Negative/Film Scanners

[Zimri]

I've just aqquired me a rather nice Nikon FM2, and have now decided I need a negative scanner to get the best results, rather than getting the prints put onto cd through jessops and the such.

However, i've no idea where to start, is it going to be better to buy a weel known companies model, such as Nikon or perhaps Canon, or are less well known companies just as good, same hardware, different name kind of situation.

Along with this i'm after a scanner for further photo work, is it going to be better to buy a combination of both a scanner and a negative reader, will the quality of scans on both be affected because this is, what appears to be, the cheap option, again, will the name of the hardware affect the quality of the end result?

Any help with my situation would be great, cheers in advance :)

[boskysquelch]

IMHO you'd be better off seeking a processing lab who would facilitate you with a top class scan in the development stage...controlled environs and all that ..basically save you alot of time and heartache...if you are determined, then I would go for a Nikon, as much as you can afford(I reckon £250 will find you a decent second hand one...loads about,,,they are so 'fussy' to use people sell them before too long). :)

[editor]

There's a group test of film scanners/flatbed scanners in this month's PC Pro magazine. Might be worth a look...

[Zimri]

Cheers ed, i'll have a look at that, basically my budget is somewhat limited as well, me being a student and all, i don't really want to spend hundreds and in reality, all i can afford is probably around the £100 mark.

I don't need really top, professional style, david bailey size prints, i just need to get my negatives scanned and opened inside of photoshop, wold be just fine as i cannot always get to a darkroom to do editing that way, and i'd like to "computerise" a lot of my slr work.

[Cid]

Hooray for the FM2! Lovely piece of kit isn't it? Sorry, don't really have anything else to contribute to this thread. Although actually you might be interested in this link (http://www.mir.com.my/rb/photography/hardwares/classics/nikonfmseries/fm2n/fm2manual/index.htm) to an instruction manual for it (is actually pretty useful sometimes), Errr... Nothing in relation to the thread though.

[Zimri]

Cheers for the link cid, but i've actually already printed it off, come in handy already :)

And yes, what a loverly camera, especially compared to my old pentax's although i now have to start building up a collection of lenses again as the ones i have aren't nikon fit, but no matter, seems to be a fair few deals going on ebay and the such so shouldn't be too hard.

[Stanley Edwards]

There must be a huge demand for a quality film scanner at a reasonable price. I'm still getting everything scanned at time of processing (low res and med res scans) and then getting negatives drum scanned when I want to print or, submit for publication.

If you buy a scanner please let us know how you get on with it.

[Wilson]

i had an epson one like this (http://www.epson.co.uk/products/scanners/Perfection2480Photo.htm) but older it actually did a suprisingly good job although i would say it wasnt perfect but its maybe worth considering.

[5T3R30TYP3]

I've a Nikon LS-50 scanner, which will give prints of slightly bigger than A3 (I think that's around 12" x 18"). Works really well, especially with Vuescan software, but the scanner costs about 4 times your budget so I'm gonna shut up now.

[mhendo]

Cheers ed, i'll have a look at that, basically my budget is somewhat limited as well, me being a student and all...I'm a student too, and when i wanted to scan some old slides i found out that my uni had a bunch of decent equipment. I took my slides up to campus and used their Nikon Coolscan LS 2000. Worked a treat. Maybe you can check if your college or uni has a media/computer lab where students can do this sort of stuff?

Here (https://jshare.johnshopkins.edu/mhender4/public_html/lakes_district/lakes_district.html) are some of my scanned slides, from my time living in the Lakes District.

[boskysquelch]

Maybe you can check if your college or uni has a media/computer lab where students can do this sort of stuff?

Here (https://jshare.johnshopkins.edu/mhender4/public_html/lakes_district/lakes_district.html) are some of my scanned slides, from my time living in the Lakes District.

Dear God The Voice of Reason!

Nice pickees too! :D

[Zimri]

Unfortunately i'm not in school/college/university at the moment so my choices are somewhat limited, i'm going to Newport university next year and they have a wide range of equipment for their digital darkroom, so it shouldn't be a problem there.

Hence, i don't want to spend a great deal on something i won't be using constantly after this year, but i do need something pretty soonish :)

*edit* nice photos :D

[Cambazola]

I have a PrimeFilm 1800 film scanner, I don't know if they are still made but mine was £120 four years ago or so. I wouldn't recommend it; I just can't get decent results, and find the packaged software hard to fathom. Maybe it would be better with different software, but I've come so close to throwing it from the window that I daren't try anything new.

Nice one with buying an FM2 - great cameras. The Vivitar 283 flash compliments it well, and is cheaper than the Nikon units.

[WouldBe]

I've been having problems trying to scan my MRI scans but have finally cracked it by scanning them with the lid open.

I'm using a cannon canoscan LiDE20.


Not tried it with negatives though but will try later on and let you know.