[MacDV] Re: Film Scanners

[June Parlett]

Well, off and on I have been making transparencies/slides Photographs black
and white and color negatives, in all sizes for 32 years, with books and
books of negatives in sleeves. The Slides are really the best, and since I
started getting Kodak Photo CDs made in 1995, I have had varying results
with them, as you all can imagine. This one lab, used to send their work
from Florida to Texas for them to be made. Rates were high then, too. Once I
had to have the images re-made as they were scanned much too darkly. There
was a strong tendency for the darks to break down into varying stradations
of black posterizations, which would drive me nutz trying to smoooth out. I
have been working on PhotoShop since 1993, but never got to scanning slides
until early 1995, so KodakPhoto CD was the first scanned slide I ever saw. I
then bought a Polaroid SprinScan for $799 in Nov. 1996. It served me well,
until I worked in a lab in 1999 where I could use a Nikon Coolscan which
scanned better than my Polaroid scanner. I always had more images than I
could work with, since I am a fine artist, and really do a lot with images,
I make more images from the existing images I've got & and many versions of
them. I do understand the problems of trying to preserve one's earlier work,
negatives and transparencies, for posterity, sort of like wanting the best
possible scans on DVD to put away in the safety deposit box for posterity
All of you have been very realistic, down to earth honest with yourselves
and each other. It does take a colossal effort to get the images together to
take to the lab to have them made to Kodak Photo CD. I have had good results
and also bad results. Recently I went to Eckerds in Tampa, FL, had two rolls
of Kodachrome processed at Kodak, since they are the only place now in Tampa
that does Kodachrome processing, and paid extra for them to be put onto
Kodak PhotoCD. The results were really good. So I am encouraged. It was
about $1.00 per slide. I think if you find a place that has those Kodak
PhotoCD machines and has someone who knows how to use them, then you are
best off with that. I remember when they were on Kodak's site being sold,
for an incredibly low price. It was for a very short time, and then they
were gone, and they weren't selling them any more. I thought I truly missed
out on a big opportunity. Sort of like there it was, and then no longer
available. I wished I could have bought one of the PhotoCD Writers. Would
sure have made my life better, and have paid for itself, with the amount of
work I have. 
I know of one place in Tampa that charges an inordinate amount of money to
do KodakPhotoCD's and then there's Eckerds. I don't know of too many other
places. The original photo store that sent out my slides to Texas, got
bought by Kodak, then was bought by Fox Photo, then closed. I don't know who
Ritz Camera sends their KodakPhotoCD's out to do. Perhaps, if searching
around through the internet, you may discover a guy with one of these
PhotoCD Writer machines in his house, and this is his business. It is worth
supporting, if he can support photographers who want their work archived
accurately. If anyone has the luck of the draw to find such a person, please
share it with me/us. Also, I think the company who can offer to do the
images at 50 cents a slide is okay too.
I still want to scan my own slides on my Nikon Super Coolscan 4000 ED
Digital Film Scanner. I may spring for the slide feeder for $366.98 extra. I
am glad that Dan revealed that the slide feeder isn't foolproof/jamproof. I
suspected it wasn't. I think doing some of each is worth it. I am not made
of money. I get ideas when I am going through my work, and then I go off on
a wild track making more art. In the past, in my experience, if I got the
particularly desired slides put onto PhotoCD of a project I wanted to make,
then so much time passed when I actually got them back and got "to them"
that the heat of the moment had worn off, and the project was tabled, or
put on the backburner, like some heavy legislation, especially if the reason
for making the poster soured with some other business issue with the
involved parties, etc. ad nauseum....whatever There is the immediacy of the
Slide scanner versus the overland stagecoach letdown factor. That was just
one incident. I have gotten CD after CD's that I have filed away, just like
the slides were filed away. And actually Organization is my main issue. I
actually loved scanning whole negatives and larger negatives on a Heidelberg
Linoscan with transparency adapter. The images were of such high resolution
that the dust particles became huge bolders and the retouching time was
something else. But what a beautiful scan it made of 4x5 and 6x7 size negs
and transparencies. Lot of work to de-dust. I have holders of all sizes, but
if a neg isn't flat it isn't flat. I loved that tip about the double sided
tape. Thanks,
June Parlett
. on 12/30/02 9:38 PM, Brian Sledz at brianhome at linkus.net wrote:

> It really just depends on what your time is worth.  Oh yeah the Nikon stuff
> says 40 some seconds to scan but do hi res and or ice and you get to 4
> minutes or real life according to the salesman.  I figured I coudld go
> through each film strip and only scan the good ones but that means a lot of
> prepping.  This way they scan everything I pick from the cds which ones to
> download to iphoto and voila done.
> I used to think like you with the saving money by doing it myself, but
> still got the rug cleaner in the box in the garage on the way to the
> Goodwill.;-]
> Brian