[filmscanners] Re: apology and more info re: About cleansing
To quickly support Rob's comment... I scanned some badly mould-affected slides before and after cleaning them on my LS2000. The results were a decent advert for ICE - the scans done before cleaning were remarkable in that the mould was almost not visible, although it was intolerable without ICE. It still took me 15 minutes to digitally tidy up the image post - ICE, but it was possible, and the result was pretty good. When I did a second scan after chemically cleaning the neg with some patented neg cleaner I bought locally, the result was awful and I lost a *lot* of image from the slide - I was much better off scanning without cleaning. I'm sorry I don't remember what the cleaner was...it has erased itself successfully from my mind. Julian ---Original Message from Rob Geraghty at 11:29 AM 22/11/2003--- In some cases I would wonder whether it's better to scan the image with the mould on it, because some of the emulsion at the edges of the growth may be unstable - either way it would make sens eto do a before and after scan. Julian Canberra, Australia http://members.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/photo-an/photo-an.htm Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: HD failure [was RE: keeping the16bitscans}
Perhaps I should have said that the MTBF must be based on certain observational data but must be essentially a prediction as a real-time testing process isn't possible. How are these values derived? 1) By maths based on component MTBFs. (supported by tests of the components), and 2) sometimes supported by testing of large numbers of the final item, or 3) by accelerated testing and more arguable maths. Julian Julian Canberra, Australia http://members.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/photo-an/photo-an.htm Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Digital camera topics on this list
My suggestion was that we allow comparative and evaluation discussion of digicam topics. That is, discussion of digicam technology compared with, and related to, scanning. I was not saying this should be a digicam list. There are a zillion topics re digicams that have no relevance to a transition from or comparison with scanners. My point was that the people on THIS list have the best knowledge for evaluating parameters that are of interest in deciding whether or when to go digicam, or how digicams might coexist with scanning for some of us, or whether digicams are better or worse for our purposes than scanned film. This would not be resolved by starting yet another list. Of course if people lose interest in film scanning, and become purely digital photographers, then at that point they should unsubscribe from this list, and stick to those lists that are about digicams. Once again - I was not suggesting that this now become a digital camera list. I was suggesting that we allow discussion of digicam technology that is relevant to us. Julian At 16:39 05/02/03, you wrote: From: Julian Robinson So my vote is that we allow comparative and evaluative discussion of digital camera topics, including the capabilities and limitations of digital cameras, for as long as it remains an issue. After that I am sure this list will either naturally become a digital camera and scanning group (i.e. digital darkroom) or move towards what will then be a minority interest group specifically devoted to the then arcane-but-interesting business of scanning. Either is valid and obviously Tony as list owner will have the last word, but it seems silly to rule out what is currently one of the most interesting aspects of scanning - it's possible alternative. Cyberspace is full of mailing lists, and if there aren't enough, you can easily create your own for free using the facilities of Yahoo. If people on this list are becoming more and more interested in digital photography, then they might mention the digicam lists that they like, and invite people to join. In the end, if people lose interest in film scanning, and become purely digital photographers, then at that point they should unsubscribe from this list, and stick to those lists that are about digicams. This list is called filmscanners. It wouldn't make sense for it to become a digicam list without at least having its name changed, at which point it would become a different list anyway. So although I'll probably be one of those people who eventually abandon film scanning, I hope this list remains devoted to the then arcane-but-interesting business of scanning. -- Ciao, Paul D. DeRocco Paulmailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Julian Canberra, Australia Satellite maps of fire situation Canberra and Snowy Montains http://members.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/cbfires/fires.htm Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] JPEG2000 Paul
Paul, I have half-heartedly tried to research JPEG2000 without reaching any useful conclusions. Can you give a reference or a potted summary with such useful but not readily findable info like what is the outlook for JPEG2000? how good is it? is it only available for sale or are their free versions? if only for sale - how do they expect it to become universal? etc. It seems stupid to have standards which are not free because they never become standard. The slowness of uptake and limited public knowledge seems to support this view. But maybe JPEG2000 is the exception? Is the lossless compression worth having, i.e. what is the compression? Lastly, given you obviously have JPEG2000 (as a PS plugin?), why do you save your final images as old jpeg rather than jpeg2000? Thanks, Julian At 08:30 03/02/03, you wrote: For masters, I prefer JPEG2000 over TIFF, for the obvious size reasons. But once I've done an edit, I save as 8bpc lightly-compressed JPEG (PS quality setting 12). Julian Canberra, Australia Satellite maps of fire situation Canberra and Snowy Montains http://members.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/cbfires/fires.htm Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Filmscanners - is this about as goodasitgets?
At 12:02 28/01/03, Paul wrote: Digital's contrast range is the ratio of the clipping level to the noise level. That's bigger than 7 stops. My DiMage 7 is more like 9, meaning that the amount of noise I see on the 12-bit digital output is about three bits or less. From what I've read, the 35mm CCDs are much quieter still. I have got not argument with this. The medium is capable of recording more than fits on the available brightness range of paper. But digital cameras have to process the image somehow to get presentable contrast on paper. If they print a whole 9 or 12 stops on paper it looks too low contrast, no punch. Even if they record as much range as negative film, the fact is that they do not display, or make available all this info, while the film does keep it all. Just as nobody prints all the info stored on a neg because the result is appallingly washed out low contrast, no digital camera that I have heard of outputs the unadulterated full brightness range photo. People would be returning them in droves. So they do clever things to pick which range we want to see, and output that instead, just as a photo processor does with negs. What I am after is a digital camera that has an option to output the full range it is capable of recording, even if that is low contrast. Julian Canberra, Australia Satellite maps of fire situation Canberra and Snowy Montains http://members.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/cbfires/fires.htm Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Nikon LS-4000ED Depth of Field Revisited
Hi Derek, In the web site above, critical focus is maintained with a +/-12 Nikon unit range, and decent focus within a +/-24 range. How this translates to the LS4000, I don't know. I have looked at the scans super magnified and tried to discern what makes for a critical focus range in the LS4000 and what makes for a decently focused range (using NikonScan focus units) by looking at grain structure, but I fear I have not been to successful with this method. I was very interested to read your comments - it is good to hear that at least some examples of the LS4000 seem to work well re focus. As Peter said, the extent of the focus problem definitely varies a lot of between individual scanners. But I am bothered that you couldn't determine the critical focus range - particularly since I have been waiting for a year or so for someone to do this on an LS4000!! (it was my page you were looking at). Can you have another go? It would be very instructive for LS4000 owners, of which I am not one, and also for me to know if the LS4000 is an improvement over the LS2000 in this respect. It should be easy to do, unless I am missing something about the LS4000 that interferes with the method. Let me try another description to see if it helps. Pls don't be insulted by the level of detail, I am trying to make sure we are doing the same thing. 1) Use a negative, neg is better because scans have more apparent grain to play with. 2) Do a preview and crop the image on the preview to be a small area around some part of the neg with obvious grain 3) Do a manual autofocus on that point, read the focus number in Nikon units - call your reading X. By manual autofocus I mean : - hold down on the control or command key and click on the focus button (the one like a checkered flag) - now click on your test area on the preview (the cursor should have changed to a gunsight) 4) Scan, save the scan and enlarge in PS or whatever. Note that the grain is sharp. 5) Now, manually set the focus point to X + 5 or 10 units. To do this, type the required value directly into the Manual Focus Adjustment box on the Scanner Extras palette. Repeat the scan and check if the grain is still sharp. 6) Repeat 5) as often as necessary increasing the focus point value each time, (moving the lens more and more away from the correct focus point) until the resulting scan has clearly lost grain sharpness 7) Repeat 5) and 6) but this time setting the focus point to LESS than the auto-derived focus value (i.e. X-5, X-10 etc), until the image again has definite soft grain. 8) You should now have a series of little images with names like +5, -20. Line them up in Photoshop or whatever, in order, and pick the two (a plus value and a minus value) at which the grain first becomes definitely soft. The difference between them is the DOF in Nikon units - to grain sharpness level. I did the same exercise again, but looking at the *image* sharpness disregarding the fact that the grain was obviously soft and got another figure - a greater range - over which the image was acceptably sharp for my purposes. This gave me a kind of worst case - the actual range which I had to keep my film within if the image was to be usable. The first time you do step 5, I suggest you choose an outlandish figure like X + 50 just to check that the method is working. If the resulting test image is not way our of focus then there is a problem with my description. Hope this helps, because it is not much use knowing the curviness of your images if you don't know the scanner DOF. I look fwd to your results. If any other LS4000 user has done this measurement can you tell us your results pls? (Or LS2000, 30, 8000 for that matter). Julian Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Nikon LS-4000ED Depth of Field Revisited
Tony, At 09:11 26/01/03, you wrote: I performed these exact experiments about a year ago when the DOF issues were being discussed at length. My tests were done on a Kodachome 200 slide which I specificaly used because of the ease with which I could focus on the grain. My own personal tests made it evident that anything much outside of -5 and +10 from critial focus (this is using Nikonscan's focus units) started to show unacceptable softening. That to me does not give much leeway in focusing on a pice of film to get the image sharp across the whole length of the film. Og course other peopple may not be as fussy with sharpness across a scan but -5 and +10 are my own personal comfort levels. As a result all my film is now left uncut and stored in negative sheets so it remains perfectly flat for scanning. Any probematic pieces of film go in a glass slide mount with anti-newton glass. Thank you! It seems that the LS4000 is much the same as the LS2000 in optical DOF and in calibration of arbitrary focus units, since my critical DOF was +/-6 units. i.e. your range total is 15 compared with my 12 - well within experimental error! As I said before I found I could get usable images (not grain sharp but image-sharp, enough to be undetectable) over double this range. Thanks again that was useful, Julian Julian Canberra, Australia http://members.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/photo-an/photo-an.htm Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Nikon LS-4000ED Depth of Field Revisited
Mats, Interesting way of determing DOF. I wonder if it works with Vuescan and a Canon FS2710?? The method requires software and hardware that gives you a readout of focus position, and allows you to set that focus position. I doubt that the Canon does this, in which case you can't do it. I don't know much about the Nikon scanners (I have a Canon FS 2710). But I think there MAY be a flaw in the above method of determining DOF. I just think that it may actually be that the Nikon units are not the same size on two different models of scanner, because I have a feeling that they may be stepper motor steps from some point (or something along those lines). Yes this is correct, but I wasn't attempting to compare between scanners. The idea is that for your own (Nikon) scanner you compare your own 'usable DOF' with your own measured 'film curviness'. If the film sits in your scanner with a measured flatness (measured using the scanner's focus units) such that the film location variation is less than the measured scanner DOF (also measured in scanner focus units) then you are doing well - your scans will be in focus. In my scanner, the usable DOF is about 20 nikon LS2000 units (i.e. +/-10), but the variation of the film position is 30 to 90 units (I.e. +/-15 to +/- 45), so unless I try very hard (use flat film and manual holder), some part of my images will be out of focus. Julian Julian Canberra, Australia http://members.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/photo-an/photo-an.htm Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Advice needed on Photoshop
Everyone has their own method it seems; this is mine. I assume you have layers and masking, if not this obviously won't work. Make a copy layer. Adjust one layer for best result on the dark area - using levels should be enough or curves if you have it. Adjust the other layer for best result on the lighter area. Make sure in particular you match the apparent contrast of the two image versions, as this is what looks odd if not done well. Make a layer mask on the top layer and then apply a black to white gradient to the mask. This will select the bottom layer at one end and fade to the top layer at the other end. You can change the mask as much as you want until you get the effect you want, and you can detail the mask for special areas like highlights just by using the paintbrush with suitable feathered edge on top of the gradient - paint over the gradient. Julian - Original Message - From: Mike Bloor [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, December 09, 2002 19:03 Subject: [filmscanners] Advice needed on Photoshop I have a slide of a building (the treasury in Petra), lit only by candles standing in front of it. This means that the top half of the building is much darker than the bottom. While retaining this effect to some degree, I would like to lighten the top of the building and leave the bottom as it is. Is there some way I can use Photoshop to lighten the slide progressively from say 0% at the bottom to 50% at the top ? I have Photoshop LE 5.0, so I might be missing some of the more esoteric tools. Regards, Mike Bloor -- -- Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: How to label CD backups
Good points, thanks everyone. I am off to buy a sharpie and a Staedtler Lumocolor. In response to [EMAIL PROTECTED]'s question, it seems that it is quite possible for any interference with the top layer to produce unspecified and unknowable chemical/mechanical reactions which can and do damage the information layer directly underneath. There is a bit about these risks at the links I gave, I don't know how much of the fear is justified by experience and how much is just a natural fear of catastrophic consequences of getting it wrong. Julian At 16:50 05/11/02, you wrote: Quoting Julian Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED]: Thanks for the quick answers guys, but maybe I should clarify - the issue is whether these pens will eventually corrode/dissolve/affect the useful layer which is right near the label side of the disc. These CDs will be my only records, and even though I keep multiple copies it won't help me if they all fail after a couple of years because of the pen I used. There has been a lot of discussion around the place on this topic, and I have done a bit of research, but as I said - with conflicting results. Shen can you say why the oil-based is safe? As you can see, there are others who say the opposite so I would like to feel comfortable with my decision. And Andrew, I definitely DO want to write on the main surface, not just the clear area in the middle, because of the way my storage works and what I want to write. Lastly, and frustratingly, I don't know what a Sanford sharpie is as I am in Australia. Julian, If you keep multiple copies of the same CD, why not hedge your bets and get two or three different types of pens and and use one of them on each copy of the CD? ie a Sharpie on one of the backup CDs, and another pen on the other (identicial?) CD? That way if one does affect the CD, then you still have the other CD with the data on it. I do a similar thing with my CD backups. One set use one type of pen, the other set I use a different pen. I don't think you are going to get a definate answer. If there was one, then you would have got it by now and everyone would have agreed on it. With this ongoing discussion, I think you can come to the conclusion that there is no *known* answer with 100% certainty. The Sharpie are available in Australia. I got one from my local Woolworths supermarket in the stationary section. They are just another brand/type of Artline type markers which I gather are rather well known and popular in the USA. Mark P. -- .sig - TBA CBR AU Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: How to label CD backups - storage
What I want to know is a decent labelling and storage regime. At present I resort to mmdd_clientname, and use Extensis Portfolio to catalogue the contents. That bit is fine, it's finding the CD which is a swine - the CD's are always out of sequence (gremlins, I swear) and the one I want is invariably the last one I look at out of hundreds. Jewel cases suck utterly for finding stuff, and binders are even worse... negatives are a cinch in comparison. I am not sure what you mean by binders, but have a look at the 'archival' sleeves such as http://www.compupack.co.uk/detail.asp?productid=22 Is this good for you? It seems ideal and way better than jewel boxes, so long as the plastic etc is truly archival and also not a scratch hazard. Once in a binder, they stay in order, and the tabs on top answer the labelling question. Julian Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: How to label CD backups Tim
Tim - do you have any thoughts on the storage problem resulting from this work? Are plastic sleeves OK and better/worse than jewel cases? If so, what plastic? Julian At 04:48 06/11/02, you wrote: I've posted ad infinitum the advice about storage etc we were given by scientists from the Canadian Conservation Institute who were doing this testing (The Longevity and Preservation of Optical Media...) - I'm sure you can find it in the archives if you hunt for CD's! tim Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: dynamic range discussion
You are right it is not hard to delete or skip. I skip most messages on lists, and only choose to read the ones with subjects that interest me. There is very little overhead in doing this and I don't really understand why people get so upset about it. The funny thing is that the people who do object seem to have read all the posts! The other surprising thing is that there is an enormous amount of back-channel chat going on about this dynamic range issue, much of it by people who choose not to participate on the list. It does seem that there is a level of interest which is not reflected in the number of participants. But I too am heartily sick of this particular discussion and it is obvious that the protagonists are never going to get anywhere. You'll be relieved to hear that I'll be leaving the discussion soon anyway. Not because I don't still believe in the practical importance of the issue in scanners (and more to the point the practical importance of what I see as grossly misleading information), but because I don't believe we will ever resolve it given the personalities involved. Also I don't think the growing amount of personal abuse is good for the group or the participants Julian At 12:39 03/09/02, Paul wrote: I agree. This _is_ the place to discuss dynamic range with respect to film scanners. I don't think anyone can reasonably complain about it, as long as it's labeled as such in the subject line. It's no harder to hit Delete on something that says Dynamic Range in the subject than it is to hit Delete on something that says Get Your Viagra Now. -- Ciao, Paul D. DeRocco Paulmailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Dynamic range
