Scanning Photos

[creeker69]

This forum is such a wonderful thing that Roxio provides. I have picked up so much valuable information and advice here.

 

There are a whole lot of people on here that are smarter than I! So, I am asking for some experiences and recommendations with/about photo scanners.

 

I want to start scanning in old pictures of my kids and produce few slideshows for them. I am wondering if anyone has hands on experience with them and can share their recommendations with me (us).

 

Even if you do not own one, perhaps you can give some advice on things like dpi. Some scanners have large dpi but with interpolation. (I have been told I need "hardware" dpi not software to be high). Also, scanning speed.

 

I have tried to find a site that compares photo scanners. And the sites I have found have too many multi function printers (although it won't surprise me that some manufacturer will have a great scanner built in to their printer.)

 

All advice is welcome and I thank you in advance.

 

Ron

[ggrussell]

I've been a long time fan of Microtek scanners. I love their TWAIN drivers. Tons of options, but may be too much for a beginner. I now own an Epson which is also very nice. The TWAIN driver has 3 modes: Full auto, Home and Professional. This gives the user several choices from fully automated scanning to fully manual.

 

HP makes great scanners, but I find their TWAIN drivers to be frustrating to use especially if you're trying to 'fix' a photo before scanning like color balance.

[sknis]

I also have an Epson scanner (4180) that I bought refurbished from the Epson web site. I

I bought it primarily to scan negatives and it works well - I use it from and with Adobe Photoshop Elements 2 that I've used for years. The Epson does come with scanning software that will restore color and get rid of dust which is real handy when you are scanning old.negatives and slides.

 

It depends on what you are going to do with the photos (or slides or negatives). For web, they say 150 is sufficient, for printing, 300. If you are going to do a lot of cropping so that you will need to blow up sections of the photo several times (like a 8 by 10) or if you are starting with a 2 inch by 2 inch photo that you want to make into a 8 by 10, you must scan at a higher resolution - 1200 and higher. There is a balance, with the scanner dpi and the amount of space on your hard drive. I scan at 600 dpi and I can crop and blow up images that will be more than acceptable for Video work.

 

This forum is such a wonderful thing that Roxio provides. I have picked up so much valuable information and advice here.

There are a whole lot of people on here that are smarter than I! So, I am asking for some experiences and recommendations with/about photo scanners. I want to start scanning in old pictures of my kids and produce few slide shows for them. I am wondering if anyone has hands on experience with them and can share their recommendations with me (us).

 

Even if you do not own one, perhaps you can give some advice on things like dpi. Some scanners have large dpi but with interpolation. (I have been told I need "hardware" dpi not software to be high). Also, scanning speed.

 

I have tried to find a site that compares photo scanners. And the sites I have found have too many multi function printers (although it won't surprise me that some manufacturer will have a great scanner built in to their printer.)

 

All advice is welcome and I thank you in advance.

 

Ron

[vid2man97]

Patty...I've had the 4990 now for eight months or so. I've done well over a few thousand scans, everything from 35mm negs to 4X5, old 4X6 transparencies and photos as well. For a home scanner it is quite good. It even sends my images into Photoshop embedded in Adobe(1998) colourspace. And as I mentioned, the ICE is a big help not only when you have a lot to scan but when scanning film. You can never get rid of absolutely every speck of dust and who wants to spend hours clone-stamping in photoshop? It doesn't work miracles, but in most instances can help get you most of the way home. Unfortunately it can't be used with Kodachrome or true B/W. The infrared scanner that looks for imperfections gets bounced around and the ICE goes nuts thinking there's dust everywhere. Check out asf.com (Kodak) for info on ICE.

 

There are slide scanners that have ICE to correct colour and reduce grain, but I'm guessing if you're thinking of buying this scanner, you have the expertise to fix this up in whatever photo application you have. I can recommend however, a program called NeatImage when it comes to grain (which you may see a lot of if you scan negs at 4800 dpi). And it's not just for scans of film or photos, if anyone out there that has digital is reading this. Digital cameras have grain too. It's just called noise. Ever take a pic at night with one at "800ASA"? Run the pic through "Neat", and you won't believe your eyes.

 

Lastly, in case you were wondering. The scan times are blisteringly fast. My computer if near identical to yours (just some more memory)...and a 48bit, 4800dpi scan of a regular 35mm (giving a 175meg or so file) takes less than a minute. Apply ICE and it goes up quite a bit. It needs to do repeated scanning and then the ICE software has to do it's calculations. That minute or so can go up to 6 or so.

 

Hope this helps.

[The Highlander]

It depends on what you are going to do with the photos (or slides or negatives). For web, they say 150 is sufficient, for printing, 300. If you are going to do a lot of cropping so that you will need to blow up sections of the photo several times (like a 8 by 10) or if you are starting with a 2 inch by 2 inch photo that you want to make into a 8 by 10, you must scan at a higher resolution - 1200 and higher. There is a balance, with the scanner dpi and the amount of space on your hard drive. I scan at 600 dpi and I can crop and blow up images that will be more than acceptable for Video work.

Hi Ron,

I agree with Gary and Skins, it does really depend on a lot of things, what you want to do with them?, are you going to edit out items?, ect...

I started with Microtek scanners as well, and still have one (very reliable units) and my wife who was a desktop publisher thinks it is the bee's knee's...

I have now got an HP ScanJet 4700C with light box for slides and negatives, and the item i use mainly is the document feeder.

most of my picture scans are at 300 or 600 DPI and seem to print well on my Epsom Printer.

