Scanning advice

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edgley

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Hi,

I have just taken delivery of a shiny new Epson V700, with the purpose of archiving someones photo collection, ranging from B&W from the 30s up to the 80s.

I have tried using the Epson TWAIN driving inside PS CS5, but that just crashes too often. So now I am trying the Epson as stand alone and also the copy of Silverfast that came with it.

I will spending the next couple of days playing with all of the settings, I was just hoping for some general advice.

I am presuming that I want to scan in 48b mode @600dpi and save as TIFF.
I was then just going to take the TIFFS straight into LR and tinker away till I get an image I like.

I was planning on having Digital ICE turned on, but have read that as that softens the image to only use it when necessary, so I have just turned on the basic cleaning and left it on low.

thanks.
simon.
 
Lots of folks like VueScan, http://www.hamrick.com/ . That's what I use, although I wouldn't call myself a heavy or sophisticated scanner user. I've used Ed Hamricks' stuff going on 20 years, from back around MS-DOS 3 or 4
 
I'm using SilverFast Ai (which came with my scanner) from time to time, but I find it a terrible software to work with (I consider myself computer literate). Sorry, don't have any more advice.

Beat
 
I, too, use VueScan. It seems to be a kind of a love it or leave it type of program. I find it easier to use than Nikon's stock software, but then again I am not currently scanning much.

--Ken
 
Below is an image from the Epson and VueScan software. Both have all of the things like sharpening turned off on the scan and added in LR.

Which one looks better to you guys please?

epson.jpg


vuescan.jpg
 
Top one looks softer to me.

Beat
 
Cool, thats what I thought.
As I prefer the tone of Vuescan, I shall drop the 70bucks me thinks.

Must admit to being slightly disappointed that no-one said the bottom one was worse as it had text all over it ;)
 
I initially thought the bottom one had a bit more contrast, but then thought they were a toss up. I would suggest trying a few more comparisons before making a final decision, Although I find VueScan a handy program to have on hand.

--Ken
 
I ended up going for Vuescan; anything with more options must be better.

Next thing I am playing with is that it can dump the "raw" data (as a tiff) as well as a processed tiff.
This solves the problem of the processed tiffs being slightly over exposed (as the raw image is very dark and needs looks doing to it).

Whether its better is another matter; when I look at both it seems to be six of one again.
However, the fact that the raw tiff is about 6 times larger means it will be impractical to use.
 
The best advice I was given about scanning was to pay for an expert to do it. I know that doesn't help you much :tape:

I prefer the lower image, it has a little more detail in the highlights. General sharpening and tone can be fixed afterwards but getting the most detail from the scan is paramount.
 
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