Hi Roy, I was talking about your context so we are discussing the same thing. You have already got a response from Vincent which puts that case in terms of resolution, here's my quick take from the dynamic range point of view - the two arguments are otherwise essentially the same. The important thing I think to remember about DyR is as always, the definition, and what defines the minimum signal, the MDS, in that definition. The DyR is the range from the max signal down to the MDS, not down to some zero figure. So in the case you are discussing, and if we call black the low end of the range as you have, we can establish the DyR as follows. We know it is max signal / MDS. What is the MDS? It is the minimum signal that can be detected ABOVE whatever corresponds to background or 'zero level'. In this case, and with all digital step limited situations, the MDS is step 1, not step 0. It is the first, lowest signal you have any chance of discerning above the zero signal level, which in this case is pure black. So in the first case, the DyR is : max/MDS = (4096 steps) / (1 step), and in the second 256/1. i,e, DyR 4096 vs 256. Looking at it another way, with an 8 bit file, the bottom step is the same level as step 16 was in the 12-bit case. So when you converted from the 12-bit to the 8-bit, you lost the 16 lowest steps and combined them all into 1, the lowest level of the 8-bit situation. In that conversion you lost the 16 lowest shades of gray, permanently. So all that info is gone and your MDS is now 16 times larger, and correspondingly your DyR has diminished by the same amount, 16 times. If you then converted back to 12-bit, you can't regain those bottom 16 shades, so your picture is permanently degraded. Despite the 12-bit digitisation which implies DyR of 4096, the actual image bottom step- the new minimum discernable signal above black MDS - is actually step 16 of your 4096 and so the DyR is now 4096/16 = 256, the same as the 8-bit case. This must be so because the information content is exactly the same in both cases. Does this make sense? Julian At 17:14 01/09/02, Roy wrote: I'm curious whether we're talking about two different things or that you disagree with what I was actually talking about. It think that your post (in response to Austin) was talking specifically about scanner output. In other words the phrase the number of bits LIMITS the dynamic range was in the context meaning the number of bits in a scanner LIMITS the dynamic range of that scanner. In this context I entirely agree -- a 16-bit scanner has more dynamic range than an 8-bit scanner. My 8-bit versus 16-bit comment was in a very different context. I was talking about a 16-bit Photoshop that was ready to be printed. Thus value 0 was the max black and value 65535 was the max white. At this time the file was converted to 8-bit such that value 0 represents the same max black as 0 in the 16-bit file, and value 255 in 8-bit file represents the same max white as 65535 in the 16-bit file. So both files represent the same black to white range. In this context I say the 8-bit file and the 16-bit file have the same dynamic range because they represent the same tonal range on a output print. The endpoints are the same only real difference is how many levels are in between. So, is there disagreement? If so I'd like to know why and how you look at it. Thanks, Roy Roy Harrington [EMAIL PROTECTED] Black White Photography Gallery http://www.harrington.com Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Dynamic range
Austin, I have never read whatever paper you are talking about, but I GUARANTEE you it does not SAY that dynamic range is a resolution. I am sure that you, Austin, INTERPRET it to say that, but it will not actually say that. You probably should have read the paper before commenting... But no, that is the point. I don't need to because I know that no paper will say what you believe - you are mistaken in this and still, to this date, after buckets of wasted electrons and keyboard hours, you have still not produced a single reference that says what you say. I gave you this totally unsupported challenge as a free kick - you had absolutely every chance to smother me in extracts from this paper that I have not even looked at with quotes that agree with you. The fact that you have not done so I think proves the point. ... Austin, if you have a scanner with a noise level of 36dB below the max signal (i.e. 3.6D or 1/4096), No, where did you get 3.6D??? You can't equate DENSITY values with DYNAMIC RANGE. Density values are absolute things, like volts are, though density units are expressed in log form. They are NOT relative to noise. Good grief Austin, you are playing semantics. I only included the 3.6D to stop you from having a go at me for using dB in an area that usually we use Bels. I should have said Bels, except no-one understands what they are. Forget the D, I wasn't referring to density absolute, I was using it as the Bel version of 36dB. You have used this semantic and unrelated approximation of mine as your only argument below. It is not relevant, I do understand what D is about, I was trying to protect myself and readers from another of your interminable side branches designed to get you off the topic. I am sure you'd agree that you need a 12 bit downstream system to maximise the utility of this scanner. (because 12 bits digitises to 4096 levels, and one level is then just equal to the noise level of 1/4096 * max signal. You won't have wasted bits being lost below the noise, and you won't waste good information by failing to digitise the smallest possible discernable signal) That's correct, but don't confuse density values with dynamic range. Call this Case 0. ***The dynamic range is 36dB. I say that is the RANGE of this scanner, you say it is the RESOLUTION. In this case it is both. ***So, resolution also = 36dB. Well, no. As I've said, you are confusing density values with dynamic range. Now that I've removed the D equivalent, can you make a substantive comment on the point that was being made? CASE 1 Now, if this same scanner only had a 10-bit downstream system (such as from the old days when A/D's were incredibly expensive), what is the dynamic range? The noise level is 1/4096, and the smallest digital non-zero signal is one bit or 1/1024. Obviously the minimum usable or detectable signal cannot be smaller than either of these, or in other words it is the maximum or the two figures. In this case it is 1024, and the MDS is determined ONLY by the bit-size. Noise level is 4 times smaller than this, so is irrelevant. So DR is 1024:1 or 30dB or D3.0. The dynamic range IS 1024:1 or 30dB...but that has nothing to do with DENSITY values. I am not discussing density values. I am discussing dynamic range and only dynamic range as you know, so please reframe your response accordingly and stop this disingenuous nonsense. This scanner can, technically, still encode ANY range of DENSITY values into those 1024 available values. As you once said, duh! ***In this case DR = 30 dB ***Resolution is still 36dB if you stick with your formula = max/noise, or 30dB as it obviously is in fact, given you have a digital step size of 1/1024 or 30dB. Well, here you go again, Julian...and this is why I get pissy with you. You take things out of context and apply them to something else. I NEVER said the MDS was ALWAYS noise. In the case of the ORIGINAL SIGNAL, it is noise, in the case of the digitized signal, it is NOT noise. Well Austin, let me quote one of many interminable exchanges where I was tearing my hair out because you were insisting that MDS was noise. Please note carefully the contradiction, clear and unambiguous between these two statements: A) I NEVER said the MDS was ALWAYS noise. - from this post B1) The smallest discernable signal IS noise. - from post in June B2) This is a misunderstanding of the concept of dynamic range. It is ALWAYS based on noise. - post in June B3) Noise and smallest discernable signal are EXACTLY the same thing. - post in June. I have struggled for months to get you to agree that noise and MDS are not the same thing, and now you tell me you have always thought this!! I am pleased that you are coming round, but flabbergasted at the same time. Here is the exchange for the record so you don't accuse me of taking you out of context: --start of exchange last
[filmscanners] Re: Dynamic range
Austin, I have never read whatever paper you are talking about, but I GUARANTEE you it does not SAY that dynamic range is a resolution. I am sure that you, Austin, INTERPRET it to say that, but it will not actually say that. You probably should have read the paper before commenting... But no, that is the point. I am confident that I don't need to look at the paper, because I know that no paper will say what you believe. You are mistaken in what you say and still, to this date, after buckets of wasted electrons and keyboard hours, you have still not produced a single reference that says what you say. So I was giving you a FREE KICK - a totally unsupported challenge which gave you absolutely every chance to smother me in extracts from this paper with quotes that agree with you. The fact that you have not done so I think proves the point. Now as for the rest of the post, I am in a bind. If I respond to all of yours, you and others will accuse me of being interminable. If I only respond to what I think are relevant points, you will accuse me of being selective. So I am going to be selective. But I have written a complete response at some cost, and if you want the rest please tell me. ... ***In this case DR = 30 dB ***Resolution is still 36dB if you stick with your formula = max/noise, or 30dB as it obviously is in fact, given you have a digital step size of 1/1024 or 30dB. Well, here you go again, Julian...and this is why I get pissy with you. You take things out of context and apply them to something else. I NEVER said the MDS was ALWAYS noise. In the case of the ORIGINAL SIGNAL, it is noise, in the case of the digitized signal, it is NOT noise. Well let me quote one of many interminable exchanges where I was tearing my hair out because you were insisting that MDS was noise. Please note carefully the contradiction, clear and unambiguous between statement A and the statements B1,2,3 : A) I NEVER said the MDS was ALWAYS noise. - from this post B1) The smallest discernable signal IS noise. - from post in June B2) This is a misunderstanding of the concept of dynamic range. It is ALWAYS based on noise. - post in June B3) Noise and smallest discernable signal are EXACTLY the same thing. - post in June. I have struggled for months to get you to agree that noise and MDS are not the same thing, and now you tell me you have always thought this!! I am pleased that you are coming round, but flabbergasted at the same time. Here is the exchange for the record so you don't accuse me of taking you out of context: --start of exchange last June-- Julian: iii) How can you tell me that smallest discernable signal is not the correct term!? Austin: It IS the correct term, but you are using the wrong definition for it! The smallest discernable signal IS noise. I don't say it IS determined by noise, I say that most of the time it is. Because MOST of the time, the smallest discernable signal is determined by noise, so MOST of the time dynamic range is determined by noise. This is a misunderstanding of the concept of dynamic range. It is ALWAYS based on noise. The importance of this semantic juggling is twofold, first, it is important to understand the DEFINITION of dynamic range, and the fact that it is NOT defined in terms of noise, it IS defined in terms of smallest discernable signal. Noise and smallest discernable signal are EXACTLY the same thing. Second, on those odd occasions when smallest discernable signal is NOT determined by noise, then you need to make sure that noise is NOT in the equation! (which is one reason why your equation has a problem). So, you are saying that my reference material is entirely incorrect? I KNOW that isn't the case. ---end of exchange IN fact, noise and digitised step size are the two things that limit MDS in a scanner, as I have always said. Whichever one predominates determines MDS and thus the bottom half of DyR.. ... : max signal / MDS. This time, MDS is determined by the noise level, because noise level is higher (4 times higher) than the bit size. MDS = noise level = 1/4096. So the DR of this scanner is 36dB again. You could have any number of bits over 12, and it would not change the dynamic range one iota. ***In this case DR = 36dB. ***Resolution is --- 36dB by your formula = max/noise (correct this time), or 42 dB if you just consider digital bit numbers and step size. I really don't know what your point is here. My point was to demonstrate in agonising detail that your unambiguously applied formula for DR (of the system) as something/noise is not always correct, and your unambiguously applied formula that DR is determined by the number of bits is not always correct. We may even agree on this, but in past discussions you have blasted people with these as absolute truths when they are not. The ONLY absolute in dynamic range that is
[filmscanners] Re: Dynamic range
At 14:53 30/08/02, David wrote: Does that mean you claim that density range and dynamic range are equivalent measurements of the same physical quantity? Well yes and no. Density range is normally a property of a slide or piece of film, or an image on a film. Dynamic range is normally a property of some processing device, like a scanner in this case. If you have a slide that can just be scanned by a scanner without the scanner saturating or getting the black bits lost in the noise, then the slide's density range is the same as the scanner dynamic range, in that case. A scanner doesn't have a density range, but it has a range of densities that it can handle. The maximum range of densities that it can handle in a single pass is its dynamic range. The maximum range of densities that it can handle under any circumstances is it's static range, or max range, sometimes called just Dmax by manufacturers. (Inaccurately, but we think we know what they mean. Dmax is not a range, it is a figure. When they say this, they are by implication assuming an upper limit of 0dB as the other end of the range). So if a slide's density range is greater than the scanner dynamic range then the scanner cannot capture the whole density range of the slide. I am using the terms as they are normally used. Both are measures of range of densities. One is the range of densities actually or potentially on a slide, one is the range of densities that a scanner can handle. You *can* talk about the dynamic range of a particular slide and be kind of correct. Or you could talk about the dynamic range of the medium (that is, the particular film). Dynamic range is, as it always has been, nothing more than the range of largest signal to smallest signal, usually expressed as a ratio. On an actual slide it is easy enough to pick the largest signal (the lightest density) and the smallest signal (the densest area which is just discernable against unexposed film background). For the medium, the relevant figures are the lowest POSSIBLE density, and the highest POSSIBLE density that can still be discerned from background black. If you use the language this way, then the slide's dynamic range is the same thing as its density range. Julian Julian Robinson Canberra, Australia http://members.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/ Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Dynamic range
Todd Flashner [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Yes, I suppose if one is convinced that DYR is a resolution that is the way they'd have to approach it as such, but David, tell me, have you seen a cited reference that supports that approach? David replies: http://www.chipcenter.com/dsp/DSP000329F1.html The dynamic range of a digital signal is the ratio of the maximum full-scale signal representation to the smallest signal the DSP or data converter can represent. For an N-bit system, the ratio is theoretically equal to 6.02N. Julian comments: This quote says nothing about resolution, it is not saying that dynamic range is a resolution, it is saying that the dynamic range is a range between the max and the smallest signal. Nothing new here. I don't know what the 6.02N is about, the ratio is theoretically 2^N (2 to the power N) This ratio calculation will give you the dynamic range AND the resolution in this case. (But don't forget, this does not mean that dynamic range is the same thing as the resolution!!!) Julian Canberra, Australia http://members.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/ Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Dynamic range
There's a large number of ways you can write down numbers to define a range. There is only one way in common use to express a range in a single number that is independent of gain and other things that are irrelevant - as a ratio. You can express that ratio in a number of ways, dimensionless plain number or as a log value etc. Julian At 12:55 30/08/02, you wrote: Julian Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: ... It is not hard to understand - 1dB is a small range (about 1.26 to 1), 100dB is a big range (100 to 1). The range we are discussing is the range from MDS to max signal, which in scanner case is Dmax to Dmin. There are _two_ ways to talk about Dmax to Dmin, you can talk about their absolute values (transmittances in the range 0 to 1, for example) as a density range or you can talk about the ratio of Dmax to MDS (or Dmin to MDS depending on the definitions) as the dynamic range. If you claim that these are equivalent, then Austin and I disagree, but if you think they are different, then we all agree. That's all there is here. David J. Littleboy [EMAIL PROTECTED] Tokyo, Japan Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: IV ED dynamic range... DYNAMIC RANGE!
I am only posting two replies to what has been posted during my overnight. This one is a short response to the nitty gritty of Austin's argument. The other includes replies in a single post to other points by everybody. There are two points I am addressing in this post: 1. Dynamic range is a range, not a resolution 2. Dynamic range is the range that the scanner can capture AT ONE TIME i.e. dynamically i.e in one scan I address them purely by providing the resource that Austin requests. For logical discussion, see other posts. 1. Dynamic range is a range, not a resolution * Julian: It is a simple enough concept. Most explicitly, dynamic RANGE is ***not*** the RESOLUTION, Austin: Yes it absolutely is. Julian: and there is no book or standard that has ever said this. Austin: Well, the ISO spec shows clearly it is exactly what I've said it is, as well as every other resource I've posted on this subject before. I simply don't understand where you get the resources for your misguided understanding of it. YOU HAVE NO RESOURCES THAT SUPPORT YOUR BELIEF. Julian now replies: Hmmm. Here is the draft ISO spec, from http://www.pima.net/standards/iso/tc42/wg18/WG18_POW.htm . It is entitled Photography Electronic scanners for photographic images Dynamic range measurements. Perhaps there is another ISO spec from which you are deriving your beliefs? Perhaps you could post it? ---direct quote from Proposed ISO standard--- 7.2 Scanner dynamic range The dynamic range is calculated from the Scanner OECF by: DR = Dmax - Dmin(7.2) DR = Scanner Dynamic Range Dmax = Density where the Signal to noise ratio is 1 Dmin = Minimum density where the output signal of the luminance OECF appears to be unclipped ---end quote from Proposed ISO standard--- (and OECF is opto-electronic conversion function) You will notice, it is exactly as I have described it, a RANGE. It is the range between Dmax and Dmin. It is not a resolution, there is no mention of resolution. Can you tell me then how this says that Dynamic Range is a resolution? 2. Dynamic range is the range that the scanner can capture AT ONE TIME Julian: DYNAMIC RANGE on the other hand, is the smaller range within the Density Range that the scanner can capture AT ONE TIME i.e. dynamically i.e in one scan. It is the instantaneous range the scanner can handle. Austin: Absolutely not correct. Where on earth did you get that? Please please provide any credible source that says anything to the such. The ISO spec doesn't define dynamic range that way...nor do any of the resources I have seen. On the contrary, the ISO standard states a fairly precise process in which the Dynamic Range is measured by scanning a single slide in a single pass. (They do repeat the same single-scan measurement several times to improve accuracy). Here is the relevant text, remembering that the dynamic range is calculated from the OECF: quote from proposed standard 6 Measuring the Scanner OECF The scanner OECF shall be calculated from values determined from a test chart 4 that consists of a density range higher than the range the scanner is expected to be able to reproduce. For reflective targets the density range shall be higher than the range of typical reflective media scanned on this scanner. Many scanners will automatically adapt to the dynamic range of the scene as reproduced on the film or reflective media and the luminance distribution of the film. The results may also differ if the scan mode is grey scale or RGB A minimum of 10 trials shall be conducted for each scanner OECF determination. A trial shall consist of one scan of the test chart. For each trial, the digital output level shall be determined from a 64 by 64 1 pixel area located at the same relative position in each patch. Identical, non-aligned patches may be averaged, or the patch with the least scanning artifacts, such as dust or scan lines, may be used. The scanner OECF so determined shall be used to calculate the resolution measurements for this trial. If the scanner OECF is reported, the final digital output level data presented for each step density shall be the mean of the digital output levels for all the trials 6.1 Scanner settings The scans for the determination of the scanner OECF shall be made in RGB or grey scale mode with a resolution set to the maximum sample frequency (given in Dpi or Ppi) divided by an integer to avoid interpolation R = Rmax / i R = scanning resolution Rmax = maximum scanning resolution of the scanner i = integer value (6.1) The scanner shall be set to automatic adaptation to the dynamic range and the digital values representing the dark grey patches shall be
[filmscanners] Re: IV ED dynamic range... DYNAMIC RANGE!
