Digital BW, The Print

Hi Martin..

>
> Supposedly B&W films resolve to a dpi equivalence of 3000 to 7000 dpi. 
> I
> imagine that in real world situations you have much less than that by 
> the
> time you take into account optical issues when you shoot. Some people
> suggest that about 2500 dpi true optical resolution would be plenty 
> for B&W
> film scanning. So a true 4000 dpi scanner should really do the job.

When you shoot color, or color for B&W and B&W, and require very good 
scans for all, how does that change the specs for sampling resolutions?

>
> The problem is that the resolution calculated from sensors or samples 
> per
> inch don't correspond to actual optical resolution. The Nikon 8000 
> scanning
> at 4000 dpi tested out at ~2,900 dpi. optical resolution but that 
> should be
> very good for our purposes. I would guess that the Polaroid and 
> Minolta MF
> scanners are similar.

Thank you for that information.

> Comparing Polaroid 120 scans to scans of the same
> negatives on a Howtek 4000 which has an optical resolution of ~3500 dpi
> there is a difference. While I like having that extra bit of data, I 
> am not
> sure the final print is better. If anything it may just be making it 
> easier
> to get a print I like.

I know how precise you are and what you achieved with your Polaroid is 
the reason I went looking for one once it was required. Thanks for that 
info as well...


> If the next generation of 5400 dpi CCD scanners can deliver 75% as 
> optical
> resolution then they would be at 4000 dpi and that would be very nice!

Yes it would. ;)

>
> The Aztek Premier drum scanner gives an optical resolution of over 
> 7000 dpi
> from an 8000 dpi scan so you wouldn't lose a bit of information on the 
> film.
> Not quite sure how you would handle files that big though.

I play with 1.5 gig PS files, though layers and layers of course, not a 
flattened image file size. PS has a size limit of 2.51 GIG's. So even a 
Scanmate 11k  would fit in nicely... I've been reading about people 
seeing a big difference in those huge scans of 35mm, so how can it be 
said with completely certainty that what we have now is near the limit 
for desktop CCD's and the quality of the scans won't improve with 
higher res etc. I'm just curious... and I don't have your engineering 
degrees so forgive me for being naive in this respect.

> Not to mention
> that you could get a nice new car for the price. <G>

Well, that's just it, can't justify it just yet ;)

Carolyn