Curious about Slide Scanner
in [Digital Cameras]
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From: OG on 5 Aug 2010 19:33 "Bruce" <docnews2011(a)gmail.com> wrote in message news:oegm569klq80mnbd4gnh24frf1ku5semsi(a)4ax.com... > On Thu, 5 Aug 2010 20:08:52 +0100, "OG" <owen(a)gwynnefamily.org.uk> > wrote: > >> >>"Mirsky" <mirsky(a)mirsky.com> wrote in message >>news:mirsky-D32546.18525104082010(a)free.teranews.com... >>> Hi. My mom has 3000 slides and wants to digitize them. She can't afford >>> to have a store do it. I just found a cheap scanner on Amazon that scans >>> slides: >>> >>> http://amzn.to/9K7DHs >>> >>> It's even cheaper on buy.com >>> >>> I can't find any reviews of it anywhere other than Amazon. I'm a little >>> skeptical that the quality of the scans will be good, but I'm not an >>> expert on scanners and scanners are much cheaper than they used to be. >>> >>> So, I'm looking for some opinions on whether it's worth buying the >>> scanner. It's cheap and mom can afford it. I just don't want her to >>> spend lots of time scanning if the quality of the scans isn't any good. >>> >> >>How's she going to view the scans? The level of quality you actually >>need, >>may not be that great depending on the quality of the viewer. >> >>I've got a similar one (4.2M px) and, yes, the output quality isn't great >>(you'll probably find that the results are very contrasty), but a bit of >>workflow on the slides in your photo editing software should probably >>bring >>them up to a presentable standard. > > > No, it won't. The scanner doesn't have sufficient dynamic range to > produce acceptable scans of slides. The situation with negatives will > be better, of course. > > >>After all, if you're waiting for a perfect copy, they'll never get done. > > > With a cheap scanner, it doesn't matter how long you spend in > post-processing, it will never produce an acceptable scan of a slide. I refer you to my first sentence.
From: Dave Cohen on 5 Aug 2010 20:10 Dave Cohen wrote: > David J Taylor wrote: >> "Bruce" <docnews2011(a)gmail.com> wrote in message >> news:60sk56996h93eheit7lev5ifn5gea879ga(a)4ax.com... >> [] >>> It's junk. There are many of these cheap Chinese-made scanners >>> around. As you say, they can be bought even more cheaply than the one >>> linked to. They have poor resolution and very low dynamic range. >>> Dynamic range is very important when scanning slides - it is slightly >>> less important with negatives. >> [] >> >> Agreed. I had the chance to use something similar for an evening and >> could never get satisfactory results. I don't think the country of >> origin matters, it's the spec to which it's made. >> >> Cheers, >> David > > Same experience here. Couldn't get a decent color slide copy, no > adjustment provided. Did a little better on negative strip. Definitely > do not purchase. A little update. The one I used is not the one shown on Amazon site. That one will work as a standalone and does seem to have adjustments. Amazon are very good at accepting returns, the reviews on it are positive so for that model I change my negative comment to don't know.
From: Grimly Curmudgeon on 8 Aug 2010 13:32
We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Mirsky <mirsky(a)mirsky.com> saying something like: >Hi. My mom has 3000 slides and wants to digitize them. She can't afford >to have a store do it. I just found a cheap scanner on Amazon that scans >slides: > >http://amzn.to/9K7DHs > >It's even cheaper on buy.com Wait a year /two years and even the cheap ones will be better, or you could buy a decent quality used one now for not a lot more than the cost of that. One thing to bear in mind - if your mom wants to throw out the originals after all the scanning work is done, you won't get another chance to improve them, so better to do it right first time round. It's a helluva load of work, scanning 3000 slides, and not something you'd want to repeat. |