This is composed into a single post because I know that this topic is overexposed and frustrates many people. It frustrates me too, but it would be wrong not to try to correct misinformation which is propagated with such authority that it has succeeded in hijacking the moral and technical high ground on this authoritative list. The purpose of this list is to allow all of us to discuss and get a handle on exactly this kind of question. I know that Austin has a deserved great reputation amongst list members, partly because he is a prolific and unflagging contributor and has obvious technical knowledge. Just the same, for whatever reasons, the view he puts forward on dynamic range is not in accord with any textbook, paper or standard of which I am aware, and this definition misleads and distorts and confuses much consequential discussion. Worse than that, it has succeeded in stifling a lot of the useful discussion we should be having on a pretty basic topic because people have realised they don't understand this most basic aspect of scanning - in large part because they are confused by unnecessarily difficult and incorrect constructions of what dynamic range is. For those of you who have assumed that Austin's view is correct and therefore not attempted to read my earlier post in any detail - I beg you, please read what I wrote (first post headed RE: IV ED dynamic range... DYNAMIC RANGE!) and try to follow the logic of it, don't just assume that any particular person has the natural authority here. I tried hard to make this post short-ish and non-engineering. If it makes any difference to you, I have at least as much experience with using Dynamic Range in my career as Austin so don't make any assumptions about level of knowledge based on presentation or style. Go and look at every definition of dynamic range you can find for yourself on the web or in textbooks - you will not find one which says that dynamic range is a resolution. It is a range. Answers to many posts below: At 23:06 08/08/02, Austin wrote: DYNAMIC RANGE on the other hand, is the smaller range within the Density Range that the scanner can capture AT ONE TIME i.e. dynamically i.e in one scan. It is the instantaneous range the scanner can handle. Absolutely not correct. Where on earth did you get that? Please please provide any credible source that says anything to the such. The ISO spec doesn't define dynamic range that way...nor do any of the resources I have seen. Austin - in my other post you'll see that the draft ISO spec does support my assertion. You need to get over this mental block as to what the dynamic means in dynamic range. Here is another very simple example to illustrate the distinction between Dynamic Range and the non-dynamic kind of range - a very simple distinction that people need to understand. Consider a basic analog 3-range voltmeter. It has a graduated scale, a needle, and you can switch between 3 ranges, 1v, 10V, 1000V. We can measure on this meter from max = full scale deflection, down to a min = the smallest graduation on the scale (let's say). The meter is divided into 100 graduations, this is equivalent to saying the *resolution* is 1/100th of full scale. So, on the 1V range we can measure from 0,01V to 1V. On the 10V range we can measure from 0.1V to 10V. On the 1000V range we can measure from 10V to 1000V. The Dynamic Range of this meter is max/min = 100 in each case. BUT, and here is the rub, this meter can - overall - measure voltages from 0.01V to 1000V. This is the total range or just the range, the kind or range we talk about without the word dynamic in front of it. In this example, the range is 1000/0.01 = 100,000 to 1. So for this meter: total range = 100,000:1, and dynamic range = 100:1 Engineers might say that total range = 100dBV and dynamic range = 40dBV. The difference between these two figures is EXACTLY analogous to the difference between the Dynamic Range and Density Range of a scanner. Dynamic refers to at one instant, it means the signal range of the thing without changing it's configuration. Same in radio, same in audio, same in signal theory, same in light. Notice that in above example the resolution is 1/100th of full scale. You could express this resolution if you wanted to as a number of distinguishable levels, i.e. 100. The number of distinguishable levels (i.e. loosely, the resolution) is the same *number* as the Dynamic Range. But they are not the same thing! And under different assumptions even the numbers would not be the same. More on that below. Absolutely incorrect. Dynamic range is absolutely NOT a range as you believe it is. It is what happens WITHIN A RANGE...or it would not contain the word dynamic. You are arguing against everything I have ever seen written... please save us from going on for days on this in hopeless spirals - just post your authoritative sources to support this. A range is simply a range. I'll repeat that
[filmscanners] Re: Messages
Come on Tony give me a break! I don't give a fig how much traffic there is on the list, I have never complained about too much or too little. I was only trying to reassure some people that I too (i.e. a third party) had received no messages, and quantify it a little, so they would realise the traffic was actually light. Panic, nah. Maybe you were miffed at my mildly humorous connection to the creation of the new group? I thought I was being informative about the dynamic range list, because I reckon that some of those on filmscanners were actually interested in the damned topic. I was actually sorry it got moved away from filmscanners, but there you go, such is the force of political correctness and group dynamics. Julian At 00:01 09/07/02, you wrote: On Sun, 07 Jul 2002 08:41:22 +1000 Julian Robinson ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: I got nothing for three days.. maybe this is because ...nobody posted anything! Either I get complaints that there's too much traffic, or panic-stricken queries about whether the listserver has died :-) Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Colour fringing
Mike, I agree with Arthur's comments. I bought an HP S-20 and was doing OK with it, but not stunned by the quality of scans. A friend of mine with scanning experience caused me deep distress by suggesting that the S20 was a toy and not worth having, and that I should get (at that time) a Nikon LS30 for not much more. After looking at my scans a bit more critically and not getting any joy out of HP on a problem with banding, I sent it back and bought an LS2000. While the LS2000 wouldn't win any awards now, the improvement over the S20 was spectacular and immediately obvious. Proved my friend's point, and my advice to anyone is don't get an S20 unless you REALLY want the dual transparency /positive option and you are not fussy about quality. Why anyone would want the positive scanning option I don't know as you can do a better job with a cheap flatbed. As Art says, the optical path in the S20 is complex and prone to misalignment etc. Sorry to be so down on what was probably a carefully researched purchase decision, but I do think it likely that you'd be happier with a different brand. You could try sending the thing back with example scans to HP but I don't think much of your chances. I just thing the S20 is a disappointing scanner. HTH Julian At 21:02 07/07/02, you wrote: Hi Mike: Before I make any comment, below is the exact note I supplied to my computer retailer when I returned my HP S-20 for a refund (they had to ship it back to HP, so they asked me for a defect list...) HP S-20 Scanner SN.SG8BBX Problems: 1) Color fringing (red/green) in bars going across image width Attempted suggested correction by HP of turn scanner over and cycling through modes several times. Did not improve matter. 2) excessive response to reds in transparencies, causing burned flesh tones, which are difficult to correct. 3) Double cycles eject when ejecting slides and negative strips. Sometimes doesn't acknowledge slide or neg when introduced into carrier. === Make sure your images are not manifesting color fringing from optical problems with your camera lenses (although you seem to imply this isn't the case). Look over your images with a quality loupe. Then try what HP suggested, turn the scanner over, and cycle it through the three different modes (slide, neg, print) several times, and the try it again. My S-20 had two types of fringing. The type I can see in your image, and a micro fringing that you had to zoom in tight to seem. It was a type of banding fringing that was directly related to the resolution I scanned at. It was also red/green, and it was particularly obvious if I scanned a black and white slide or a black and white negative as a slide, since it was the only color in the image. History: My first film scanner was a HP S-10. I went through 3 of them trying to get one that didn't band in the shadows, and all of them suffered from one defect of another. Finally, HP offered me the new S-20, although the banding was gone, it had a number of other problems, and eventually it too went back to HP, and I ended up with A Minolta Dual II, a much better scanner, but still not without defects and problems. The problem is that the optics are just not good enough in that scanner. It has a very complex optical path due to the feature of allowing it to scan both transmissive and reflective things (reflective at 300 dpi, which my today's standards is a bit of a joke). There are so many moving objects in the scanner light/optical path (mirrors, etc) that I'm amazed it works at all. At the time the S-10 came out, that model was the least expensive film scanner on the market. Today, there are numerous better models for about the same price (The Canon FS-2710, the Minolta Dual II, and cheaper ones (although slightly lower resolution) like the Primefilm 1800U. If the unit is still under warranty, get in touch with HP about it. If they can't replace it with one that doesn't fringe, get your money back and buy something else. Slide scanners should not show color fringing, any more than should a quality lens. Art Mike Brown wrote: I'm relatively new to the list so apologies if this one has been done to death but... I recently bought a cheap-ish scanner, an HP Photosmart S20, and I've been a bit disappointed with the results. I'm getting better results overall now I've bought Vuescan but haven't resolved the fringing issue. It's difficult to know what to expect as nobody ever puts full size sample files on their websites! I've done the usual trawl around the net but can't find fringing mentioned as a particular problem. I started off scanning some very old slides noticed the fringing. Initially I put it down to having used a cheap teleconverter with a russian lens. I've noticed the problem with other slides and negatives though and I think it's something to do with the stepper motor drive or film slippage. The fringing is
[filmscanners] Re: Messages
I got nothing for three days.. maybe this is because Todd has given the dynamic range discussion a special list! We are without Austin on that list, otherwise the discussion is going exactly as it was here - busily, and in circles! Julian At 06:46 07/07/02, you wrote: I was concerned the server was down or my computer was duff as all has been quiet on the list for a few days. However I would like to think everyone is actually busy scanning ( including myself ) without any tech problems or concerns!!! regards Philip Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Density vs Dynamic range
Austin, No! I don't! Please read. I say it is usually determined by noise, because noise is what USUALLY determines the smallest possible signal. WHat I actually say is dynamic range is based on largest possible signal and smallest possible signal. I thought that was pretty straightforward. Sheesh. OK, your clarification straightened me out...that your belief is still not right...darn, I thought we were getting somewhere ;-) This makes it pretty hard to ever convince you of anything! However, you have agreed that you were wrong about what I said the first time. I didn't give you a clarification, I just repeated what I said the first time. So this little milestone illustrates that you are actually capable of making an error in interpretation - at least once in your life. Can you concede that it is therefore POSSIBLE that it might have happened another time?!! If yes, that there is just the tiniest chance, a 'one grain of sand amongst the sands of all the beaches of the world' chance, that you have an incorrect interpretation of what dynamic range is?! ** The dynamic range is NOT a resolution definition, it is a signal range definition. ** So, you are saying that my reference material is entirely incorrect? I KNOW that isn't the case. Everything I have seen that you have quoted from a book I agree with. But what you show from the books is NOT what you use yourself! You change the meaning of the numerator to derive a new formula. And you use noise instead of min discernable signal because they nearly are always the same thing, but from a definition point of view, they are NOT the same. Please think about this.If a reference shows maximum signal or words to that effect on the top of the equation, it means what is says, maximum signal, NOT (maximum signal - minimum signal). Pleease show where each of your references state that the top of the equation is what you call absolute range. And please show references that use your actual formula. Once again, if you want me to describe such a box where the smallest discernable signal is NOT determined by noise, just say so . But that would be a mis-use of terminology. Again, for the 100th time, smallest signal level is NOT the same as smallest discernable signal. Smallest discernable signal IS noise, and as my references have defined it. OK here's an example. It is a simple box that has a smallest discernable signal which is different from the noise signal. It is a detector circuit. A very basic one. Actually a peak detector. The input goes to a full wave rectifier - a diode bridge, followed by a capacitor and then an op-amp feeding the output. The op-amp has a high enough input impedance so the peaks are preserved for a while, and it has a gain of 1 i.e. it is a buffer. Now ... you feed the input with a variable amplitude ac signal and at the output you get a DC signal which is kind of proportional to the peaks of your input signal.The noise comes from the diodes, the capacitor and the op-amp. Let's say the noise is 1 millivolt. The thing saturates for an input signal of 10V peak to peak, i.e. at an output of 8.4V. OK, so start at 0V ac on the input, and start winding up the wick while you watch the output. What happens? At first nothing. We'll assume the diodes have a sharp forward knee, and a 0.7V drop. More signal, more signal. Still, nothing - all we see is 1 mV of noise at the output. Suddenly, when the input gets to just above 1.4V p-p, you just start to see something at the output. At 1.41V p-p you see 0.01 V DC at your output, well visible above the noise. From there on, as you crank up the input, the output follows the input linearly. But, do you see, the minimum discernable signal was just above1.4V - about 1.401 in fact. You can not discern anything at 1.39 V, nothing at all. At 1.41V your meter starts registering a solid 10mV. So your smallest possible signal that is discernable at the output is 1.401V. The dynamic range of this box, is DR = max signal / min signal = 10V / 1.401V = 7, near enough. I repeat, the smallest input signal it can register is 1.401V (i.e. this is the min discernable input signal), the largest it can handle is 10V. The dynamic range of the box is 7. That is a legitimate and useful dynamic range calculation, it gives the information you want about the range of signals this detector can detect. It does NOT tell you anything about resolution. Let me emphasise this: dynamic range usually DOES tell you something about resolution, because systems are USUALLY linear, but in this case it does not. ** The dynamic range is NOT a resolution definition, it is a signal range definition. ** In this case, DR MUST be expressed in terms of the
[filmscanners] Re: Density vs Dynamic rangeAUSTIN(1)
Austin, There are at least two of us esteemed engineers who disagree with you on this list... At 03:06 12/06/02, Peter wrote: Julian, I am in total agreement with you. Peter, Nr Clonakilty, Co Cork, Ireland I point this out not to score a point, and I would never say or believe that the majority must necessarily be correct - BUT, I would ask that you at least draw the conclusion that it might be worthwhile looking seriously at what we (or I) am saying. I spent 2 hours yesterday constructing the following post which was carefully thought out to try and make the points clearly, you appear to have somehow misconstrued who wrote what and given a very partial and non-contextual dismissal of a couple of points which of course I don't agree with. Could you do me a favour and read and respond to the whole post below, especially the parts headed DYNAMIC and SCANNERS? To be very explicit, so to avoid confusion, every word is mine except those quotes that are explicitly quoted with symbols or inside quotes. Thanks, Julian R yesterday's post follows, please respond This post has 3 sections, headings are: RANGE - discusses the confusion about range DYNAMIC - discusses the confusion about what dynamic means SCANNERS - applies dynamic range terminology and discusses the relationship between density and dynamic range. 1) RANGE *** Someone else wrote: However my point is that if you can reduce the noise level then you can increase the number of steps (by halving the step size) with real benefit, but **without altering the range**. Austin responded: Correct, but that INCREASES the dynamic range. The asterisks are mine to draw attention to the problem. Here goes! Big breath... Put some numbers to the above. Let's say max signal is 1000mV and noise (or min signal in this case) is 10mV at first. Then you reduce the noise level by half. So min is now 5mV. OK, so now use the PLAIN ENGLISH language definition of a range. In the first case, the RANGE of the usable / measurable / instrumentable signal is 10mV to 1000mV, or 100 to 1, or 40dB (volts remember, so 20log, not 10log). In the second case the RANGE of the signal is 5mV to 1000mV, or 200 to 1, or 46dB. Do you see? The plain english RANGE of the signal you are dealing with has changed from 40dB to 46dB. You HAVE altered the range. Why do you say in the quote without altering the range? The range is NOT zero to 1000mV, it never was, and never will be. It is 10mV to 1000mv, then 5mV to 1000mV. The range changes when you change the noise level, that is why you would change the noise level, to increase the range. And look! The calculation for plain english RANGE is the same as the calculation of DYNAMIC RANGE! That is because they are the same thing here. The DR is, as I have said many times, a RANGE. It is not something else, it is a RANGE. Look at the definitions that you quote, it is a range. It is usually measured as a ratio, and usually quoted in dB. It is not a number of levels, or anything else, it is a range. It IMPLIES a number of levels, but it is NOT a number of levels, it is a range. The thinking that leads you to state that by changing the noise level you don't change the range is at the heart of this problem. It does change the range, and it must. And the true definition of DR is no different in maths from the definition of plain english range. You seem to have laid an unnecessary layer of additional complexity over all this, and the result is total confusion. I can see WHY you might like to do this, but I don't see how it is useful, and it is at variance with other usage. Here is what you (Austin) said in another response to me: Surely, you can understand that you can have two exact same ranges, with different noise? That can't be hard to understand? No I don't understand that because I most explicitly don't agree. By DEFINITION of the most basic kind, the range we are discussing here is from the smallest (noise in this case) to the largest. The RANGE we are discussing is noise to max signal. Change the noise and you change the range, so long as the smallest signal is noise which is usually the case. Arbitrary ranges are pointless, in particular zero does not exist, because it is not measurable or includable and we are not discussing it. The whole point of discussing the range is to specify the smallest signal and largest signal, it is NOT to choose two arbitrary points inside or outside those figures. The RANGE is the distance between the smallest signal and the largest signal. It is NOT measured from somewhere smaller than smallest signal, or zero or anywhere else. I repeat - Zero by definition is not in the range of (AC) signals we are taking about - because of noise. Noise not only always exists, it is at the heart of what we are discussing. I repeat - zero does not exist. That is usually the whole point of discussing signal ranges, to
[filmscanners] Re: Density vs Dynamic rangeAUSTIN (2)
Austin, Here is a labored sequence of points to which I would appreciate your response - maybe it'll help things. For others, this is about Dynamic Range or DR below. Here we go. Previously you promoted a definition of Dynamic Range by saying: the Dynamic Range equation out of Digital Signal Processing in VLSI: DR (dB) = 10log10(largest signal/smallest discernable signal) ..Eq(1) I have called this ... Equation(1) or Eq(1)] You quoted this, and you agreed with it. I too agree with this and it is standard in textbooks. 1) Do you still agree with this? Removing the logs we get DR (ratio) = largest signal/smallest discernable signal ...Eq(2) 2) Do you agree with Eq(2)? We were subsequently discussing a little example as follows: Julian: This example system for some reason has a noise of 1V, a smallest discernable signal of 2V and a largest signal of 10V. You often tell me that noise and smallest discernable signal are not necessarily the same thing and I agree with you. In this example they are different to make clear the distinction between all these values. Now, could you please substitute the relevant figures from our example into Eq(2)? I'll do it here: DR = largest signal/smallest discernable signal = 10/2 = 5 That is, the dynamic range of our example system is 5. 3) Do you agree with this? In responding to this example in a previous post, you said: Austin: DR = ((max - min) / noise) The absolute range is 10-2. so... (10 - 2) / 1 or 8 is the dynamic range. You calculated a dynamic range for the same example of 8. 4) Do you agree that 8 is different from 5? Your new equation for Dynamic Range that you used here is: DR = ((max - min) / noise) ...Eq(3) 5) Do you still agree with this? 6) Do you agree that Eq(2) and Eq(3) are different? 7) If you agree they are different, then this explains why you say the example dynamic range is 8 and the definition that is used by everybody else uses gives a dynamic range of 5. And thus you are agreeing that you are using a non-standard definition of dynamic range. 8) If you do not think they are different, will you please rewrite Eq(3) using the terminology that is used in Equation (2) - that is, rewrite your equation (3) in terms of the two quantities largest signal and smallest discernable signal? Do you agree this cannot be done? 9) Do you agree that the definition of dynamic range in the book (Eq(1)) does NOT contain any mention of value noise? 10) Do you agree that your personal definition of dynamic range (Eq(3)) DOES contain the value noise? 11) Do you agree that the definition of dynamic range in the book (Eq(1)) means that Dynamic Range is, in the general case, independent of noise? 12) Do you agree that your definition (Eq(3)) is always dependent on noise? 13) Do you agree that your definition (Eq(3)) is quite different from the book definition? I look forward to your response which must surely flush out where and why we have this very fundamental difference. Julian Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Density vs Dynamic range
Austin - of course RMS measurement applies to dynamic range. I think the fact that you say this points to where your view differs from the rest of the world, but I'm damned if I can work out how... Remember the definition from the book *you* posted and *you* agree with: the Dynamic Range equation out of Digital Signal Processing in VLSI: DR (dB) = 10log10(largest signal/smallest discernable signal) How exactly are you going to measure largest signal and smallest discernable signal? Most people would use RMS, or at least try to approach that with a mean measurement if they didn't have the true-RMS gear. Alternatively you could use peak measurements, but that is a bit tricky with the noise and you have to involve some statistical assumptions, and as Julian V says, sometimes it can change the results depending on your choice of peaks in the HiFi world where short term peaks can be a lot higher than sustainable peaks. Why on earth would you say RMS doesn't apply to dynamic range.? Julian R At 23:33 12/06/02, Austin wrote: SNR also is an RMS based measurements, and RMS doesn't apply to dynamic range. Julian V replied: Why not? I've seen quite a few designers and vendors use the above-described convention for specifying dynamic range. Consumer HiFi manufacturers have used other schemes, measuring the limits of their products to handle impulses or instantaneous signals. But usually these schemes are designed to generate more impressive numbers for advertisementss Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Density vs Dynamic range
Austin and Peter, I don't know which of you wrote this quote below, but it threw a big light bulb on above my head as to where part of the confusion comes from. If either of you really thinks this then it must be a complicated business to get into bed at night! ... This post has 3 sections, headings are: RANGE - discusses the confusion about range DYNAMIC - discusses the confusion about what dynamic means SCANNERS - applies dynamic range terminology and discusses the relationship between density and dynamic range. 1) RANGE *** At 03:06 12/06/02, you wrote: However my point is that if you can reduce the noise level then you can increase the number of steps (by halving the step size) with real benefit, but **without altering the range**. Correct, but that INCREASES the dynamic range. The asterisks are mine to draw attention to the problem. Here goes! Big breath... Put some numbers to the above. Let's say max signal is 1000mV and noise (or min signal) is 10mV at first. Then you reduce the noise level by half. So min is now 5mV. OK, so now use the plain English language definition of a range. In the first case, the RANGE of the usable / measurable / instrumentable signal is 10mV to 1000mV, or 100 to 1, or 40dB (volts remember, so 20log, not 10log). In the second case the RANGE of the signal is 5mV to 1000mV, or 200 to 1, or 46dB. Do you see? The plain english RANGE of the signal you are dealing with has changed from 40dB to 46dB. You HAVE altered the range. Why do you say in the quote without altering the range? The range is NOT zero to 1000mV, it never was, and never will be. It is 10mV to 1000mv, then 5mV to 1000mV. The range changes when you change the noise level, that is why you would change the noise level, to increase the range. And look! The calculation for plain english RANGE is the same as the calculation of DYNAMIC RANGE! That is because they are the same thing here. The DR is, as I have said many times, a RANGE. It is not something else, it is a RANGE. Look at the definitions that you quote, it is a range. It is usually measured as a ratio, and usually quoted in dB. It is not a number of levels, or anything else, it is a range. It IMPLIES a number of levels, but it is NOT a number of levels, it is a range. The thinking that leads you to state that by changing the noise level you don't change the range is at the heart of this problem. It does change the range, and it must. And the definition of DR is no different from the definition of plain english range. You seem to have laid an unnecessary layer of additional complexity over all this, and the result is total confusion. I can see WHY you might like to do this, but I don't see how it is useful, and it is at variance with other usage. Here is what you (Austin) said in another response to me: Surely, you can understand that you can have two exact same ranges, with different noise? That can't be hard to understand? No I don't understand that because I most explicitly don't agree. By DEFINITION of the most basic kind, the range we are discussing is from the smallest (noise) to the largest. The RANGE we are discussing is noise to max signal. Change the noise and you change the range. Zero does not exist, because it is not measurable or includable and we are not discussing it. The whole point of discussing the range is to specify the smallest signal and largest signal, it is NOT to choose two arbitrary points inside or outside those figures. The RANGE is the distance between the smallest signal and the largest signal. It is NOT measured from somewhere smaller than smallest signal, or zero or anywhere else. Zero by definition is not in the range of (AC) signals we are taking about - because of noise. Noise not only always exists, it is at the heart of what we are discussing. I repeat - zero does not exist. That is usually the whole point of discussing signal ranges, to see how close we can get our noise to zero. The upper limit is arbitrary and depends on gain, but this arbitrariness is neutralised by stating the RANGE as a ratio. Look Austin - we are discussing a situation in which we are trying to do something intelligent with a smallest measurable signal, and a largest measurable signal. So we use the concept of the RANGE. The range is the difference (or ratio if you want, it doesn't matter) between these two. It is not complicated, it is very very simple, and it is NOT ambiguous. It is NOT something else, and it is NOT up to you to specify arbitrary end points to some range and still expect that so-defined range to have any meaning. If you DO specify arbitrary end points, then you have thrown away the basic premise of your SIGNAL RANGE and you need to invent something else to get it back again. I think you do this and you call your newly defined range the Dynamic Range. But you DON'T need to do this. The actual range is inherent and unambiguous. Why do you
[filmscanners] Re: Scanning negs vs. slides
At 12:47 16/04/02, you wrote: On Mon, 15 Apr 2002 21:17:10 -0400 Petru Lauric ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: That's why usually a well exposed slide looks very rich, very dense. ... and Tony wrote: ...but you *can* produce scans from negs which look as saturated and punchy as scans from slides. Either way is just R, G B 0-255. With slide you discard a lot of image information at the shooting stage, with colour neg you defer those decisions until working on the scan and have a whole new degree of freedom not to mention endless second chances when you decide you got it wrong. Slide often forces you to sacrifice either shadow and/or highlight detail. With neg, you can if you wish retain both, by combining (say) an image which has good shadows and midtone separation but blown highlights, with one where you mask off the image apart from the highlights then adjust for those. This works absurdly well, is not difficult, and enables informal photography of subjects which would be impossible on tranny without an array of studio flash fill-in. Absolutely! to this. But I agree too with what Petru says, in my experience if you find a subject which is low contrast (studio lighting or landscapes at the right time of day are my examples) there is something about a slide that is particularly enticing - it is not only the lack of grain (compared with expanded neg grain) but also a tonal continuity or velvetiness or it might be a richness that I have never got from a neg (35mm). I can get my negs to be punchy and saturated and spectacular, but never that smoothness velvetiness or richness that a well exposed slide brings. But that said I use negs almost always, for the reasons Tony said here. Julian Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: JPEG Lossless mirror?
