xpan is great
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Discussion

le gravy noire

Original Poster:

1,857 posts

278 months

Tuesday 17th October 2006
quotequote all
Got my scanner today, and whacked through my first xpan roll, which I shot of some graffiti to see how the colours would come out on a velvia roll.





The high res scans look great: http://static.flickr.com/107/27240590 (this has been shrunkified for the internet)

Matt



Edited by le gravy noire on Tuesday 17th October 18:57

Andy M

3,755 posts

289 months

Tuesday 17th October 2006
quotequote all
Awesome

matthew_h

575 posts

245 months

Tuesday 17th October 2006
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Wow!

trackdemon

13,476 posts

291 months

Tuesday 17th October 2006
quotequote all
Beautiful colours. You still doing car work?

LongQ

13,864 posts

263 months

Tuesday 17th October 2006
quotequote all
Nice colours. Very nice.

Which scanner are you using? I presume not some form of desktop job?

Not going for a digital back yet? (For the H'blad of course.)

Edited by LongQ on Tuesday 17th October 23:50

le gravy noire

Original Poster:

1,857 posts

278 months

Wednesday 18th October 2006
quotequote all
trackdemon said:
Beautiful colours. You still doing car work?


Not sure yet...I have some ideas though!

le gravy noire

Original Poster:

1,857 posts

278 months

Wednesday 18th October 2006
quotequote all
LongQ said:
Nice colours. Very nice.

Which scanner are you using? I presume not some form of desktop job?

Not going for a digital back yet? (For the H'blad of course.)

Edited by LongQ on Tuesday 17th October 23:50


Its an epson perfection v700...I'm really pleased with it although im yet to get the best from it! Im going to steer clear of a digital back for a long while I think. One of the reasons for buying the v series blad was to really learn more about the craft of photography, and to slow me down a bit.

Bacardi

2,235 posts

306 months

Wednesday 18th October 2006
quotequote all
Hi Matt

Glad the scanner's working out OK. What software are you scanning with? Silverfast is better than he Epson Scan but if you want to improve the colours more, I'd download a trial of Vuescan.

Clunky interface (may have improved since I last used it) but, as I recall, cleaner colours, greens are green rather than yellowy green. Also does other cleaver things like multiple scans, i.e. 4 or 8 scans of the same trannie to make one file, slow but = better quality for when you want to eek out that last bit of detail.

You can also save a scan as RAW (get the pro version), which can then be reworked in the software for different output. Much the same as RAW camera files, you always have the maximum information to work with rather than reworking a file in PS after you have chucked half the info away.

P

le gravy noire

Original Poster:

1,857 posts

278 months

Wednesday 18th October 2006
quotequote all
Hi Paul,

was using the epson scan software and having real troubles with colours, particularly yellows and reds for some reason...there seems to be a weird cast on the scans. Ill download that stuff and try it out. Thanks for the advice. One thing that is undeniable is the resolution though, i put one through at 6400dpi for a giggle...jeepers!

Matt

andybuk99

312 posts

259 months

Wednesday 18th October 2006
quotequote all
the v700, i was thinking of getting one of those, i have a load of 5x4's that i could do with scanning in for folio stuff.

you pleased with it then?

le gravy noire

Original Poster:

1,857 posts

278 months

Wednesday 18th October 2006
quotequote all
andybuk99 said:
the v700, i was thinking of getting one of those, i have a load of 5x4's that i could do with scanning in for folio stuff.

you pleased with it then?


First impressions are great. Its pretty cheap (i got mine from www.morecomputers.co.uk for 330 quid) and the resolution is brilliant and its not as slow as i thought it would be (although ive got nothing to compare it to). Like any imaging technology it will require fiddling about etc to get the best from but it seems to have all the right ingredients!
a 5x4 scan from it would look nothing short of amazing IMO. You should do it!

