On 2012-02-09 14:48, Tina Manley wrote:
Emily -
I'm using a Nikon LS5000 to scan my slides but it should be about the
same. The first thing I did was to mount all of my slides and
negatives in Gepe mounts that hold the film flat from corner to
corner. That made the biggest difference in scanning focus. I'm not
using VueScan but Silverfast and that makes the next biggest
difference. You can scan twice at different exposure and combine them
in one Raw file. There is a profile for every kind of film, including
Kodachrome. (If you put that film code on the edge of the film into
Google, it will tell you the kind of film it is.) You can use Digital
ICE on everything except B&W negatives and Kodachrome. Those contain
too much silver to use ICE.
Kodachrome is not completely unworkable; Newer (K-14) Kodachrome is
mostly okay with ICE, unless the cyan layer is too dense. It's not
silver that causes the problem with Kodachrome, either.
It may seem like a lot of work to remount everything in Gepe mounts
but if you only want to scan everything one time and you want the best
results possible, it is definitely worth the time and trouble. I've
done several hundred thousand slides that way and am very pleased with
the results.
Wow, I must be sloppy, I've never noticed these sharpness problems.
I think you can go the Gepe mounts situation one better, though -- fluid
mount on a glass carrier. Scan Science is one brand name of carriers
and fluid. I've seen Ctein's scan results with dry vs. their fluid
mount, and it's unfortunately *really really clear* that the wet mount
is better. I haven't used it myself, too lazy and cheap so far.
I'd have balked at cutting up my existing negative strips, since it
makes them unusable in many other situations.
--
David Dyer-Bennet, dd-b@xxxxxxxx; http://dd-b.net/
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Dragaera: http://dragaera.info