FWIW the following is from http://www.jpg.com/products/wizard.html It implies that normally you would introduce artifacts when doing a mirror and re-saving, but I think is claiming that with this technology you won't degrade the image at all. My guess is that it does have to clip to nearest 8 x 8 pixel block to do this because the boundaries of these blocks would have to change following a mirror, but this could be wrong. Julian RECOMPRESSION WITHOUT LOSS!* Recompress your JPEG files again and again without introducing generational image loss normally associated with recompressing JPEG files! Because of the underlying Pegasus technology, you can recompress, rotate or mirror JPEG images without introducing recompression artifacts! Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Building PC system for image editing
I would go further. It is true that this is not the place to have ongoing, overbearing discussions on the topic, but there are some reasons why the subject could be covered here: - Most of us are interested in the subject at one level or other. - The subject of 'system suitable for image editing' is to some extent exclusive to this kind of group. Specialist PC how-to-do-it groups would not have the same emphasis or even understanding of what is needed/best for imaging. People using their PCs for video, or at the other extreme, for word processing, may have quite different needs. - Given that most of us use computers for a specific purpose rather than being specialists in the things, most of us will be at a lower level of understanding than those on the specialist groups, so the discussion level is more likely to be appropriate to our needs. - We are all affected to some extent by the problem that every time we upgrade our machines the technology has moved on, so there are different questions to ask and different optimal price/performance points. The sort of discussion suggested will help us all to make sensible decisions. - The fact is that by definition we all own a computer which is used for our scanning, thus it is relevant to all of us and essential for all of us. To me this subject is as relevant as lighting or screen adjustment - which are discussed here. - I have looked at some of the computer sites suggested, and none has provided me with as efficient a background as I am sure could be gained on filmscanners if the knowledgeable ones were allowed to speak. Most of the sites tend to be obscure and forget to give the potted summaries (e.g. what is the story with RAM these days and what does it dictate in your purchase decision - in two pages?) that I need since I have not looked at the subject for nearly 2 years. - as always it is a pretty simple matter to delete or ignore these posts if not wanted. There are some very peripheral or detailed subjects that get discussed at enormous lengths on this list sometimes which I am sure are ignored by most subscribers. Meanwhile the very topics that interest me are flowing invisibly backchannel, thus forcing me to ask the same questions of maybe the same people at a later time. Unless Tony has violently objected in the past I for one would like to see such discussion in public so I can learn about this essential aspect of filmscanning. Just another opinion, from someone who doesn't have time to participate in every discussion but reads most of them and learns a lot as a result. Julian At 20:23 14/01/02, you wrote: Although I would agree that this forum is probably not the place to have this discussion publicly, and I also agree that the websites you suggest provide some useful information, I do think that someone wishing to tap into the knowledge base and expertise of the members of this group in regard to computer systems for image editing is being wise, as there are some people here who have extensive knowledge in computer building and have likely suffered some of the pains of making bad component choices, which they can help Alex avid. I would therefore suggest that people wanting to further discuss this matter with Alex, simply bring it into private mail, so Alex can benefit from that knowledge without offending or annoying people who are not interested in this topic. Art Jawed Ashraf wrote: Alex, the nature of your questions shows that you have significant gaps in your understanding of the products available. This list is *not* the place for you to fill in your knowledge. I suggest you spend time reading sites like www.anandtech.com www.tomshardware.com And then use www.deja.com to find newsgroups that are dedicated to the questions you have. Jawed Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
[filmscanners] Re: Tips needed on difficult scan Stan
Ah I just saw Maris's reply which makes mine a trifle redundant. To answer this query though... - select the top layer - Layer/Add layer mask/Reveal all (or use icon at bottom of layers palette) - paint with black on the white mask with soft-edged brushes to see parts of the bottom image you want - you can paint with white to undo or fine tune what you did with the last step, and use white or black or grays for further correction or fine tuning. - when finished, flatten the image. There are other variations on layer masking. Layer masks are the most useful thing I have discovered in PS (I am sure there is plenty more yet though. As Woody Allen points out, the autodidactic always has huge holes in his knowledge ) Julian At 09:45 08/01/02, you wrote: Maris, Having layered two such images, I am not clear how to blend them. I have a similar situation in which shadow detail is lost in many small regions of the image. I tried layering the dark on the light and erasing parts of the dark layer where I wanted the shadow detail to show through. Is that what you meant? Stan -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, January 07, 2002 9:58 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [filmscanners] Re: Tips needed on difficult scan Try making 2 scans - one optimized for the highlights and one for the dark area, and then layer them. Maris On Sat, 05 Jan 2002 00:01:17 -0800 Ken Durling wrote: http://www.photo.net/shared/community-member?user_id=402251 -- -- Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
Re: filmscanners: Upgrading from NikonScan 2.5 to NikonScan 3.1
In this case as Nikon advise, you do have to uninstall 2.5 first and run regsweep before installing ver 3. I did this with Win98-nearly-SE (Win98 non-SE with all service packs) and had no probs. Julian At 17:19 20/12/01, you wrote: I am upgrading the NikonScan software for my LS2000 from version 2.5 to 3.1. I have firmware version 1.31. Are there any special procedures/gotchas/tricks that I should be aware of as I go about upgrading the S/W? I have Win98 SE. Thanks very much, Gaspar
Re: filmscanners: VueScan 7.2.11 Available
At 19:55 04/12/01, Rob wrote: bubble shaped. If you measured the focus at the edge of the frame you would be in the wrong place. If the curve is bubble shaped, ISTM the best place would be halfway between the center and one corner. I am really not doing well here. One last go, altho I realise I am speaking largely to empty space... I too now use the film strip holder all the time except for very unimportant stuff. Even for bubble shaped slides, if you look at the way the film curves, the mean focus position occurs at a location approximately 1/8th of film width from the top or bottom (in landscape) edge. Not at the edge, but 3/4 of the way towards the edge travelling from the centre. This position occurs because the curve is relatively flat at the centre and accentuates curl towards the edge. Now you can also measure this focus mean position at a location away from the centre towards the corner, as Ed is doing. My point, and I was only trying to be helpful to Ed, was that by going towards the corner you will generate focus errors if the slide/neg has a front-to-back position bias as it does under several situations: - when using the SA20 auto strip feeder which some people do some of the time - when your scanner is misaligned as mine is (no fault found from Maxwell service) - when at the end frame of a longitudinally curled strip, even when using the manual film strip holder. What I was trying to say, and this is my last go, was that you can find the mean focus distance somewhere along what I call the y axis, that is the line through the centre of the film, perpendicular to the long axis. You don't need to go off centre in the longitudinal dimension (i.e towards the corners), and indeed by doing so you can introduce unwanted errors. On the web page, I do show the measurements for the manual strip holder as well as the SA20, and you can see that my manual holder still is not holding the film parallel front to back, although it is better than the SA20 by a mile. BTW you can speed up the scanning process significantly by purchasing a second film strip holder - so you can be inserting the next film strip while the previous one is scanning. I do this and it is quite useful, much less time sitting frustratedly looking at the progress bar! Cheers, Julian At 19:55 04/12/01, you wrote: Julian Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I must not have explained myself well. I understand that the problem is bowed film - I have a web page devoted to the issue. OK, but having reviewed your web page, you're only talking about colour negative strips in the motorised SA20 adapter. The way the adapter operates - pulling the strip the whole way in to measure the number of frames, then feeding it back out when you scan frame 1 - tends to make the end of the strip curl longitudinally. What this means for me in practice is I get a scan which is 3/4 in focus and 1/4 out of focus at one end. This is the *only* kind of noticeable problem I've had with DOF and my LS30, and only if I have film that is curled before I put it in the scanner, or I leave it too long so that that the heat of the scanner makes the plastic remember its curl. I am only saying that while it seems intuitively that a diagonal offset from the centre should be best, I think that in practice an offset along the y axis, not far from the top or bottom edge is a better choice. In the case of longitudinal curl of an unmounted strip, I agree. But AFAICR this discussion about DOF problems began with people who had curved *slides* in old mounts, especially cardboard ones, which would be a hassle to remount. In a mounted slide, the curve (in my experience - YMMV) is bubble shaped. If you measured the focus at the edge of the frame you would be in the wrong place. If the curve is bubble shaped, ISTM the best place would be halfway between the center and one corner. I avoided this whole issue with film strips by using the film strip holder, but it is painfully slow to use. The IA20 APS adapter doesn't seem to have the problems with curling that the SA20 does. Your focussing measurements may have been affected by the amount of time it would have taken to do. As I mentioned above, I find the film curl tends to increase the longer the film strip is in the scanner. I can understand Ed not wanting to provide a point and click method of determining the focal position when few scanners support it - Vuescan supports an awful lot of scanners! Perhaps one idea would be to have a drop down list with at least three options - center, diagonal, edge. Obviously the options should only appear when the scanner supports setting the focal position. The problem with offset is which direction? When I've seen the curl problem, it has been the end frame of a strip, and the curl is closest to the end. This could happen at *both* ends of a strip, but I think it mainly happens at the front end of frame 1 because that is the part
Re: filmscanners: VueScan 7.2.11 Available
At 03:44 04/12/01, Ed wrote: * Changed Nikon focus point from center of scanned area to 1/3 of the way from upper left corner (works better for bowed film) This is a very good idea! For people using the motorised feeder this may cause a different problem though, bec the strip feeder on some machines (mine anyway) is misaligned front to back. That is, the leading edge of the film is closer to the scan head than the trailing edge. To avoid biasing the focus point away from one end or the other, in this sutuation the focus point needs to be on the y axis. An alternative would be to put the focus point about 1/8th of the film width from the top or bottom edge (in the middle in the long dimension). I have found this gives the closer to the average focus point and does not give a bias to one end or the other. I can't see any actual advantage in putting the focus point towards a corner rather than just near the top or bottom edge. Julian R
filmscanners: VueScan 7.2.11 Available
I must not have explained myself well. I understand that the problem is bowed film - I have a web page devoted to the issue. I am only saying that while it seems intuitively that a diagonal offset from the centre should be best, I think that in practice an offset along the y axis, not far from the top or bottom edge is a better choice. If you look at the measurementsof film warped-ness on said site http://members.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/ls2000-focus.htm you will see that a focus location about where I suggested is a better average in some cases and at least as good in other cases. In other words, the suggested location would be a better general solution, IMO. The problem that I am trying to avoid is when the film is not parallel to the scanning plane in the longitudinal direction, as happens on my scanner and at least one other person who contacted me. It also occurs when the longitudinal distortion caused by the motorised feeder curling the film into the back of the scanner causes an asymmetrical front-to-back slope in the film. My suggestion was that the offset towards the diagonal has no advantage over an offset in y only, and has a positive disadvantage in some circumstances. Julian R (who notes regarding above page address that for the 2nd time in 6 months my ISP has collapsed today (Austar this time) and so I'll have to change again! I can really pick them). At 15:13 04/12/01, you wrote: Julian wrote: I can't see any actual advantage in putting the focus point towards a corner rather than just near the top or bottom edge. Because the main headache with focussing has been bowed slides which form a kind of dome shape? A sensible average point would be halfway along a diagonal between the center and one corner. Using the motorised feeder with curled strips of film could be problematic depending on which end of the frame is curled. :( In this situation I'd think the best option would be to use the center focus point since about 3/4 of the frame should be flat. The only real solution for curled film is the flim strip holder. If only the feeder held the film flat! Rob Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wordweb.com
Re: filmscanners: Replacement of Nikon LS-30: LS-40 or LS-2000 (especially as to clipped negative highlights)?
I can only answer for the LS2000 - to confirm: a) my perception of the blown highlights and its cure is exactly as you stated it, b) even with LS3.1 which I use on my LS2000, the option for lo-contrast neutral is still there, so I think it would meet your needs. c) having asked this kind of question before here, several LS40/4000 owners did say that the lo-contrast neutral option is not there, but equally I don't think I have heard these people complaining about blown highlights. I'd imagine that you can now only get 2nd hand LS2000s, which would be considerably cheaper than a new LS40? BTW I emailed Nikon in Australia about exactly this question (how does the LS40/4000 handle the blown highlights problem) and you can guess their totally useless reply - what blown highlights?, we have many satisfied users and no-one has ever complained ... blah blah Julian At 23:04 02/12/01, you wrote: Hi everybody, sorry for the long-winded subject. My LS-30 has just quit service, very likely beyond what I'd consider worth while a repair. I have been planning for another unit anyway, so the point is just that I have to make up my mind a little earlier than I thought. The LS-2000 and the LS-40 come into mind as for replacement (I want a Nikon again, no debate on that issue please ;-)). I would gladly go for the new LS-40 if there wasn't an issue as follows: My LS-30, when scanning negatives with Nikon Scan (and no, I don't want a debate on using Vuescan either :-)), would inexorably produce blown out highlights if the factory settings were used. The only way out was a well hidden menu item called prescan mode which had to be set to lo-cont neutral instead of auto after which the highlights would be perfect. The problem is that this special menu item is said to have gone in Nikon Scan 3.x which would be needed for the LS-40, with the problem of blown highlights being there with no apparent remedy. Any of the LS-40 users here capable of reporting about that issue? The LS-2000, I understand, is more expensive, has weaker ICE and less resolution in comparison to the LS-40, so the highlight thing would most likely be the only obstacle. Any thoughts? TIA, have a nice Sunday - Ralf -- My animal photo page on the WWW: http://schmode.net Find my PGP keys (RSA and DSS/DH) on PGP key servers (use TrustCenter certified keys only)
Re: filmscanners: Replacement of Nikon LS-30: LS-40 or LS-2000(especially as to clipped negative highlights)?
I see you are in Oz, so better say that I only got a reply after I spoke to them by phone, and told them that I had NOT got a reply previously. And I was only speaking to them by phone because I had one of their scanners on my desk (i.e. they owned it, mine was here as well) and thus they had a vested interest in making contact. Like all organisations Maxwell have good and bad people but so far I have only struck one good one. As a responsive helpful organisation, they are appalling. Julian At 11:10 03/12/01, Rob wrote: Julian Robinson wrote: BTW I emailed Nikon in Australia about exactly this question (how does the LS40/4000 handle the blown highlights problem) and you can guess their totally useless reply - what blown highlights?, we have many satisfied users and no-one has ever complained ... blah blah And you got a reply!! They are not very accommodating as an agency for Nikon. And now we have to send Polaroid stuff to them for repair. Rob
RE: filmscanners: Nikonscan and dual processors
This is a very unpopular point of view, but my thoughts exactly. I try, I upgrade, I mess around for a while finding out what has changed, I lose a scan or two due to overwriting or wrong settings, I do a perfect scan and find it is no better than I get from Nikonscan with much less effort and time. I go back to Nikonscan... Like you I reserve it for an alternative approach in rare cases and sometimes on these occasions it is excellent. I do like Ed's version of ROC that is useful since I don't have it otherwise. Julian At 16:03 22/11/01, Jawed wrote: So, nowadays I reserve Vuescan for occasional use to give me an alternative point of view on a difficult image. This happens once in, erm, a few hundred images. I have a shot of the moon which it rescued - terrible picture but of academic interest. I'm disappointed with Vuescan. Sometimes I give my opinion a reality check (e.g. with an upgrade of Vuescan) but I just can't get results I like. I think Vuescan is for the forensic photographers. I like that concept.