Matt

LongQ

13,864 posts

263 months

Wednesday 18th October 2006
quotequote all
le gravy noire said:
Hi Paul,

was using the epson scan software and having real troubles with colours, particularly yellows and reds for some reason...there seems to be a weird cast on the scans. Ill download that stuff and try it out. Thanks for the advice. One thing that is undeniable is the resolution though, i put one through at 6400dpi for a giggle...jeepers!

Matt


If you use 6400 I assume you have invested in a few extra disks? The files must be huge with that format.

Various forums around and about have suggested that there is little or no point in using that setting as the gains are minimal and imperceptible in practice - other than file size. Indeed the feeling seems to be that the optics are unlikely to deliver much beyond 3200.

I have an Epson 4990 - the V700's predecessor. It can produce remarkable results but I agree that it can have problems trying to automatically assess the white balance for some images (seemingly randomly ...). Dominant red or yellow in the composition seems to confuse the Epson Scan software at times and requires some adjustment of the settings. Lack of a reasonably sized white area or to some extent a black area will execerbate the difficulty.

However I have tried the 'lite' version of Silverfast (which came with the scanner as I believe it does with the V700) and could not get on with it at all. Also the Vuescan trial (as of a few months ago) and a couple of others. In the end I found that Epson Scan offered me and my normal subject matter as good results, usually better, than the others for what I was trying to achieve. All of the applications seemed to have the ability to produce randomly odd results from different frames of the same film.

Maybe with a longer learning time I would think differently. My strong impression is that each commonly available product is set up and defined mainly for certain types of shot - mostly Landscapes for example and with a specific type of film in mind - and to step outside that window, so to speak, requires some careful adjustments of the settings which may take some time to identify to your satisfaction.

Getting close and adjusting in an editor or some other specialist plug-in type application seems to me to be a more effective way forward. But that comment relates to mostly 35mm colour film and a few 2 1/4in square negatives in B&W so possibly has no bearing on your requirements.

le gravy noire

Original Poster:

1,857 posts

278 months

Wednesday 18th October 2006
quotequote all
LongQ said:
le gravy noire said:
Hi Paul,

was using the epson scan software and having real troubles with colours, particularly yellows and reds for some reason...there seems to be a weird cast on the scans. Ill download that stuff and try it out. Thanks for the advice. One thing that is undeniable is the resolution though, i put one through at 6400dpi for a giggle...jeepers!

Matt


If you use 6400 I assume you have invested in a few extra disks? The files must be huge with that format.

Various forums around and about have suggested that there is little or no point in using that setting as the gains are minimal and imperceptible in practice - other than file size. Indeed the feeling seems to be that the optics are unlikely to deliver much beyond 3200.

I have an Epson 4990 - the V700's predecessor. It can produce remarkable results but I agree that it can have problems trying to automatically assess the white balance for some images (seemingly randomly ...). Dominant red or yellow in the composition seems to confuse the Epson Scan software at times and requires some adjustment of the settings. Lack of a reasonably sized white area or to some extent a black area will execerbate the difficulty.

However I have tried the 'lite' version of Silverfast (which came with the scanner as I believe it does with the V700) and could not get on with it at all. Also the Vuescan trial (as of a few months ago) and a couple of others. In the end I found that Epson Scan offered me and my normal subject matter as good results, usually better, than the others for what I was trying to achieve. All of the applications seemed to have the ability to produce randomly odd results from different frames of the same film.

Maybe with a longer learning time I would think differently. My strong impression is that each commonly available product is set up and defined mainly for certain types of shot - mostly Landscapes for example and with a specific type of film in mind - and to step outside that window, so to speak, requires some careful adjustments of the settings which may take some time to identify to your satisfaction.

Getting close and adjusting in an editor or some other specialist plug-in type application seems to me to be a more effective way forward. But that comment relates to mostly 35mm colour film and a few 2 1/4in square negatives in B&W so possibly has no bearing on your requirements.



I agree about the 6400..mental. I did the xpan scans at 1200 i think. The scanner seemed to respond better to velvia than provia, but that might just be the colours in the compositions etc. Its definately a bit of a learning curve but a fun one.