against a known spectrum so you'd know its response. If you can estimate colour to a reasonable degree then you can transform it to what it "should" look like. Nevermind that pixels are single-wavelength as well.

https://store.waveformlighting.com/collections/led-strips/pr...

Negative Supply use something similar in their light tables, though I don't know exactly what the source or spectrum is. They're highly regarded enough that I think it's not an issue.

You can also use LEDs for enlarging, but you need to be careful about buying the right bands for the paper. I've used Luxeon SunPlus with some success as you can buy the correct green/blue for the different contrast layers. Though for B&W, even a random 5500K module from Cree worked quite well.

Re: A modern 35mm film scanner for home

#92

Post by stephen_g »

anfractuosity wrote: post #16

Hmm, does seem pretty expensive but sounds interesting. I've got an old Canon FS4000 for 35mm, which works ok for me. I'm curious what people recommend for 4x5 film. Is there such a thing as a cheap drum scanner.

I don't think you want a drum scanner, look up a video of the process for wet mounting negatives... It's super time consuming, cumbersome and messy. Something like an Imacon looks like the best middle-ground, shame they don't make them anymore...

Re: A modern 35mm film scanner for home

#93

Post by [deleted] »

anonymousiam wrote: post #90
gtm1260 wrote: post #41

The fact that there is still no sample scans has me heated - instead of showing us all these specs, how about some sample images!!

It doesn't seem to exist yet. The specifications are not specifications, they are design goals. I don't see how they can get the color coverage they're claiming with RGB LEDs. Seems about as credible as a lot of the crowdfunded stuff.

[deleted]

Re: A modern 35mm film scanner for home

#94

Post by skhr0680 »

Scanning 135 format at home is pretty much a solved problem right? The home made solution to this costs $0 if you own any DSLR and some other basic photography gear.

I think the product would be more compelling and worth it or even a good deal at the price they are offering if it offered drum scan-quality for larger formats.

Re: A modern 35mm film scanner for home

#95

Post by snowwrestler »

zimpenfish wrote: post #19
sbszllr wrote: post #6

As someone who has a mirrorless scanning setup for my film, and pondered getting a dedicated scanner... the price of this is quite steep given how inflexible of a tool it is. A second hand DSLR setup is going to be roughly the same price or less. I'm also not sure what kind of workflow improvements it actually offers. If you want fancy and experimental, filmomat has arguably a more interesting but pricier offering. B…

> A second hand DSLR setup is going to be roughly the same price or less. And if you get one with Pixel Shift, you can get way higher resolutions than the 22MP they're offering (e.g. my cheapo Olympus gets 40MP JPEG or 64MP RAW from a 16MP sensor.)

You’re for sure exceeding the linear resolving power of 35mm film at 40MP or 64MP.

However, a Bayer-filtered sensor has lower color resolution, since each pixel only sees one color. So the pixel shift really helps quite a bit here since the sensor (and Bayer array) are shifting relative to the film multiple times per exposure.

High-quality film scanners maintain color resolution by using linear sensors without Bayer filtering. But they’re slow and expensive.

Re: A modern 35mm film scanner for home

#96

Post by positus »

snowwrestler wrote: post #95
zimpenfish wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A second hand DSLR setup is going to be roughly the same price or less. And if you get one with Pixel Shift, you can get way higher resolutions than the 22MP they're offering (e.g. my cheapo Olympus gets 40MP JPEG or 64MP RAW from a 16MP sensor.)

You’re for sure exceeding the linear resolving power of 35mm film at 40MP or 64MP. However , a Bayer-filtered sensor has lower color resolution, since each pixel only sees one color. So the pixel shift really helps quite a bit here since the sensor (and Bayer array) are shifting relative to the film multiple times per exposure. High-quality film scanners maintain color resolution by using linear sensors without Bayer…

Some modern 35mm emulsions can record ~500 megapixels worth of detail, but good luck getting all that detail in a digital scan.

https://www.adox.de/Photo/films/cms20ii-en/

Re: A modern 35mm film scanner for home

#97

Post by embedding-shape »

elzbardico wrote: post #83
MBCook wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a cancer on the web. Apple started it and I hate them for it. And I’m an Apple fan. If I wanted to wait 1/2 second for each part of the page to load I’d have stayed on dialup.

Wasn't the NYT that started this?

In my recollection, NYT started/popularized the whole "reportage as a interactive story with stuff moving as you scroll" on the web, but I think it was web developers wanting to emulate the Macbook/iPhone inertia scroll that started the whole "lets override scroll behaviour" trend.

Re: A modern 35mm film scanner for home

#98

Post by atomicthumbs »

anonymousiam wrote: post #90
gtm1260 wrote: post #41

The fact that there is still no sample scans has me heated - instead of showing us all these specs, how about some sample images!!

It doesn't seem to exist yet. The specifications are not specifications, they are design goals. I don't see how they can get the color coverage they're claiming with RGB LEDs. Seems about as credible as a lot of the crowdfunded stuff.

The Coolscans used RGB LEDs.

Re: A modern 35mm film scanner for home

#99

Post by atomicthumbs »

KaiserPro wrote: post #64
sbszllr wrote: post #6

As someone who has a mirrorless scanning setup for my film, and pondered getting a dedicated scanner... the price of this is quite steep given how inflexible of a tool it is. A second hand DSLR setup is going to be roughly the same price or less. I'm also not sure what kind of workflow improvements it actually offers. If you want fancy and experimental, filmomat has arguably a more interesting but pricier offering. B…

I bought some time on a hasselblad medium format scanner (took fucking ages) The results are good, as you'd expect. However can I tell the difference between that and me putting the negatives on a decent softbox and using a fancy camera to take a picture? yes, but not by much. I think the main issue is film registration, that is getting the film to be flat and "co-planar" to the lens so the whole frame is sharp. My n…

It'd be nice if they were able to adapt the Hasselblad/Imacon "virtual drum" concept and curve the film underneath the sensor for side-to-side flatness. I wonder if that's feasible with a 2D sensor.

Re: A modern 35mm film scanner for home

#100

Post by atomicthumbs »

pathartl wrote: post #47
MBCook wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Medium is the problem. There’s nothing. Epson stopped making their flatbeds that do film, reportedly because they can’t get the CCDs anymore. That may be a rumor. The result is they go for 2x MSRP on eBay for models that are many years old. Because that’s all that exists. Without that, you can buy the kind of scanner meant for a photo lab ($$$$$), DIY it with a DSLR ($$$ if you don’t have one), or pay your a lab a lo…

Not that they're cheap, but you can get Imacon scanners for much less than they retailed for. I inherited a Flextight Precision II and it still does a great job.

Do you use it with an old computer, or do you have a good way to interface a SCSI scanner with a modern machine? I tried to get my Precision II up and running but the SCSI card driver would crash Windows at random intervals.
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