Re: filmscanners: Negs vs slides again: was Color Negative Film Poll
That's interesting - I got my figures by looking at the characteristic curves of some Kodak films - see for example http://www.kodak.com/global/en/consumer/products/techInfo/e2509/e2509.shtml (royal gold 400) and comparing with some slide film - see for example http://www.kodak.com/global/en/professional/support/techPubs/e163/e163.shtml (PROFESSIONAL EKTACHROME Film E100VS). I looked at the characteristic curves, and the exposure density range on the bottom axis corresponding to a more-or-less linear part of the curve. For slides I got a density range (log) about 1.6 and for negs around 3.3 corresponding to just over 5 stops and 11 stops respectively. Perhaps in your measurements you went beyond the linear part of the curve, which is valid if you can still see the difference. This fits with the given curve because 7 stops corresponds to a log density range of 2,1 which is in fact the range given on the curve when you include the more curved parts at the end. You should have noticed some compression at the limits, and from the curve I am looking at, a tendency to red at the extreme dark end. On the same basis you'd get 12 stops out of neg film. I was told at my recent classes by a pro that slides had a range of 4 stops, and negs 7 stops which are the figures he used in his zone thinking. Perhaps he was being conservative and allowing for inaccurate exposure. I cheerfully admit to not really understanding the zone system, but I can well understand the simple concept of a 5, 7, ... 11 stop range and how to fit what you want out of a particular high contrast scene onto your film with a spot meter. Julian Regards, Julian At 15:52 23/11/01, you wrote: I think the brightness range of transparency films has improved a lot over that. 15 years ago, I ran some zone type tests with transparency (EXTACHROME should any one care). Essentially, I metered a evenly lit, evenly toned surface ( a gray garage door for me back then). The meter wants to reproduce this as ZONE 5. I then did a range of under and overexposures, in half stop increments. You want to learn three things: 1) does your meter reproduce this image as 18 % gray (Zone 5). 2) when do things get as white as they can get (film base + fog) 3) when do things get as black as they can get (max D) What I learned was that I needed to boost film speed by a third of a stop, and that EXTACHROME had a range of 7 stops. I was able to use that information to shoot effectively. I then stopped shooting for a couple of years as I had small children and they left little time for creative activities. I picked up my cameras again in earnest, 2 years ago. As film stocks have changed a lot, I repeated the same tests on both KODAK and FUJI emulsions. I was surprised to learn that the film speeds were now more accurate for my camera, and that I was getting a 10 stop range out of both emulsions. I have never run these tests on color negative stock, so I can't vouch for their performance. I know that I went through a lot of grief trying to come up with a black and white negative film combination that worked for me to get a 10 stop range (TRI-X at EI 250 in HC-110 and ELITE paper). Out of the box standards for both KODAK and ILFORD gave me film that was underexposed, and with a 9 stop range. My point is that you need to test the films that you use to determine what the reponse curve is for your camera and your color lab. Once you know that, you can make great technical images (creative images is another matter). I personally, tend to shoot transparency stock. It make it easier for me to organize things. Transparencies are denser than negatives, so I would expect that to make them grainier, but that has not been proven to me. Film is so much faster and finer grained today than 20 years ago. I have not reviewed any Zone System books in a long time. I always had a hard time with Ansel Adams writing, Minor White was a lot easier to read. It is not just a technique for working with BW negative technology (although that does give you the most control). It is applicable to colog negative, color transparency, BW transparency, and digital cameras too. - Original Message - From: Bernie Kubiak [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, November 22, 2001 9:12 AM Subject: Re: filmscanners: Negs vs slides again: was Color Negative Film Poll Being new to the group, I've missed previous discussions. Thanks for the info and broadening my perspective (by about 6 stops)! - Original Message - From: Julian Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, November 22, 2001 12:35 AM Subject: filmscanners: Negs vs slides again: was Color Negative Film Poll The bigger question is why shoot print film if you're going to scan the images? This has been covered before, but I just decided to check my facts by looking at the characteristic curves for representative
filmscanners: Negs vs slides again: was Color Negative Film Poll
The bigger question is why shoot print film if you're going to scan the images? This has been covered before, but I just decided to check my facts by looking at the characteristic curves for representative Kodak films. These curves demonstrate admirably the main reason you might choose to shoot with negative film over slide... simply, you can capture a LOT more of the scene brightness range with neg film. - Slide films capture a range about 5 stops max. - Neg films capture a range about 11 stops!! You can't print this whole range of 11 stops directly, but one of the great advantages of scanning is that you can process the image to restore as much of this range as you want if you are prepared to do a bit of work. I do this regularly to improve reproduction of my high-contrast scenes. It is precisely BECAUSE I am scanning my images that I choose negs. At least if you have the info on film, you can access it somehow, if not, (as in slides) it is gone forever. I agree though that a well-exposed flatly lit scene on slide is a beautiful and satisfying thing, but most of real life is not flatly lit, certainly not limited to 4 or 5 stops range. And I agree that grain is more of a problem with negs than slides, especially when underexposed when it can be completely unacceptable. These other advantages of the slide probably make it the best choice in studio work where you have complete control over lighting, but for travel and other more spontaneous work, this amateur anyway would choose neg films every time. Julian At 23:05 21/11/01, Bernie wrote: The bigger question is why shoot print film if you're going to scan the images? I shoot chromes for most of my color work. You have an original image for reference, can use Ilfochrome, reversal or an inteneg, if you want to print conventionally and scanning is more straightforward with a slide. Provia 100 and 400 are my favorites.
Re: filmscanners: Canon 4000 scanner VS Nikon LS4000 Mikael
Mikael - thanks for this useful info. It is interesting that the different generations of scanners have the same depth of field although they have totally different optics. Means that Nikon must be holding a firm line against other constraints (such as LED brightness). Cheers Julian At 20:14 19/11/01, you wrote: Its the same problem with my 2 scanners ls2000 and Ls 4000 regarding sharpness/ dept of field problem. If you are pleased with your Ls2000 stay with it and wait and se what's coming. The difference between LS2000 and a extrapol. picture from 2700ppi up to 4000 ppi and real 4000 ppi from Ls 4000 are not huge. In fact I have done some test pictures and asked other photographers which one are a 2700ppi picture from the beginning. No one could se and tell for sure the difference from the 2 scanners, Fuji 100ISO slide film and 30 x 40 cm copies . The noice is lower and colors are better in LS4000 than LS2000. Best regards Mikael Risedal
Re: filmscanners: Canon 4000 scanner VS Nikon LS4000
At 9:44 AM -0500 20-11-01, Bruce Kinch wrote: Perhaps it's worth noting that Kodak now provides curved field projection lenses as standard for normal (cardboard, presumably) mounted slides in their Carousel projectors, but their older flat field design is recommended for glass mounted transparencies. BF: If memory serves correctly this has been the case at least since the 1970's. Curved field lenses were standard, and flat field lenses were special orders. YES! I have wondered why Nikon don't do the same thing within the range of their scanner Depth of Field. It would nearly double warping that could be tolerated before losing focus. The only downside is that you would have to put the film/slide in the right way round regarding film curve, not regarding mirror image sense. This would not be a problem if documented clearly. Julian
Re: filmscanners: Pixels per inch vs DPI
Whatever works for each of us I guess. I was trying to point out that printer dots are not relevant to anything that I actually deal with (as in, I don't have to decide on what dpi to set, or allow for it, or even know what it is, to get 'proper' results - apart from as a specification on the day I make my purchase decision (and if you assume that integer relationships are not important with recent printers). I understand that a group of dots make a pixel via dither etc, but my point is that it is not something that you need to or should wrestle with when scanning and printing. Samples per inch at scan time IMHO only confuses the issue - even if I do oversample the result is still a pixel so ppi is still the correct description. From that point on - image processing and printing, it is still a pixel - so for me, call it a pixel at scan time, call it a pixel all the time. The other point I was making has been made by many others, and that is that the only important thing to *track* is the pixel dimensions of the image - trying to track ppi as you work from scanning (2700 ppi) to screen (96/72/100ppi) to printing (300ppi) only makes things complex unnecessarily. So I scan at 2700ppi bec that is my scanner's native resolution, without worrying about any output parameters or sizes. I process in PS without thinking about ppi. WHen I come to print, I resample in PS using the image size box and set an image dimension to suit. Of course I have to check that the resulting ppi is a sensible one, but apart from that don't think it serves any purpose to even think about ppi at other times. I believe most people actually do more or less the same, but lots of complex suggestions pop out when people try to help others on the dreaded dpi/ppi subject which I don't find useful myself. Everybody's MMV! Julian At 11:05 26/10/01, you wrote: I like Maris' terms. Differentiation is important at least because a 1440 dpi printer doesn't print 1440 pixels per inch. It prints dots per inch and a mosaic of dots is required to render an image pixel. With scanners, saying samples per inch tends to suggest samples within the optical resolution of the scanner, although 'over sampling' is a term known in the science of digital signal processing that relates to creating artificial samples using interpolation of actual samples. Raster displays have always been described in terms of pixels, as have raster imaging applications, such as Photoshop. Wire Moore
Re: filmscanners: OT: edible CDs?
I was captivated by this, and slightly relieved when they issued a request at the end of the program for any examples that viewers might have if they thought they might be the victim of cd-eating fungus (CEF). THe fact that they had to ask means it can't be horribly common, which is good news. Julian At 12:47 26/10/01, you wrote: Off topic, but this was an interesting story aired on an ABC (Australian Broadcasting Commission) science program last night. http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/s400527.htm Given the recent debate in this group about the longevity of various types of media, a CD-eating fungus could rethink our archiving strategies. Yuri.
Re: filmscanners: Pixels per inch vs DPI
Everyone has their own points of confusion and moments of comparative clarity, but this is one discussion about which I have never understood the confusion. I use pixels for everything. Everything that is relevant to me, I mean. The pixels I get out of the scanner becomes the same number of pixels when I work in PS, and is the same number of pixels on screen, and (unless I resample) will be the same number of pixels when I print it. The pixels per inch is only of interest at those moments when I want to transfer from my digital image to a physical sized image or vice versa, and its calculation is straightforward. It seems that thinking of the pixels more than the ppi is much more efficient. I have seen people totally tied in knots trying to fathom how to print their 36x24mm 2700ppi image onto 7x5 paper at 300ppi, but thinking of it as 3800x2500 pixels means the whole thing is straightforward. The tagging of images with ppi figures in PS and other software is an unnecessary confusion - I think it should never be mentioned unless the context at that time is one of transfer to a specific physical sized medium. Even then the ppi should only be mentioned with a kind of flashing red-arrow link to the image size that is implied by that ppi. The fact that the printer happens to separate colors and dither and re-present the image as a greater number of 4 or 6-colour dots is of no significance to me so I ignore it. I suppose it would be different if I needed to understand the printing process, but even then the concept of printer dots does not seem confusing because it is such a different thing from the pixels that the image is stored as. 1440 dpi is an internal printer spec that has no relevance to me other than to define - once- the likely resolution performance of the printer. It is not something I have to work with or calculate with, so I ignore it. And I don't understand the advantage in differentiating between scanner pixels and screen pixels or any other pixel - just makes things more complex? Julian At 15:37 23/10/01, you wrote: I use these terms: Scanner - spi - (scan) samples per inch Monitor - ppi - pixels per inck Printer - dpi - dots (of ink) per inch I think this came from Dan Margulis's Professional Photoshop Maris - Original Message - From: Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, October 22, 2001 8:45 PM Subject: filmscanners: Pixels per inch vs DPI
RE: filmscanners: Nikon film flatness (was Glass slide mounts)
Do Nikon make glass holders for the LS2000? I have never had this suggested to me by Nikon, but this may be because in Australia we are several light years away from the manufacturer and thus accurate information. Julian At 10:23 21/10/01, you wrote: Nikon make and sell glass holders for their scanners, so... You pay your money and you makes your choice...
Re: filmscanners: Bruce Fraser Reviews Nikon 4000ED
Wire - I enjoyed your review of a review - some meaty kiblets for thought. I too become totally frustrated by reviewers who play it safe to the extent that you can't tell whether it is a good bit of gear or bad. I think more often it is because they are not sure enough of their own ground (and don't want to invoke ire from anywhere including the manufacturer for mistaken comments) than kowtowing directly to supplier / advertiser pressure. But maybe not. Julian At 11:07 04/10/01, Wire Moore wrote: I'm not at all hostile to the 4000 ED. It's just a piece of gear. I used a LS-2000 for a few years and found it to be very effective. I'm sure the 4000 ED is an improvement. Bruce likes it; I think... ? I couldn't tell from his review! My intention was primarily to challenge someone else's comment about the Creative Pro article being a good review. I thought others would be more interested in my position if I backed it up with some thoughts and observations. Wire on 10/3/01 1:16 PM, PAUL GRAHAM at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I've read both his comments and Wire Moores, and the truth is somewhere in between. his are written for a major magazine readership, yours, if you will excuse me, seem quite hostile to the 4000.
RE: filmscanners: VueScan 7.1.17 Available
. I've played with all the Vuescan settings for HOURS and HOURS, but I just can't seem to get a nice, rich scan without dragging it in to Photoshop. I've also had the same problems with over brightness, but have been able to work around that issue as you and some of the other posters have suggested. Any advice/explanations on what I might be doing wrong would be appreciated. There is nearly always a problem - at least with negs - in... a) scanning to get the whole range (output looks very low contrast) vs ... b) getting good contrast (end up having to chop off highlights or shadows to achieve this). Normal print processing invariably chops shadows and/or highlights to give a pleasing print. Unless your neg is exceptionally low-contrast (evenly lit) image, you will have this problem in scanning. If you choose small white point and black point settings you will get the full histogram range and a very 'flat' image. This happens no matter whether you use Vuescan or any other software, except that most manufacturer softwares use quite gross black point/white point settings to give a more pleasing contrast result. Since Vuescan gives you full control over this, you can set low BP WP settings, and this will give the flat result you speak of. To demonstrate if this is in fact the problem, you could try setting a much higher black point, say 5% or more, and see if this helps. (based on your saying the image is light). Or try both BP and WP to a much higher value. If this gives you 'better' results then at least you now know the reason! Julian
Re: filmscanners: RE: filmscanners: Nikon Scan VS Negative dynamic rang e
Thanks guys - I knew this! Actually I think I did - even had the terms right - but from memory couldn't get it to work as I expected (I am talking maybe 6 months ago) so decided I just didn't understand it at all. Maybe it is the problem you (Rob) mention here, or maybe my finger trouble. I do try with Vuescan every now and again, and it does (as I said) give me some good results - sometimes. I tried it with colour restoration the other day and it wasn't half bad considering it doesn't work at a film level as I read ROC does. I was quite impressed and even though it required a bit of PS work after, it was much better than my skills could have managed with PS alone. I might post this example on my website because the slide was quite badly faded and purple (Agfa 40 years old) but came up at least with reasonable colour, even if grainy. Julian At 15:20 26/09/01, you wrote: Julian wrote: I think Ed would make it much more user friendly if the exposure algorithm automatically applied a buffer which blanks out the outer 10% of the image from exposure calculations. That's what the border and buffer settings are for. But as mentioned recently there are some cases where excluding the neg mask may result in awful exposures where the mask has not been removed correctly. Rob Rob Geraghty [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wordweb.com
RE: filmscanners: Nikon Scan VS Negative dynamic range
Alex At 23:01 25/09/01, you wrote: I could try Vuescan and see if the white/black point settings actually work at scan phase, looking at the raw file (if this worked, it would also give me the benefit of 10 bits). I haven't had much luck with Vuescan until now, but the latest release, which claims better results with negatives and more accuracy in the preview, is surely worth a try. I would try this - I really have a lot of difficulties with Vuescan, but it DOES seem to work much of the time, and if I had the LS30 I'd use it by default as Rob does. That 10bits is apparently a real 10bits, and the black and white points do work IME. There is sometimes a confusing problem though and that is it seems to get confused around the edges of the frame and will use the unexposed portion of the image in its black/white point measurement which is not very useful. It seems that the cropping is not very accurate. I think Ed would make it much more user friendly if the exposure algorithm automatically applied a buffer which blanks out the outer 10% of the image from exposure calculations. Julian
RE: filmscanners: Nikon Scan VS Negative dynamic range
Alex - glad it helped - I was beginning to wonder if anyone read any of this. About the combing, are you using 12-bit? I always scan in 12-bit and I have not noticed this being a problem except for outrageous manipulations (which I must admit I seem to need too much of the time). I presume you do this too. If some of yours only cover half the histogram range then things are getting squeezed a bit. I agree it would be nice to get more control over scan contrast, but AFAIK there is absolutely no way of setting the white and black points to 0 which is really what we want to do. Pre-scan I mean, not post-processing. I wrote to Nikon about this, they (Nikon USA) directed me to Australia Nikon, who won't answer my emails. Surprise! Julian At 18:56 24/09/01, you wrote: Julian, thanks for the VERY useful information - I had missed this contrast setting, too. This is really a saver on most images, and I find that it also definitely improves color balance, not only contrast. The only drawback is that often the resulting histogram is very narrow (sometimes it covers only about half the available range), and so you get the infamous combing as soon as you touch levels or curves to increase the contrast a bit. I'd really like to have a continuous control, rather than three fixed values, for contrast. There is, of course, the Contrast slider, but I understand from your post that this is just another post-scan tool, and therefore not as effective. Alex Pardi -Original Message- From: Julian Robinson [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: venerdì 7 settembre 2001 06.44 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: Nikon Scan VS Negative dynamic range OK mystery solved at last. I looked at the manual for the first time (which must say something about ease of use of NS3.1!) and there it is - Lo-contrast is a facility only available on the LS2000 and the LS30. I attach the relevant page so that you can see (as a GIF 30k, I hope this doesn't exceed our list limit but I am sure it'll be chopped into bits and dropped into the sinners bin if so) . snip Incidentally, the manual also includes an excellently informative flow chart (p109) to show where different bits of processing are done, something I always wanted in the LS2000 manual, and something I never understood till now. This shows that the only adjustments that take effect at the scan level (as opposed to post-processing) are Scanner Extras functions, ICE and Analogue gain. Of these the only ones which affect exposure are 'Analogue gain' and 'prescan lo-contrast' so these are two very important functions. To lose the latter with the recent scanners is a bad move IMHO and means - use Vuescan. Unless there is something I've missed.
Re: Nikon filmscanners: LS-40/4000 without lo-cont prescan settings? Usable for negatives?
