Silverfast is good software, but costs a lot and doesn't do anything any better than VueScan. It *might* have a slightly easier user interface for some things. It is also licensed as specific to a particular scanner, rather than able to be used with as many different scanners as it can support like VueScan does.
The dust and scratch elimination tools are useful but aren't always perfect and sometimes cannot work. They work best on dye emulsions like E4 slides and C41 negatives; they are poor when operating on traditional B&W film and Kodachrome 25 because the silver grains and pigments in these films are not transparent to IR. (In E4 and C41 films, the silver grains have been replaced by dye blobs.) Used in a flat bed scanner, the emulsion side of negative or positive images should face the scanning element. Of course, with any useful image processing software, you can flip images on both axes any way you want so it really doesn't matter much: just adjust them until you get right side up and left to right correct if you scan them in the wrong orientation. G > On May 5, 2020, at 7:47 AM, Eric Weir <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Emerging from lurking to ask for help. > > A couple days ago I got out a shoebox of slides from a trip to Russia 20 > years ago. A few were shown to the group I traveled with a month or so after > we returned home. Other than that I have done nothing with them. As a result > I am unable to identify many of the subjects and scenes. Nevertheless, some > are interesting, if not good photography. (They were shot with a Pentax K1000 > and a fast 50mm lens, the only lens I took on the trip. Not sure of the film. > Best guess is Fuji Velvia 100.) > > I would like to start scanning a selection of the slides. I have an Epson > Perfection V500 Photo scanner. I have always found the Epson scanning > software difficult. I recently forked over $100 for a VueScan license and > have found it much easier to work with. That said, yesterday I watched a > video demonstrating scanning with SilverFast and was impressed. Among other > things, It can eliminate dust and scratches, do color correction, and scans > to a Raw file. And the price is reasonable. I’d appreciate opinions on > SilverFast vs. VueScan > > I have no experience scanning slides. one question is how to orient the > slides in the scanner, i.e., which side of the film should be up and which > down. My slides have the date and frame number on one side and “this side > toward screen.” should that side face up or down on the scanning table? > > Random comments or advice about scanning slides would be welcome too. > > Thanks, > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Eric Weir > Decatur, GA USA > [email protected] > > "Imagining the other is a powerful antidote to fanaticism and hatred." > > - Amos Oz > > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > [email protected] > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
