35mm Slide Scanners
 

There must be lots of you out there who will be able to advise me on Slide Scanners. I have a life time of slides taken in my carreer as a ships officer and it's time I started showing them off! There must be lots of good 2nd hand ones about. People like me; once the collection is duly scanned the the scanner becomes surplus.

Hello Bob,

Firstly, a very warm welcome to WPF, glad to have you aboard!

I use a slide scanning attachment on an ordinary flatbed scanner, but I wouldn't recommend it for quality or speed. If you have lots of slides to scan, it is probably worth investing in a dedicated slide scanner. I have no expertise in such things, but I'm sure someone will be able to recommend one soon enough. Member Nirofo springs to mind.

Hang on, I recall this has been asked before. A quick search has found this thread:
http://www.worldphotographyforum.com...ead.php?t=1010

Regards,

Duncan

Hi Bob:
Last year I was looking for a scanner to upload my slides and I found this review in PC Magazine.
In the past I've found their reviews fair and without bias. The price was right, I took a chance and bought the Canon.
It has been everything I had hoped for, a reasonably priced machine giving a quality scan.
It might be worth your consideration.

Canoscan 8400F
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1712301,00.asp

Bruce C

I have an Minolta that works really well, only trouble being that doing 4 slided at a time can get really boring!
Chris

Have any of you any experience of the Plustek range of scanners?

If you are on a budget, I would also recommend the Canoscan 8400F flatbed with slide attachment. I've been using one for 2 years and the results are very good. I understand that dedicated slide scanners are better in terms of quality and speed, but they are also pricey. Plus, if you have other things to scan, you need two scanners, making it even more expensive.

Cheers
Phil

I already have a good flat bed scanner, but it does not do justace to my slides, all taken with prime Nikkor or Canon lenses. My only budget consideration is once I have scanned my slides it will not be used again. So it seems daft to spend a fortune. But one thing to remember is shrouds don't come with pockets!

Thanks Bob

You could always buy one, scan everything then put it on ebay, sure cheaper than getting the pros to do it.

Chris

What's the film? That can make a difference. Kodachrome is a real pain to scan.

I'm sure you can find reviews of the PlusTek scanners via Google:

http://www.ephotozine.com/equipment/...fm?test_id=403

The Minolta 5400 and Nikon Coolscans are some of the best. There is a MInolta on ebay currently at £200 with ages to go, so it looks like they fetch a decent amount.

I can reccomend the Nikon Coolscan V, and the Nikonscan4 software that comes with it is especially good for restoring fading Kodachromes.

The bulk of the film I used was the various Ectacrome Pro with a few Agfacrome from the 1960's

I can recommend the Nikon Coolscan range too. I'm still finding out what the scanner can do.....the only real poor scans I've had from it have all been down to my operational errors.
Bob, particulalry after reading that you want to use it then sell it on, I would personally recommend you go with a secondhand Nikon, Canon, or KonicaMinolta unit rather than a PlusTek unit. It isn't very good compared to the main branded items. and the branded units hold there price better in the secondhand market ;) .
The real test for any, but especially the cheaper end scanners is to put any transparency through it, not just Kodachrome, some just can't handle the contrast and 'bleed' is a result.
In my experiences so far (I don't think I'll ever stop learning, and I've made plenty of mistakes along the way) is transparencies scan BETTER on my Nikon V unit than colour negs do.
Unlike you tho, for the time being I plan to keep the scanner and get better at that end as it seems the scans rather than the original is the element with my pics that keep letting me down so far!

Good luck

I can also reccommend the Nikon Coolscan range, I've used them for years, first of all a Coolscan lll and now I use a Coolscan 4, excellent results from both. One thing I find when scanning slides, I don't always accept the first image as being the best you can get from the slide. If the result doesn't look good enough when you know the slide is good, keep reinserting the slide and scanning again, sometimes they take a bit of persuading to obtain the result you want. I've been amazed at the results that can be obtained from a slide you thought wouldn't scan, I had several slides of Barn Owls that had a very dark band across their feet, the flash setup had slipped without my realising, I scanned the slides, cropped the head and shoulders in Photoshop and now have some very useable photo's that print well to A4.

nirofo.

Nikon Coolscans are probably the best bet as I think they are still made, so spares for repairs, if needed, are available. The Minolta and Canon slide scanners are I think discontinued. As Joe says, the big brands will have good resale value. Years ago I sold a Nikon LS30 with little loss, but when I came to sell a lesser known brand of scanner, the loss was much greater.

From the reviews I have read if you want a 35 mm film scanner than I would go for the Nikon, if buying new if you pick up one second hand you could add canon or Minolta to the list. The other makes you can buy currently while good are still lower quality then the Nikon range in my option.

I had an Acer model which was reasonable think that has been rebadged as BennQ and don't know if it is still made now, not seen it advertised so don't think so. It had a scssi card as to usb which most seen to be and was 2700 dpi which is low for spec now as I think most are 3600 or 4000. It was the best one I could aford at the time and served it purpose.

It all is down to what you want to do with your photographs if you are wanting just to have them all as digital files then one of the cheaper models would suit your needs if you are wanting to make prints of the same quality as you could get straight from the slide you will need to spend that bit more.

Hope it helps