Ralf, Your experience is mine exactly. As I said in my post a couple of days ago, the Nikonscan 3 manual definitely says that lo-cont is available on the older scanners only LS2000/30. Not available on the LS4000 / 40. I don't know if this means you get blown highlights with them, or whether they think they have fixed the problem some other way. I am waiting on an answer to this from Nikon and hopefully Jack ASF Phipps. Cheers, Julian At 18:37 09/09/01, you wrote: Hi everybody, sorry for the long-winded subject. My inbox file crashed some days ago, but I remember this issue to have been dealt with in a previous thread. However, I think it is so serious that I found it worth starting a thread on its own. So, here we go: When I bought my LS-30, I first found it impossible to get decent highlights out of negatives with Nikon Scan 2.0 and later 2.5. They would inexorably produce blown-out highlights, no matter what the color management, auto adjust and analog gain settings were. Vuescan would fix the problem but, with its poor implementation of ICE, not allow me to scan my old negatives properly. By accident, after some days of frustration, I found a menu called prescan mode in the scanner extras section and tried alternative instead of normal (NS 2.5 and later: lo-cont instead of auto) and just couldn't believe my eyes because this well-hidden menu item was the one that brought my LS-30 to usability, which meant no blown highlights whatsoever. Now, I remember from the messages I lost that this menu item has been cancelled with the LS-40 as well as the LS-4000. Is this really true and, if yes, does it mean the return of blown out highlights without any remedy? 95% of my animal pictures are on negative film, and my LS-30 won't last forever. Will I have to get another LS-30 then, or a LS-2000, instead of one of the newer models in order to get good negative scans? I am really confused because the LS-30 won't be available forever, neither will the LS-2000. I am even thinking of getting another unit although my present one works fine, just in case it breaks down some day and all those LS-40 and LS-4000 come with those built-in blown-out highlights. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Greetings from Germany - Ralf -- My animal photo page on the WWW: http://schmode.net Find my PGP keys (RSA and DSS/DH) on PGP key servers (use TrustCenter certified keys only)
Re: filmscanners: Canon FS2710
I agree with the need to capture entire tonal range, but don't agree with your belief that this cannot be done with Nikonscan. Have you tried Scanner Extras / Prescan mode / low cont neutral? (on negs only I think) Julian At 13:19 06/09/01, Maris wrote: There is no set answer one way or the other to this question - it's whatever works best for you. I use VueScan myself rather than NikonScan for my LS-30. I prefer to capture the entire tonal range by setting white and black points where appropriate or even outside that to be certain I capture it all, and selecting the film type setting as appears best and, if necessary, adjust the brightness and gamma numbers, and then to do all level, curve and other such color correction work in Photoshop where the tools are much more useful than even in NikonScan and the image much larger and appears as it should on a calibrated monitor with working space color selected. Maris
RE: filmscanners: Nikon Scan VS Negative dynamic range
Have you tried Scanner Extras / Prescan mode / low cont neutral? Julian At 09:44 06/09/01, you wrote: It is very simple: NS decides to clip a neg scan if the dynamic range encoded in the neg is more than a certain amount. I don't know what this amount is, but I can demonstrate a very strong difference between NS and Vuescan in this respect with shots on Supra 400. No amount of adjustment to NS's master or R, G, B light output levels solves this problem - you can tweak the output levels to choose which you'd rather lose (shadows or highlights) but you cannot get the full range of such a neg with NS. Maybe older versions are different. I write this with respect to NS3.0 and 3.1 working with my LS40. (Hoping I haven't grabbed the wrong end of the stick.) Jawed
RE: filmscanners: Nikon Scan VS Negative dynamic range
I have NS 3.1, and on my system there is a tool palette called Scanner Extras. If you open this, there is a setting called Prescan Mode which you can set to Low cont neutral (or hi key or lo key). But note that this setting only appears if you have Negative selected rather than Positive for your film type - IOW it is not available for slides. Maybe you were set to slides the day you looked in there. I was mystified for quite some time because I thought I saw it... then I didn't... then... It reduces the contrast of the scan, so that the whole histogram will fit into the available range which is how I like it - then into PS in 16 bits and reshape from there. Julian At 22:36 06/09/01, you wrote: I've never seen these options in Nikon Scan 3.0/3.1. Where should I be looking (I can be blind like this sometimes)? Jawed = Original Message From Julian Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] = Have you tried Scanner Extras / Prescan mode / low cont neutral? Julian At 09:44 06/09/01, you wrote: It is very simple: NS decides to clip a neg scan if the dynamic range encoded in the neg is more than a certain amount. I don't know what this amount is, but I can demonstrate a very strong difference between NS and Vuescan in this respect with shots on Supra 400. No amount of adjustment to NS's master or R, G, B light output levels solves this problem - you can tweak the output levels to choose which you'd rather lose (shadows or highlights) but you cannot get the full range of such a neg with NS. Maybe older versions are different. I write this with respect to NS3.0 and 3.1 working with my LS40. (Hoping I haven't grabbed the wrong end of the stick.) Jawed
Re: filmscanners: Nikon Scan VS Negative dynamic range
Hmm - maybe this is one of those things that Nikon withheld from LS30 / LS40 (I have the LS2000). I dunno, if this is the case it is unnecessary, but a good reason to buy the more expensive scanner versions, or alternatively to buy Vuescan. Surprise Surprise! If I didn't have this facility I would ABSOLUTELY be using Vuescan, although I will investigate the clipping settings you describe which I didn't know about. If they can be set low enough I probably should be using them. Thanks for the tip. Julian At 23:29 06/09/01, you wrote: Jawed Ashraf [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I've never seen these options in Nikon Scan 3.0/3.1. Where should I be looking (I can be blind like this sometimes)? = Original Message From Julian Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] = Have you tried Scanner Extras / Prescan mode / low cont neutral? Julian, the setting you refer to isn't in 3.1. It must have been lost after 2.51. However Jawed, try looking in the Prefs button under Advanced Colour. There is a setting at the bottom for the percentage to exclude of black and white pixels as well as the sample point size. The default % is 0.5 so that's probably where the clipping is. Try 0.1% and see if you're happier! Rob
filmscanners: VueScan Problem ACDsee
Just a quick note to point out that ACDSee will happily display 48 bit images, and LZW compressed images, and the combination of those - 48 bit LZW compressed TIFFs. I guess from what people have said that it will not display images compressed with whatever compression scheme Ed has used. My ACDSee is ver 2.43. Julian At 10:45 03/09/01, you wrote: Another reason why ACDSee doesn't deal with 48 bit files, where PSPro and others do is that 48 bit TIFF is a format used for image editing, not strictly viewing, which is what ACDSee is designed for. That's just my guess, anyway.
Re: filmscanners: Scanning and memory limits in Windows
OK thanks Rob and Rafe for luring me to check the price of memory. I nearly fell off my chair - $68(australian) for 256MB so I bought two, and a 40G HDD as well what the hell I was trying to work out what to do to save my over-full disks anyway. I have just installed same, now have double the RAM and more than double the HDD space after retiring a few bits. As for resources this (below) is what I was trying to say and wanted confirmed. In fact, from the observation that System resources is always the most pessimistic of User and GDI, I assume it is just an overall figure and there are actually only two stacks involved. Who knows... all I know is that I run out of the damn things and it is very annoying, and I am sure that my comparatively huge new memory will not change this one iota. Will report on effect of 768MB on my W98 system when I get time. Looks good so far, fingers crossed that I am one of the lucky ones. Cheers, Julian At 12:38 28/07/01, you wrote: Tony Sleep [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Thu, 26 Jul 2001 13:03:17 -0500 Laurie Solomon ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: I noticed in both systems that since the addition of the RAM the Windows resources meter shows proportionately less system resources being used than previously (ie., more system's resources available), which is one thing which I take as an indication that the additional RAM above 512 is being taken into account. AIUI Resources meter shows only useage of 3 internal OS stacks which are of fixed size (System, User, GDI) and don't vary with RAM installed. Tony is correct. The system resources have nothing to do with free RAM in general, only with available space within the fixed User, System and GDI blocks. Rob Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
RE: filmscanners: Vuescan question
I am one of those who has not found the problems that others report with Nikonscan; I have found it to do what it should do, quickly and with great control. I bought Vuescan after reading how much better it was, but have not found it to be either better or worse, just different and much more difficult to use - for me (who has not spent much time on learning how to cope with its non-G UI). The histogram in Nikonscan I find invaluable: I always feel as though I am flying blind with Vuescan even though the results are usually not bad. Last time I tried Vuescan's IR dust removal I found it didn't work as well for me as ICE, but this may have improved since then, or at least I should say it definitely has improved going by what I have read here. The bottom line for me is that I have both, and I actually use Nikonscan. There are plenty of others for whom the opposite will apply. I will say that for most people there is nothing wrong with Nikonscan, and it is one of the most powerful OEM scanning softwares around. I suggest the obvious - try Nikonscan (which you have) and try Vuescan (try-before-you-buy version) and compare. Then tell us what you discover. Julian PS if it is the learning curve that is worrying you about Nikonscan, I think it is not too bad, and you will learn much about your scanner features and capabilities that would be useful anyway, even if you end up using Vuescan. The Vuescan interface means that you can remain unaware of scanner features for a long time! -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Steve Woolfenden Sent: Monday, July 23, 2001 5:27 PM To: FILMSCANNERS Subject: filmscanners: Vuescan question I'm a little apprehensive asking this question considering the present debate , but , I'm a total novice to scanning and you've got to start somewhere I've just bought a Nikon 4000 scanner , which came with the Nikon Scan3 software . I've not even used it enough to form an opinion about it , but am wondering whether I should be going straight over to vuescan - others have told me its better. Is this the case and what does it do that the supplied stuff wont? Thanks , Steve p.s. I see a few familiar names from the Contax list here - Hi guys! Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: My replacement 8000 is banding like the first one :-(
At 01:43 20/07/01, rafe wrote: Stepper motors are known to resonate a certain step-rates, for example. Yes... Given that Nikon were reported to be having development problems with the higher res stepper motor for the new generation of product including the 8000, and given that jaggies is probably a result of some stepper motor resonance, and given that the reported banding seems to be related to nothing predictable but is changeable, then it could easily in fact be related to processing timing and thus step times, so it seems likely that the banding problem may also be related to stepper motor issues. Also since the 8000 presumably has a heavier scanning head than the smaller scanners (more ccd etc), the mechanical constraints are more serious and it may therefore be the most sensitive to such things and which may not show up as problems on their 35mm scanners. Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
filmscanners: Nikon Service - in Australia
I have reported on this list about the poor focus of my LS2000. I sent it back for warranty repair and today after 4 weeks I got it back - - - without trying to encourage Art any more in his campaign, what I got back is enough to drive me into a rage. First, the thing arrived with one of the transport screws lying loose in the bottom of the box. Second, it came with the dreaded Checked and tested. All found to be within manufacturer's specifications. I rang them and complained bitterly, but the level of their insight and dedication of the first line help desk is not sufficient to match the nature of the problem. (IN Australia Nikon is sold and serviced by Maxwell Photo Optics who don't really have anything beyond first-line support. This guy was not up to dealing with this kind of problem). All he could say was your method of measuring how well it is in focus is useless, and we measured it and it is within specs. When I asked how the measured it, the gentleman said that they have a special slide which they put in and look on the screen to see if the test pattern is focused all over. Very sophisticated. Trouble is it doesn't use the holder that I was having the most problems with, and it doesn't give you any objective evidence. IN short form, I got NO satisfaction from this man at all, and just reached a dead end. He actually said if you send it back, we'll just send it back to you the same. He also said I don't know the details of how it was checked, and you can't talk to the service people directly, you have to talk to me and I am only a support person as well as It is within manufacturer's specifications - at least 10 times. What specification? Measured quantitatively how? I finally spoke to the head of service this morning who appears to be much more comprehending and has offered to send me a replacement unit while I send mine back. He also agreed that my method of measuring focus using the manual focus feature on Nikonscan was valid and should have produced better results. He couldn't explain why my docket saying no fault found had been written out on the 6th, and when I rang on the 17th it was still on the shelf waiting transport. Just ready to go. I think like most of these things, Nikon's service in Australia is partly an institutional thing which may be good or bad, but more related to the quality of the individuals you actually end up dealing with. Of course it is the organisation's responsibility to employ people who have the right attitude and enough grey matter to sort out real but difficult problems without resorting to NFF every time. BTW, the manager also let on that he had heard of jaggies, although not under that name. When I told him about Nikon USA stating that the problem had been passed to Nikon Japan, he said that more or less the same thing had happened here and that they had never heard anything back. Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
RE: filmscanners: Nikon 8000ED
Unfortunately Sir is broke and has no money. He was only enthusiastically supporting the notion of *factual* comparative information of reasonable validity as a means of choosing between scanners. As opposed to trying to do it based on opinion, unverifiable comparisons and manufacturer's claims. (It was by the way the search for good quality data that explains how he came to find this list in the first place after being drawn to your reviews). I do hope to be in a position to buy a scanner sometime in the next year or so and it is for this that I enthusiastically devour good comparative info. While I agree with many comments that the 8000 and 120 are obviously very similar in what can be achieved with each, I believe there are probably a few characteristics that might make you choose one over the other, specifically - ultimate resolution, focus-ability over the whole film, grain visibility, shadow detail...and dust/scratch visibility and correction. But maybe even these are into diminishing returns already.. Julian PS as well as the software you'd need the same images at each scanner location no? At 11:34 10/07/01, you wrote: On Mon, 09 Jul 2001 12:13:54 +1000 Julian Robinson ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: - when you see something in one and can directly try it on the other,or tweek one to match the other. What's needed is a PC Anywhere/VNC/Carbon Copy remote control of a range of scanners. Then you could do this from anywhere. How much would Sir wish to pay for such a service? :) Regards Tony Sleep http://www.halftone.co.uk - Online portfolio exhibit; + film scanner info comparisons Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Wierd Problem with my SS120!
The single best piece of test gear I have discovered for this kind of intermittent problem is the bump, tap and wiggle. If it were mine, I'd wait till the light goes out, then starting from the power into the UPS bang every component or wiggle the flexible ones. Unfortunately your most likely candidate seems to be the scanner itself, and you might understadable be not so keen on bashing it too hard. Just the same this is not said in jest - banging is often the fastest way to find the source of the problem. A slightly more sophisticated version of this is to spray suspect areas with freezing spray, but this means you have to be inside the box. Julian At 04:05 10/07/01, you wrote: Check the house for Gremlins Maris - Original Message - From: Lawrence Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, July 09, 2001 9:36 AM Subject: RE: filmscanners: Wierd Problem with my SS120! | Some further details.. The scanner is contected to a UPS and so power | related problems should not be an issue. | The cords arer all snugly and completely seated. | | It only happened once yesterday. | | | Lawrence i have the worst luck Smith | | Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
RE: filmscanners: Nikon 8000ED
I dream of someone being in a postilion to do the same thing for the 35mm scanners Patience, dear boy, patience!... :) Regards Tony Sleep Really? Now I *am* excited - although the thing that most appeals to me is the ability of some lucky bugger to have the comparison scanners at the same place at the same time because it enables a much more direct comparison - - when you see something in one and can directly try it on the other,or tweek one to match the other. Waiting... keenly Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Nikon 8000ED
Ouch! Yes it was the spell checker, with my help. I like the often quoted useful phrase from an old French text book - which was - Lo! the postilion has been struck by lightning! Very handy in so many situations, Julian At 02:07 08/07/01, you wrote: On Sat, 7 Jul 2001, Peter Marquis-Kyle wrote: being in a postilion to do the same thing for the 35mm scanners - LS4000, ...don't you just love it when the spell checker does that? It just reminds me how difficult it is to get good postilions these days. ___Since the invention of the horsely carriage, postilion is a word that seldom is heard. Probably if at all by people who set up funerals for heads of state etc. Otherwise, a carriage with two or four horses with riders on the horses is not seen much and probably was seldom seen even when horse drawn conveyances were in style. Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
RE: filmscanners: Nikon 8000ED
Re Lawrence's test scans... At last a direct comparison! Thank you Lawrence - excellent comparison scans considering it is your first day. The things I guess we are looking for are sharpness, focus, and shadow and highlight detail - I don't think you can really draw any conclusions about contrast or colour from such a test. Both of these are so affected by how you set up the scanner, and both can in any case be adjusted within a wide range by PS. To me - the Nikon clearly wins on sharpness, but the label you show (is it at 1:1?) is in the center of the image - I'd like to see a full 4000dpi crop from the image corners. What size is the neg? It seems that there is some kind of grain visible on the 120 more than the 4000 (label crop), but this depends on if it is a full-res crop. If so that surprises me. But it may be texture on the label, in which case it would make the 120 more successful, unless again that is only because of its higher contrast setting. Is it possible to post a Nikon scan but without using the 16x multiscan? A single pass comparison might be interesting. Also a crop of the some of the dark wall behind the flowers might show something about shadow detail. As these are set up, the 120 seems to have more shadow detail (from the bottle reflections), and the 8000 has more highlight detail, but I doubt this is anything more than settings. This is the most exciting thing I've seen on this list! I dream of someone being in a postilion to do the same thing for the 35mm scanners - LS4000, IV, Polaroid and Cannon side by side at the same time there must be a just slightly eccentric millionaire out there who wants to do something really really worthwhile? Then again you could just buy me a couple of scanners and I'll do the tests ... Thanks Lawrence, Julian -Original Message- From: Lawrence Smith [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Friday, July 06, 2001 1:07 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: filmscanners: Nikon 8000ED I just posted a set of camparison scans by a SS120 and an 8000ED to my site at http://www.lwsphoto.com/scan%20tests.htmhttp://www.lwsphoto.com/scan%20tests.htm These are not a final conclusions, they are simply examples I am a bit surprised by the results however. Lawrence Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Setting screen gamma problem