 

If you want a good flatbed scanner review then have a look at this link.

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/cne...ws/scanners.htm

[Patty]

I have Adobe photoshop CS, I think I will look into the NeatImage that you recommend. Thanks alot. Costco has the Epson at a pretty good price and I like their return policy so i think I will go for it. Thanks for your information.

 

p.s. When you mentioned memory, I double checked what I had put in and I realized it was incorrect, I have 4G of Memory.

[grandpabruce]

This forum is such a wonderful thing that Roxio provides. I have picked up so much valuable information and advice here.

 

There are a whole lot of people on here that are smarter than I! So, I am asking for some experiences and recommendations with/about photo scanners.

 

I want to start scanning in old pictures of my kids and produce few slideshows for them. I am wondering if anyone has hands on experience with them and can share their recommendations with me (us).

 

Even if you do not own one, perhaps you can give some advice on things like dpi. Some scanners have large dpi but with interpolation. (I have been told I need "hardware" dpi not software to be high). Also, scanning speed.

 

I have tried to find a site that compares photo scanners. And the sites I have found have too many multi function printers (although it won't surprise me that some manufacturer will have a great scanner built in to their printer.)

 

All advice is welcome and I thank you in advance.

 

Ron

 

I like my Hp 7400c. It is more of a pro model, and it was expensive when I got it about 4 years ago. IMHO, you can get all you need for less than $200.

 

Edit: I really don't like this webboard. Bring back the old one. LOL. It is way too easy to type your response, within the text of the person to whom you are responding. The damned cursor defaults to the last line of the post of that person. It is nonsense.

[vid2man97]

Oh you're cooking. There's nothing like being able to assign Photoshop its own couple of gigs of memory, is there?...have fun

[REDWAGON]

Boy, lots of choices out there, and all the information I have read so far is all right on the mark. I am like Bruce and have an HP 7400c scanner and have been using it for 3 or 4 years now to scan other colored photos, 35mm negative slides, text and just about anything else you can think of and have used most of the scans for slide shows (EMC's Videowave--DVDBuilder etc. to make DVD's) and they all have come out really great so far. I scan my colored photos at 600 dpi, colored negative slides at 600 dpi and text at only 150 dpi.

 

I also have printed a lot of my colored photos that I have scanned at 5x7 and 8x10 using HP Premium Plus glossy photo paper and I have some framed that are around 4 years old now hanging on my wall and they still look great !!

 

Everyone has a favorite scanner I'm sure, just like everything else in the computer hardware line. And if one picks a scanner that is medium priced and is Epson, HP or Microtek, I think most of them will do a pretty good job. Not all scanners are capable of scanning transparencies, negative slides or have ADF units, so that's a choice one has to make.

 

Frank.....

[creeker69]

Thanks guys,

 

I guess I should have explained better. What I want to do mostly with the scanned images is produce slide shows. So, I am concerned about a scanner with the capabilities of taking the original picture, scanning it in and blowing it up enough to fill a TV screen without losing too much definition.

 

I have had some success with old photos that I can find negatives for, taking the negatives to the local CVS photo and having a CD made. The result has been fairly good. I have had to enhance some of the pics that are on the CD due to age of negatives.

 

But, I have many photos that do not have negatives so I want to scan them in.

 

So, the primary purpose will be for Slideshow Assistant/VideoWave.

 

Thanks again!

 

ron

[awoo87]

Thanks guys,

 

I guess I should have explained better. What I want to do mostly with the scanned images is produce slide shows. So, I am concerned about a scanner with the capabilities of taking the original picture, scanning it in and blowing it up enough to fill a TV screen without losing too much definition.

 

I have had some success with old photos that I can find negatives for, taking the negatives to the local CVS photo and having a CD made. The result has been fairly good. I have had to enhance some of the pics that are on the CD due to age of negatives.

 

But, I have many photos that do not have negatives so I want to scan them in.

 

So, the primary purpose will be for Slideshow Assistant/VideoWave.

 

Thanks again!

 

ron

 

Hi Ron

I use the Canon 8400F and have had great results. It comes with a neg & slide scanner attachment so all bases are covered. I'm putting the family history together as slide shows which starts in the 1920's.

[vid2man97]

Gotta agree with Gary R...Microtek is nice but I too have an Epson right now that's pretty nice. It might be more than you need at 4800 optical dpi...the Epson 4990Pro. It'll do all film formats up to 8X10 transparency. Not too many people need that. The nice feature is the digital ICE...gets rid of dust and scratches from film and prints for you. I might pick up the V700 but I usually drum scan when I need something of rocking quality.

Don't know what your budget is but you can't go wrong with any of the little siblings to the 4990. Can you tell I'm a bit of an Epson fan?

[Patty]

Gotta agree with Gary R...Microtek is nice but I too have an Epson right now that's pretty nice. It might be more than you need at 4800 optical dpi...the Epson 4990Pro. It'll do all film formats up to 8X10 transparency. Not too many people need that. The nice feature is the digital ICE...gets rid of dust and scratches from film and prints for you. I might pick up the V700 but I usually drum scan when I need something of rocking quality.

Don't know what your budget is but you can't go wrong with any of the little siblings to the 4990. Can you tell I'm a bit of an Epson fan?

 

Good to hear from someone that has a Epson 4990, I am thinking of buying that one and was wondering if it was a little overkill. I am going to be doing a lot of old photos and feel I would rather invest a little more and be able to get good scans. Thanks for the information.