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Re: [Digital BW] Scanning

2003-05-27 by A. Huntley

Stephen,

We'll see what some of the more knowledgeable members of this group have to
say but, like you, I always try to get the most information from the neg
that the scanner can deliver. I used to tweak the scan capture quite a bit
early on, but now about the most I'll do is to set the black/white points if
the dynamic range of the neg does not cover the 0-255 range. Even then I
tend to stay on the conservative side to avoid any clipping. I think a
"better scan" is whatever you make of it. It seems that some time and quite
a few scans are required before you arrive at what you consider to be
"best." I've been at this for about 3 years now and still don't think that
I've produced my best scan...there's always something to be learned.

Good luck. Push the envelope a little...the trash can is always available
and no one has to know! ;>)

Alan Huntley

----- Original Message -----

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From: "Stephen Kobrin" <skobrin@...>
To: <DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Monday, May 26, 2003 6:35 PM
Subject: [Digital BW] Scanning


> There have been a number of recent posts about scanning that make me
> wonder if I am missing something.  When I scan, my sole objective is
> to get as much information off of the negative as I can -- shadow
> detail, highlights to the extent possible and as smooth a range of
> tones as I can.  I typically do not play with contrast or even adjust
> the mid tones a great deal, assuming I am better off doing all of
> that in PS when I have more precise controls and a much better image
> to work with.  The Nikon scan software seems to work well in this
> regard.  ( I scan in rgb and convert in ps as the Nikon scanner seems
> to be problematic if set to B&W.)
>
> Should I be doing more than working with the equivalent of levels and
> curves at the scanning stage?  I guess the real question is what
> a "better scan" would entail.
>
>
> Steve

Re: [Digital BW] Scanning

2003-05-27 by Martin Wesley

----- Original Message -----

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From: "Stephen Kobrin" <skobrin@...>
To: <DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Monday, May 26, 2003 6:35 PM
Subject: [Digital BW] Scanning

> There have been a number of recent posts about scanning that make me
> wonder if I am missing something.  When I scan, my sole objective is
> to get as much information off of the negative as I can -- shadow
> detail, highlights to the extent possible and as smooth a range of
> tones as I can.  I typically do not play with contrast or even adjust
> the mid tones a great deal, assuming I am better off doing all of
> that in PS when I have more precise controls and a much better image
> to work with.  The Nikon scan software seems to work well in this
> regard.  ( I scan in rgb and convert in ps as the Nikon scanner seems
> to be problematic if set to B&W.)
>
> Should I be doing more than working with the equivalent of levels and
> curves at the scanning stage?  I guess the real question is what
> a "better scan" would entail.
>
>
Steve,

As Kevin said, what is coming from the scanner's electronics is fixed in
most scanners and everything after that is software. I think the results are
very dependent upon the specific scanner and software in question. For some
combinations, it works well to do basic adjustments with the scanning
software and with others you are better off doing everything in PS. Sometime
a middle of the road approach works best.

It all depends upon how the specific scanner and software were designed.

One thing I have observed is that it is better to set your end points first
and then do your contrast/gamma changes later as a seperate action. If do
them both in the same action, some software will apply the gamma change
first within the original range of the data resulting a loss of data while
software that spreads the data out before applying the gamma change better
preserves all the data. The losses are small but can become an issue with
some images if you want to drop into 8-bit and do further adjustments.

A big plus to the "raw scan" approach is that you have the actual output of
the scanner on file and can always go back to the begining without having to
physically rescan the film. However some software leaves you with a "raw
scan" that is very compressed and/or pushed up close to one end of the scale
making it initially difficult to work with in PS.

Personally I use Silverfast Ai to output a 16-bit raw tiff file and then use
Silverfast HDR to "scan" the raw file just bringing the end points in enough
to spread out the data before bringing it into PS.

Martin Wesley

Re: [Digital BW] Scanning

2003-05-27 by Anthony Atkielski

Steve writes:

> Should I be doing more than working with the
> equivalent of levels and curves at the scanning
> stage?

Your current strategy seems correct to me.  You should use the scan
exclusively to extract as much data from the film as possible.  Once you
have the data, you can do anything you want in Photoshop.  There is no
reason at all to tweak anything on the scan itself except to try to match
the scan capacity to the film, i.e., ideally you want the film density range
to fall right in the middle of the scanner's density range, if possible (if
the film density range exceeds what the scanner can handle, then you'll have
to scan as much as you can and accept the loss of the rest).

In practice, I don't bother tweaking the scanner much, as it handles
autoexposure itself and usually centers its gain on the density range of the
film to the extent possible.  In practice, then, it is already getting quite
a bit of the available information from the film.

I don't tweak colors or anything in the scan software, as there is no
advantage to it and it takes too long to see the results.  I just fix it all
in Photoshop.

Digital BW, The Print

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