Sorry to be difficult, but I don't believe that this is correct, and this is exactly what I would like some confirmation of - either way. The whole point of the non-linear transformations or mapping that leads to the 'gamma' that we are discussing is to make equal digital brightness steps cause equal PERCEIVED brightness changes on screen. The means of doing this and the non-linear response of the eye vs the non-linear response of the tv tube and how it all ties together is complicated, but the end result AIUI is that one digital bit at the bottom end of the greyscale should represent the same APPARENT visual difference as one bit at the bright end of the greyscale. The reason this is done is to maximise the utility of the miserable 256 brightness levels we have available. If we didn't perform this logarithmic mapping, a bit at the high end would represent a very small difference in perceived brightness and we might have more resolution than we need, while at the low end a bit would represent a very large difference in perceived brightness, so in dark areas we would not have enough resolution. To avoid this situation we map the ACTUAL screen brightness to a power law of the digital levels. This power law matches the eye's logarithmic response so that the PERCEIVED screen brightness is directly proportional to the original digital levels. If this is true then a 16-bits step at the bottom (dark) end should give the same apparent brightness difference as 16 bits at the top (bright) end, and the same in the middle of the range. And so my 'linear' (linear in terms of digital values) ramp should look evenly spaced in PERCEIVED brightness on screen. I believe that on this first-order analysis that the ramp should look evenly spaced. When I asked the question I was wondering whether there is some other second-order reason why such a ramp should NOT look evenly spaced. I can't think of a reason why, but there might be one. My original reason for asking this was that I can NOT get my ramp to look linear without setting the gamma to silly levels - about 1.4. Alternatively, if I set gamma correctly, the ramp does not look linear - small steps at the bottom and big ones at the top. Hence I wondered whether my understanding was incorrect, or if there was something else wrong with the set up of my monitor. It seemed a simple enough question at the time. Does anyone know? Julian PS as a check, I set my monitor gamma to 1.0 (i.e. linear mapping of bits to perceived brightness), and the ramp looks very unevenly spaced. This time the big steps are at the bottom, with virtually no visible difference between the top levels, as I would expect if things work as I understand. Also, when adjusting gamma I have - after reading many posts and emails - very carefully set my black point because incorrect black point will make any attempt to set gamma fairly meaningless. Julian asked... |Hence my | original question - should such a step wedge look evenly spaced on a well | set up monitor? Maris replied... No, it should not. Monitors use gamma of necessity as the guns do not display light linearly. Gamma is logarithmic - hence a non-logarithmic step wedge with even tone spacing will not and should not *appear* evenly spaced in tone on your monitor. Maris Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
RE: filmscanners: Setting screen gamma problem
Not to be funny; but how sure are you fo the acccurracy of your step wedge? Most commercial step wedges are created using precision measurement instruments and printed to precisely measurable standards. Is it possible that you personnally created step wedge may be out of gamut at the dark end with respect to your monitor? Is it possible that your web sit files might be tagged with profiles that have small or inapproriate working color spaces so that those receiving the image get images that their systems correct to the embedded profile? My step wedge is nothing more than done by numbers - in hex the brightness values set in PS are 0, 10, 20,30,40,50,60,70,80,90,A0,B0,C0,D0,E0,F0,FF. I am not totally convinced that each step should look the same difference or not on a properly adjusted screen - which was my original question, and I still don't know! I think it *should*, even though I can't get this on my screen without making extreme adjustments and silly figures for gamma. I think I have been tagging my images with profiles, although it would only have been with sRGB unless I have made a monumental error. Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Setting screen gamma problem
Jean-Pierre - Thanks, I took your advice and other suggestions, and my story is ... I followed the Photoscienta page http://www.photoscientia.co.uk/Gamma.htm , and successfully set up my gamma - I selected a gamma of 2.0. Checked it at two other sites with good test patterns (Timo's gamma = 2.0 test pattern (yes it is NOT true as I believed that everything on his pages was for gamma = 1.0!) at http://www.aim-dtp.net/aim/evaluation/gamma_space/index.htm and Hans Brettel's gamma checking applet http://www-sig.enst.fr/~brettel/TESTS/Gamma/Gamma.html). (The Photoscienta test pattern is the most sensitive and simplest to use to set the gamma, but read on...) Both these checks showed that my setting was good at only one greyscale level, and that at the dark end and the bright end my gamma was way off. This led me to investigate more the effect of black point setting; I soon realised that this is CRITICAL and that Photoscienta's test patterns are not sensitive enough to indicate whether your black point is correct or not. In passing ... I believe that the Adobe Gamma Utility is very poor at setting black point - and was responsible for my original bad adjustment at the bottom end. I have checked it again, and it gives me wrong setting for black point each time. After adjusting black point using brightness control and comparing scanned parts of the screen to unscanned part, I reset gamma and it checks perfectly with both the above tools, over the whole range from dark to bright. And the result is that my screen looks fairly similar to how I had it set up before all this trouble began(!), except that I can discern the lower levels of my step wedge when I couldn't before. BUT - the step wedge is still somewhat compressed towards the black end. To get it looking even steps over the range, I have to adjust gamma towards the ridiculous extreme, maybe around gamma = 1.3 or so. Hence my original question - should such a step wedge look evenly spaced on a well set up monitor? I remain with this problem, and the fact that even with my new setup, my web photos look OK on my screen but light, pale and washed out on a number of other screens. Maybe the latter is coincidence and I have looked at a bunch of badly set up monitors??? Anyway, I continue to research... Julian At 06:17 28/06/01, you wrote: Me too I struggled a lot with calibrating my Viewsonic PF815 22' monitor. I used Adobe Gamma on the Gamma-space 2.2 monitor calibration chart made by Timo Autiokari on www.aim-dtp.net. and http://www.aim-dtp.net/aim/evaluation/gamma_space/index.htm. He made also many other gamma charts. I downloaded the 2.2 chart and placed it as the desktop wall. Withy Adobe Gamma I managed to get a quiet good calibrated monitor on all the grey values from deep black to high white. When looking at the Yellow Rose from Lawrence W.Smith in PS6.01 I can see clearly the subtle details in the leave and the beautifull colors in the rose. It indicates me that my calibrtion is correct. I suggest you try this too and see what it gives... Jean-Pierre Verbeke Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
filmscanners: Setting screen gamma problem
I know this topic is revisited ad nauseum, but I have just discovered that what I thought was the Right Thing To Do does not appear to be right at all. On my system, Adobe Gamma setup seems to be worse than no setup at all. I have cross posted this to Epson7x7, filmscanners, scan and digital silver lists. This post has become very long, read it if you are interested, but the essence of my question is ... ** Please look at my simple greyscale step wedge at www.austarmetro.com.au/~julian/stepwedge.htm and tell me if setting this up for equal visual steps is a valid way of setting screen gamma, and does *your* monitor show this wedge accurately? ** My problem was to make my recently web-published photos look reasonable on other people's monitors. I use PS5.5 and a Sony 400PS monitor. I thought I had this all sussed, because I had religiously used Adobe Gamma to give me what I assumed would be, maybe not perfect, but at least ball-park OK settings. I then looked at my pubescent website on someone else's computer to discover all my deep beautiful saturated colors were pale, insignificant and plain ugly. I checked a couple of other computers and while they vary, generally they give the same result. My conclusion therefore was that for some reason my screen gamma is set to make my screen look too dark. So I checked Adobe Gamma again but it gave me the same settings. I can't afford a proper calibrator at this time, but decided to go back to basics on the assumption that a step wedge greyscale from 0,0,0 to 255,255,255 should look balanced on my screen and the steps should all be visible and roughly the same brightness difference between adjacent steps across the scale. I constructed a simple step wedge of 17 steps (0,0,0; 16,16,16; 32,32,32 ...255,255,255) and it looked bad. The bottom 3 steps were all black, which seemed to confirm that my monitor was NOT adjusted correctly. So I tried then to adjust gamma so that my stepwedge looked ok. The problem is that to achieve this, the gamma has to be set so high as to be almost off the scale. This is the same whether I use the slider on Adobe Gamma Utility, or a different setting available in my Matrox card adjustment software. In both cases the gamma required to make the step wedge look OK is way up the top end of the adjustment. And of course all my wallpapers and in fact all my images now look pale and washed out. I have since looked at other photo sites to see how they look with my new settings, and the situation is still confused. On some sites their images now look washed out, others look OK. The average would be roughly half way between my Adobe Gamma setting and my Step Wedge setting. I am now completely confused, but aware that most of us are probably making false assumptions about how other peoples' web photos are meant to look. For example, Lawrence Smith has a critique site whose address was posted on a list today - at http://www.lwsphoto.com/06_25_critique.htm. I looked at this rather beautiful photo but didn't like how dark the stem and leaves were, which agreed with a few of the comments posted at the site. But now that I have adjusted to my Step Wedge gamma and looked again, the photo looks completely different, and the stem and leaves are fine. Which is right? There is a HUGE difference. Any answers to my questions welcomed... - is my assumption correct that such a stepwedge is a reasonable way to set up screen gamma? - why doesn't the setting that this implies agree with the setting suggested by Adobe Gamma? There is a HUGE difference. - why is the correct gamma setting according to my stepwedge so high, nearly off scale? - what kind of gamma are most monitors actually aligned to IN PRACTICE? I know about nominal 1.8 and 2.2 for Apple and PCs, but it doesn't seem that this bears much relationship to reality? Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
RE: filmscanners: LED Illumination for Film Scanners
Hey let's keep this clean and vaguely accurate even if it is OT... My guess is you are not an electrical engineer, or you would know that LEDs do have a life span. Because you haven't heard of them burning out, doesn't mean they don't burn out. In fact, their typical MTBF is rated for 1000 hours. I am another engineer(!) (not that this is relevant to reading a manufacturer's spec) and LEDs don't have MTBFs of 1000 hours! One of the great advantages of using LEDs in a scanner is the enormous lifespan of the light source... this was also the original driver for the mooted LED enlarger lamp that you have been discussing - lifespan *and* the consistency of light i.e. unchanging spectral characteristics. In fact the MTBF of ordinary boring nothing special LEDs is around 100x your stated figure and good ones (presumably like those used in scanners) are 1000x. I quote from the first google-located site I found... If packaged properly, LEDs emit light for a much longer time period than almost every other alternative light source technology. ... The mean time between failure (MTBF) of high quality LEDs properly packaged, is on the order of millions of hours. Or this second site I found... The long term dependability of Precision Optical Performance AlInGaP LED lamps is an important consideration for those who specify LED traffic signals and LED variable message signs (VMS). Precision Optical Performance LED Lamps are T-1 3 /4 plastic package devices that exhibit a nominal Mean Time Between (possible catastrophic) Failure, MTBF, greater than 1.2 million hours at the operating temperature of +74°C (+165°F). At operating temperatures below 0°C (32°F), MTBF is in excess of 10 million hours. Therefore, MTBF need not be a concern. Let's say the first LED dies in my scanner after 1/10 th of its MTBF, then I'll get 100,000 hours out of it or 50 years if I use the scanner 5 hours a day. Not bad eh! (Caveat - this was an example only - I don't know what the figure is for the actual LEDs used in Nikon scanners, but I am sure it is a lot higher than 1000hours). Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: Fw: filmscanners: mechanical adjustment on nikon ls-2000
Jules, I have always received an answer from Nikon at Nikon - Digital Imaging [EMAIL PROTECTED] Not usually the answer I wanted, but they do answer and quite promptly I would guess their answer in this case (send it back for repair), so I am afraid I have not been much help again Good luck, Julian. At 06:59 19/06/01, you wrote: hi again, since i had no luck getting any help on this or the digitalsilver list, does anyone at least know where i could look for an answer? is there the equivalent of the old nikon tech forum somewhere? thanks in advance - Original Message - From: Jules [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, June 15, 2001 3:23 AM Subject: filmscanners: mechanical adjustment on nikon ls-2000 greetings, my ls-2000 recently fell just a tiny bit out of mechanical calibration causing a very short grinding noise at the end of the scan as the scanning aparatus runs out of space to move. this introduces a smear on one side of the image. i'm also worried that it's not good for the stepper motor. i don't want to send the scanner back to nikon for repairs. is there a way that i can adjust the scanning aparatus? or maybe the problem is with the SF-200 slide feeder that i'm using. a glance shows the slide perfectly centered when loaded in the SF-200. but i still get the short grind. turning the scanner on/off doesn't help this as you'd expect. i'm hoping there's some screw i can turn to make minute adjustements on the scanning field. -- j u l e s @ p o p m o n k e y . c o m http://www.popmonkey.com/jules Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Sprintscan 120 and new negative proile scheme
At 23:07 08/06/01, you wrote: Do minilabs read the emulsion type before printing neg? No. My lab once told me that my prints were not up to their usual excellence because we haven't got the Supra profile right yet. So I understand that minilabs DO use individual film profiles for some purpose. That said I agree with Austin that this is not the best way to go for a scanner - for three reasons: a) as Johnny said, emulsions change with bewildering rapidity, so even if you try hard you can be trapped without the correct profile. b) as Austin said, the exposure and light source used when taking the photo etc must change the characteristics c) films change from nominal characteristics before and after exposure - so there is no accurate reference anyway. Changes start as soon as the film is out of the fridge, and fading can easily take a film a long way from the assumed profile. The point of using profiles of course is to match the scanner's filter characteristics (or LED bandwidth) with the film response curves, and to remove the mask of a neg. But there is an alternative, and that is for the scanner to do some kind of analysis of the film itself and attempt to automatically profile the film and hence produce a good automatic scan. (which is what I thought minilabs did until the exchange quoted above). This is what the Nikons do, by means which are beyond me, and IMHO they do it very well. I have used only five film scanner/software combinations in my time, but the Nikon with Nikon ver 3 software is IME far and away the best at producing good default scans. With ROC I imagine it is even better. Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: RE: filmscanners: New Nikon performance
Art wrote: To bring this into a slightly different realm... Let's say you had a choice between a car which has a bit of vibration in the steering column, and tends to require just a bit of steering adjustment to keep it going perfectly straight, but handles over steering and other human aspects of imprecise driving without creating any real danger. Then, on the other hand you had a choice of a car that had hardly any vibration in the steering and tended to handle somewhat better on the road as long as you used perfect driving habits, but if you over steered, for instance -(hey, your fault, right?) it skidded right off the road. Which would you prefer to drive? Being human, I'll take car number 1, thanks. Art Boy if ever there was a poor analogy, this is it! The difference between cars and scans is that with one you risk you life, so safety kind of outweighs other concerns. With the other, the beauty of the result is what counts, so analogous wheel vibration would be a nasty problem. I can say that I have owned a Nikon scanner with ICE and LEDs, and another scanner with similar resolution but no ICE and no LEDs and an obvious difference in sharpness. I have absolutely no difficulty in deciding which I prefer, and it is original sharpness, slightly degraded by ICE. 1000x I would prefer that combination, simply because it results in fine usable scans with virtually no retouching at all. Saves countless hours, and the result is at least as sharp as my film/skill can support. Maybe there are people with less dust problems than me in which case - go for it! As an aside I wonder how the non-LED scanners with ICE perform? It would seem to be softness upon softness? Art, you accuse Nikon owners of being defensive - it is the persistence of your opposite stance that surprises me! And I wonder how many people there are who have tried ICE who elect to go to a non-ICE scanner? This would be a very interesting statistic. Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: New Nikon performance
I have also used LS2000 with many Kodachromes and have had GREAT success with them. My problem was mould and some quite awful slides have been rescued with minimal work. I tried one of them before getting the Nikon and spent 3 hours (it was a very bad attack of mould) fixing it in PS. The Nikon scan, with a couple of minutes of work, was far superior. But I realise that maybe it depends on which version of Kodachrome you have. Maybe I won't be so successful when I get to the '80's. Julian At 04:12 09/06/01, Dave wrote: But I have a lot of Kodachromes I'm waiting to scan and I'd like to get an idea if the new Nikons are going to sneak in some problems here or not. Dane reports no problems at all with thousands of Kodachromes scanned on an LS-2000, and I wonder what I'm doing wrong. Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: NikonScan 3.1 here june 7 Joanna
No it doesn't. Julian At 09:16 09/06/01, you wrote: does the nikon scan 3.1 work with ls-1000. thanks joanna Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
RE: filmscanners: VueScan and Occam's Razor - OT
He paraphrases Sir William's insight with the phrase that the simpler the explanation, the more likely it is to be correct. ... So the Earth is flat? But simple is not simple to define. I prefer Entities should not be unnecessarily introduced. I don't think the universe is bound by my notions of simplicity. ;^P There is a little part left out of the first paraphrase, which if extended could read that the simpler the explanation which fits with all relevant observations, the more likely it is to be correct. Unfortunately, a flat earth does not fit with many observations that can be made in nature. So my preferred version... when trying to explain anything, choose the simplest possible explanation which fits all the facts. Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: OK, Vuescan is driving me nuts
Rob - if you meant Photoshop and not Vuescan, it does have a crop tool which is adjustable on each edge. It is not the Rectangular Marquee Tool that I think you are referring to, but the Crop Tool on the same location in the tool palette. Hold mouse down on the corner of the Rectangular Marquee tool to expand and select the last one which is the crop tool (in Ver 5.5 anyway). Julian At 20:04 20/05/01, you wrote: I wish Photoshop had a crop tool like the one in PSP - the problem with the normal rectangular selection is that you can't drag the sides once you've placed it. That means you have to guess the starting corner very well or you'll lose some image when you crop. Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: OK, Vuescan is driving me nuts
At 09:20 21/05/01, Rob wrote: You say easily and it is if you know how, but it's nowhere near as straightforward as the click and drag behaviour in PSP. As I said it is exactly as straightforward if you use the Crop Tool and not the Marquee Tool. Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Stellar ghosts and Nikon Coolscan IVED (LS40)
I am not sure if you picked up this post by Ed. I agree that it sounds very like an exposure problem. As well as Ed's suggested Vuescan solution you could try Nikonscan / Extras / Autoexposure / Lowcontrast low key (or lowcontrast neutral) I hope you can sort this otherwise it seems to be a serious deficiency in what one hopes is a great scanner. Julian At 19:56 10/05/01, you wrote: In a message dated 5/10/2001 3:20:02 AM EST, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: When I scan an image containing black sky and bright stellar images with a Nikon Coolscan IVED (=LS40) , then close to the edge of the field every bright (saturated) stellar image has a faint ghost image separated from the main image (by 20- 40 pixels). All the ghost images are on the outside. These are not present in the center 1/3 by 1/3 of the field. Multiscanning with vuescan appears to make these features more striking because it reduces the background noise but not these images. The CCD might be over-exposed near the star, causing CCD charge bleeding. It might also be some kind of optical side effect. Try turning off Device|Auto exposure and set RGB exposure to 1.0. Regards, Ed Hamrick Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
RE: filmscanners: Stellar ghosts and Nikon Coolscan IVED (LS40)
Harry - maybe this is a bit obvious, but why don't you write to Nikon with a sample and ask them what they suggest? They may not be the world's best at customer relations (perhaps because they are trying to avoid a jaggies fiasco) but IME they always answer emails I send to ... Nikon - Digital Imaging [EMAIL PROTECTED] It seems to be a real problem you have there, and one which may turn out to be fixable or may be something that Nikon need to look at. Best of luck, Julian At 07:10 12/05/01, you wrote: On Fri, 11 May 2001, shAf wrote: To me this implies the problem is with respect to the film ... a problem with the scanner, yes ... but the problem rotates with the film. If I were to guess, and try something different ... I would snip off the sprocket holes ... possibly all those edges are the source for the internal relections(???) The slides are framed. The ghost does not rotate with the film (it rotates in respect to the stars) - am I choosing the right words here? I have scanned two more pictures http://www.astro.utu.fi/~hlehto/nikontest/crop0041.jpg Here the slide is put in the scanner as should and when viewed with vuescan this image is at the bottom, somewhat to the right. You can see the ghosts below the two stars in the field. Then I turn the slide counterclockwise by 90 degrees. Now the scene is on the top edge of the vuescan window and again on the right side. Now I get http://www.astro.utu.fi/~hlehto/nikontest/crop0042.jpg. Now you can see the ghosts pointing up on the screen. Exposure is set manually on 1 sec. Gamma curves are used in processing. This image is taken with a 300mm lens, on EPH ISO 1600 - the other images mentioned earlier were taken with a 50mm lens and Kodachrome 200. Thanks for all the suggestions and tips I have had from this group. Regards Harry Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Comparison of LS2000 and LS4000
Thanks for this really interesting comparison. I am impressed by the roc/gem technology, especially by this example of gem (grain reduction). Of course we expected some grain reduction anyway because of the 4000dpi (which I think the LS4000 scans at even at the lower resolutions that were used in the examples) and indeed there is some improvement without GEM. But gem as well makes this very grainy film look good! It is hard to tell from this example how much softening there is - I can see some apparent softening but this may be fixable with different settings or a bit of sharpening. ROC - colour reconstruction - has changed the image a lot. My guess is that the original was daylight film with tungsten light in which case ROC has done an arguably good job. Now too cool, but I am sure I would find it easier to adjust for good skin tones from the ROC'd version than the original. Thanks again for the insight, Julian At 05:26 01/05/01, you wrote: http://www.starhk.com/peterpen/nikontest.htm Includes: - Sample scans from same frame using LS2000 and LS4000 (not full res) - Sample using GEM/ROC - Pictures of the LS4000 internals - hand measured scan times with various features on/off Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Nikonscan3.0 and LSIII
As I have said before, I use NS3.0 with my LS2000 and have had no problems. Colour is IMHO better straight out of the box and my other previous comments are below. There are quite a few others on this list and others who are using it too, some with macs and some pcs. Mine is a pc, and I have not had any problems, but then I have not tried setting up colour management either. I am pleased with the colour exactly as it is on my system, for non-critical work. Nikon USA were non-committal about using the NS3/LS2000 combination; they just wished me luck. Julian -last post- I am using Nikonscan 3.0 with my LS2000. I was doubtful as to whether it would work with Win98 not SE, but it does, apparently flawlessly touch wood (apart from same bugs/problems others have noted). So it seems the only reason Nikon require Win98SE is for the firewire connection. Ver 3.0 is a great improvement in many ways on 2.5.1, once you get used to the initially annoying tool palette. As someone else noted, no more blown highlights, and the histogram is much more accurate at the low end - where I had constant problems with 2.5.1. One interesting point - on mine at least the ver 3 ICE produces much more softening than the ver 2 ICE did. I don't know why this would be so. Using sharpen helps significantly. I haven't seen jaggies yet, but I haven't looked hard yet either. If I activate curves the whole thing slows down greatly, which it did not do under the old version. Another small mystery. - julian At 02:34 30/04/01, you wrote: This site says that you should not use Nikonscan 3.0 with the LS-2000? Is this true? The site indicates that later versions of Nikonscan 3.0 will officially support the LS-2000. =Steve Caspersen - Original Message - From: Dale Gail [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, April 29, 2001 3:10 AM Subject: Re: filmscanners: Nikonscan3.0 and LSIII You can get it from the following URL: http://www.nikontechusa.com/ Dale From: Andreas Kurz [EMAIL PROTECTED] Hi Hersch, were did you get NikonScan 3.0? regards, Andi Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
filmscanners: Nikonscan 3.0 and Win98 not SE and LS2000
I am using Nikonscan 3.0 with my LS2000. I was doubtful as to whether it would work with Win98 not SE, but it does, apparently flawlessly touch wood (apart from same bugs/problems others have noted). So it seems the only reason Nikon require Win98SE is for the firewire connection. Ver 3.0 is a great improvement in many ways on 2.5.1, once you get used to the initially annoying tool palette. As someone else noted, no more blown highlights, and the histogram is much more accurate at the low end - where I had constant problems with 2.5.1. One interesting point - on mine at least the ver 3 ICE produces much more softening than the ver 2 ICE did. I don't know why this would be so. Using sharpen helps significantly. I haven't seen jaggies yet, but I haven't looked hard yet either. If I activate curves the whole thing slows down greatly, which it did not do under the old version. Another small mystery. Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: LS4000, LS2000 and sharpness
This is exactly what I have discovered I need to do with my LS2000 - set the focus point closer to the edge of the film. The small depth of field on the LS2000 is the greatest problem I have found with this scanner, and the main reason I will be nervous of the LS4000. Julian At 22:43 27/04/01, Mikael wrote: Ed Thanks to you and a scratched film I have discovered how to have the best resolution from the LS4000 scanner and curved film problem. The imported thing is to put the focus area right in the picture area. After some experiment with the scratched film I found out that the best way to have optimal resolution from the scanner are to move the focus area half way out from the middle of the picture to the side. This means that the depth of field now cover the middle and corner better and the picture now looks equal sharp overall. If I put the focus area in the middle ( standard mode) the sides and corner are not so sharp as at the middle of the picture. Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: FW: Dual Scan II - striping
Like Art I see broad soft-edged stripes of dark and lighter sky - quite obvious - with for example a dark stripe through the cock. It looks to me like an illumination issue, but this doesn't seem likely for a film scanner. I had very bad striping with my (now returned) Photosmart which was a kind of aliasing of scanner noise with the screen display - it varied enormously depending on degree of displayed zoom, but was sharp edged, not like what I see here. Julian At 08:35 24/04/01, you wrote: Vlad, I do not see the striping. One thought comes to mind, however - is it possible that it is your monitor that shows striping but that the scanner and the image themselves are OK? Maris - Original Message - From: Vladislav Jurèo [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'Filmscanners (el. adresa) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, April 23, 2001 3:51 PM Subject: filmscanners: FW: Dual Scan II - striping I'm about to make the same switch. Can you explain in more detail, or show (via a small jpeg) what the striping looks like? In which direction relative to the scanning process are the stripes? Art I send you the sample to look at. I think it has something to do with temperature in the scanner - it is more apparent after several hours of scanning. Stripes are along the frame movement direction they are not sharp but blurred, typically dark green in blue area, wide app. 10-15% of frame width. Something like that never occured with S20 (several thousands of negs) Vlad PS I have some problems sending the post this is 4th try-out --- Odchozí zpráva neobsahuje viry. Zkontrolováno antivirovým systémem AVG (http://www.grisoft.cz). Verze: 6.0.237 / Virová báze: 115 - datum vydání: 7.3.2001 Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Nikonscan 3.0 with Win98 / Win98SE for LS30/LS2000
FWIW here is the response from Nikon USA support to the question "Will Nikonscan 3.0 work with the LS2000 on Win 98 original (not SE)?" They may not know much, but are at least candid about it. - Dear Julian Robinson: While Nikon Scan 3.X will someday work with the LS2000, the current initial release is not recommended. As to whether Win 98 not SE will work, we can speculate but I learned a long time ago not to second guess new software. Nikon Scan 3.0 cannot be on the same platform as previous Nikon Scans. You are definitely getting into the realm of experimentation. I wish you well and good luck on your own. - I was guessing that it was the Firewire that required the Win98SE version, so will probably download it and try tomorrow. Julian At 20:14 20/04/01, you wrote: I'm quite sure that Nikonscan 3 will work with the LS 2000 and Win98. The reason it states you require Win98 se is for the LS4000 as Win98 does not support firewall interface. Dale Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
filmscanners: Nikonscan 3.0 with Win98 / Win98SE for LS30/LS2000
I want to try Nikonscan 3 too (with LS2000), but can't work out if I must have Win98SE or not. The website says you do, but that may be only for the Firewire interface. I have only Win98 original. Does anyone know if you can use the old scanners with Win98 original? TIA Julian At 05:26 20/04/01, you wrote: Cheers for the replies everyone... I installed 98 instead of 98SE,ooops!! back to the drawing board.. Leo Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: aliasing was Re: filmscanners: Review of the Nikon CoolScan 4000
I also would like to put a word of support for Nikonscan here. I use LS2000 and Nikonscan 2.5.1. I have tried Vuescan but just can't get it to do anything better than Nikonscan (EXCEPT reduce jaggies) so I continue to use Nikonscan. There has been a lot of negative discussion about Nikonscan - I really cannot see why people bag it so much. I get predictable output and generally excellent colour 98% of the time from negs. I don't do much slides, but they were fine too. I certainly get better results colour-wise than I could ever get out of Vuescan, and VS was *much* slower. I do agree that the jaggies is a real problem, and have not been impressed by the results of my email discussion with Nikon USA about this. I am about to send mine back for "repair" re jaggies - I have little hope but will report how it is dealt with. (remember this is in Australia). I also have troubles with focus depth of field, but that is not a software problem. re the blown highlights / loss of sky detail comment, my technique to avoid this is as follows... IME NIkonscan default auto settings cut off too much at the high end (and maybe the shadows end too), so I use the option - Scanner extras / prescan mode / low contrast neutral. This means I get the whole range of a neg into the histogram. At 16-bit there is no problem re-expanding it to get the cut off at the actual tips of the white and black points, then I can do whatever contrast enhancement etc I need in PS. Not sure how this translates to the LS30, but I think it is still valid. Julian At 05:01 10/04/01, you wrote: Rob wrote: The detail in the skies tend to "blow out" in Nikonscan with the LS30 since it only works with 8 bit data - this has the side effect of reducing apparent grain in the sky. Unfortunately Nikonscan is useless for me since I get jaggies with it, so I have to use Vuescan. I may be able to "improve" things a little by deliberately adjusting the white point, but I don't want to lose too much sky detail. The trick with the LS-30 is to hardware calibrate your monitor (PhotoCal/Monitor Spyder is great, and not too expensive), set up color management in NikonScan using the supplied scanner profile, and use the excellent NikonScan curves dialogue to tone/color correct before scanning. You'll be outputting 24 bit files to PS, but the corrections are applied in hi bit space. Then, if need be, apply tweaks with an adjustment layer before printing. Nikonscan's CM works as well as possible, with a near perfect match to the result in Photoshop. Also Nikonscan does the best color corrections out of the box of anything I've seen, on chromes and negs. And, as I noted previously, the sharpening algorithm it uses is very good. Dave Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
filmscanners: Jaggies in passing
I agree entirely, and of course Maxwell's service people said they had never heard of the problem when I phoned them. So I suspect "interesting" will be the main outcome of this exercise! I think my jaggies has got significantly worse with time, which is not surprising if it is a resonance vibration thing, because the vibration amplitude would increase as the feed mechanism wears into more slack, or holding springs soften etc. This means that it is *possible* to fix it though if you try hard enough. Julian At 16:23 10/04/01, Rob wrote: I'll be intrigued if Maxwell Optics manage to cure the vibration that causes the jaggies. As far as I can see it's a design fault caused by a combniation of hardware and software behaviour. Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Grain Aliasing at 2700pppi
What about the same thing - except using smart blur? I have had some good success with smart blur (which of course tries to preserve the edges). I generally have to use the low end of the settings, but it can be quite surprisingly nifty on some images if you take care with settings. Julian At 10:48 06/04/01, you wrote: I have been changing to LAB and splitting the channels, then applying either a Gaussian blur or Dust and Scratches, depending on the size of the grain, in the A and B channels only. Most of the sharpness remains in the L channel when you recombine. See Dan Margulis's chapter from Professional Photoshop at http://www.ledet.com/margulis/LABCorrection.pdf where he suggests this Maris - Original Message - From: "Lynn Allen" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, April 05, 2001 6:15 PM Subject: filmscanners: Grain Aliasing at 2700pppi | Grain aliasing and noise has been a regular topic on this list. It should | be--Mark, Rob, I and others have been talking at it hard enough. Without any | spectacular results, I could add. :-\ | | It's a pity that TIFFs can't be sent reasonably on the Net, because I just | ran up against one that makes the "Tiger" I wrote about into a "pussycat." | This new TIFF, done in Vuescan with 6 passes because Miraphoto couldn't | handle it, has grain aliasing in every square milimeter! True, it was | under-exposed in existing artificial light, hand-held at probably 1/15th or | 1/30th tops, with a Pentax 1.8 lens. So what? | | "There probably isn't enough 'picture there' to make a picture, there," you | might say. You've heard it before, said it before, and so have I, more than | once. But the thing is, there *is* quite a bit of picture there, and the | Scanwit "sees" it. Getting it *out of there* and making it presentable is | the difficult part. | | Most people I know would say, "Give it up, man." Well fine, but I don't | think my daughter will be graduating from highschool any time again soon. | It's been 22 years since her last go. :-) | | Every discussion we've had on this list about G-A begs the question "How to | deal with it?" We know (or do we?) what causes grain aliasing and/or noise, | what films to use in future, what scanners to buy in future, et cetera. But | how does one get those hundreds of blue-green pixels out of the dark areas | and the red-brown pixels out of the flesh-tones today, this afternoon? | | That's my question, and I'm stickin' to it. :-) | | Best regards--LRA | | PS--BTW, have you noticed that using a soft brush and Cloning smoothes out | those offending pixels? Not a lot of help unless one wants to "repaint" the | whole picture, but it might be a start. Or not. | | | --- | FREE! The World's Best Email Address @email.com | Reserve your name now at http://www.email.com | | | Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Response from Nikon USA on jaggies
I have been away, so late with this input. It seems I am the only one to receive a "Different" answer. Not very useful, but different. See below. I have since responded to this but yet to receive a further reply. I tend to agree with Rob re a combined input, but I am not really sure we have the numbers. It seems many people either don't have the problem, or don't know they have it, or it is in fact so variable that we are unsure. It is very perplexing in its variation, the only thing that I am sure of is that it IS a problem, and Nikon SHOULD be doing something about it. The fact that it can be fixed (Vuescan) says it all. Julian PS a) FWIW I have power conditioning too. b) I think the problem is getting worse on my machine, or else it is just variable and I noticed it more on some recent scans. Dear Mr. Robinson: I am afraid to mention the obvious but you have downloaded and installed the latest version of Nikon Scan from www.nikontechusa.com? The Digital Ice/Clean Image is useful for dealing with scratched or damaged slides. Is it necessary that you use it all the time for your scanning? What the software is doing is detecting faults where there are none and, in trying to fix them, introducing the jaggies. Does the setting for Clean Image make a difference in the severity of the jaggies? To be honest with you, I first became aware of the problem by reading about it in the late, and much lamented, forum at www.nikontechusa.com. However, I have not had any inquiries about the problem for some time. Finally, if you are scanning black and white film, you should not use it all. Please reference this case (number 2136) if you have any further questions on this issue. Thank you for contacting Nikon, Inc. Sincerely At 15:02 26/01/01, you wrote: Bill wrote: Same reply I received. Interestingly, the next day and today there is no evidence of the jaggies that were so obvious when I posted my query. It is not the power since I have everything connected to a UPS with line conditioning. Try the same picture which gave you the problem before. I find certain images tend to be more problematic than others. Can we (the members of the filmscanners list) petition them to fix the problem? They seem to be claiming it is a hardware fault and it clearly isn't. Rob Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: What is a photomultiplier tube
At 23:50 15/01/01, Dieder wrote: Ok, what with all the discussion about CCDs, A/D conversion etc, what is the difference between the CCDs of a high end scanner and the photomultiplier tubes of a drum scanner. How do they compare, what are their differences? Why is a drum scanner such a high resolution device? I am not greatly into this technology, so I'll make a guess about a couple of things and those who know can correct me. Photomultipliers differ from CCDs in that they have internal amplification and hence can be more sensitive. The only ones I have ever seen are bulky and thus could not be used in arrays like CCDs, so my GUESS is that drum scanners use only one or a limited number of photomultipliers, and move it across the image to cover the whole territory. I have never seen a drum scanner so this is a guess, pleas correct me if this is not true. I am assuming that the purpose of the drum is to make it easy to spin the image past the sensor for one line of resolution, then move the sensor up one line and read the next line. If that is true, then because you only have one sensor, you can engineer it to greater tolerances, and read a smaller spot size and thus get better resolution. Because you only have one sensor too, you can design the amplifier and subsequent circuitry in a more expensive way and thus get better performance - or at least you don't need the switches that you would need to read an array of sensors. And because you only have one sensor you don't have the problem of matching the response of thousands of different sensors and their associated switching circuitry etc., as you do for CCD array scanners. Hope this helps, or elicits more accurate information, Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
RE: filmscanners: Re: So it's the bits?
At 04:44 15/01/01, : [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: .Which might explain why they use the term Density Range and not Dynamic Range - Dynamic Range certainly means the range that can be covered without changing the setup i.e. the range available at one instant. Hm. Well spotted! Tony Sleep But they *do* use Dynamic Range in some of their literature (4.2 in Nikon's product data sheet for the 4000 ED and their model comparison sheet, provided by Nikon at this past week's Mac World). Yes I noticed this about 5 stupid minutes after I wrote the first comment! The truth as usual might be more stupidity than conspiracy. Probably there is some serious thinking about spec presentation by technical people arguing with sales people as to what they can get away with, resulting in a finely balanced agreement as to how to phrase this specification. Then somewhere downstream other sales people mess it all up by not appreciating the niceties of what was agreed elsewhere and plonk in the new figure with what they think is a "synonymous" name. Cheers Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: So it's the bits? (Was: filmscanners: Sprintscan 120
At 07:45 15/01/01, Pete wrote: All the available CCDs on the market today are limited to a dynamic range of 5000:1 (~12 bits) at normal temperatures. Aha! That is the figure I was wondering about. Thanks so much for this useful and factual piece of info. Given the physics I would guess that noise figures are already towards thermal limits (?)and if so it is not possible to do much better without cooling. So I guess too that drum scanners etc must use photomultipliers or something other than CCDs. But we don't know whether the new Nikons do or don't use split exposures - which seems to be the logical way to go for CCD scanners - and should be easy for Nikon to implement given LED sources. Maybe they do? And probably they don't looking at the fast scan times. Multiple exposures would significantly add to the scan time. I wonder if they have considered this as a slower option. And then I wonder why, when they already do multi-passes to reduce noise as in the LS2000, why they don't up the exposure for subsequent scans? Maybe it is hard to keep things linear? Just thinking aloud, Julian Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: orange mask
I don't know why all scanners don't handle orange mask by looking at a bit of leader or inter-frame unexposed area and automatically determine the _exact_ mask for each film. Do any of them? It would seem much easier than any other way? Cheers, Julian At 02:50 13/01/01, you wrote: It would be nice if the scanner vendors provided an applet that allowed one to create an orange-mask filter for any particular film. All you really need, I think, is a blank (unexposed) frame. Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
RE: filmscanners: Re: So it's the bits?
At 10:21 13/01/01, Austin wrote: The pixel values (for which the range of is the theoretically highest Dmax for the scanner) are relative to each other, not absolute, ... Correct ... the "pixel values" associated with measuring Dmax may be relative ... but "Dmax" is a measured value, is absolute, and belongs to film. Small point, but let's not confuse terms. The scanner manufacturers use Dmax as a specification item, which you said they didn't, but they do. We were talking about that, not a wit about film. We were talking about how many bits correspond to the different values of Dmax (amongst many other things), and that is NOT measured. Like most specification stuff, nothing is clear cut and manufacturers adopt shorthand methods of describing things - which is fine if everyone understands and agrees. In a former life I wrote specs for radars and processing systems, and wrote and assessed tenders for same so I have participated at first hand in the gamesmanship of manipulating specs. This explains why I am in my element here, and apologies to those who are not. Scanner Dmax, for better or worse, is often used as a shorthand for "Density Range" or "Dynamic Range". This doesn't seem too incomprehensible or even reprehensible to me, since the figures must be close, because Dmin is pretty close to "no film at all" .I mean... Dynamic range (or density range) = Dmax-Dmin where Dmax is the maximum film density that can be measured by the scanner, Dmin the minimum Since clear film (fully exposed slide) is almost transparent, Dmin is close to zero, so making an assumption that the scanner is set so that it can just record Dmin (by adjusting exposure), then density range = Dmax-Dmin ~= Dmax - 0 = Dmax Cheers, Julian PS There is another issue that comes up here - I have assumed that Dynamic range (which until now I would say is the same thing as density range) is Dmax - Dmin where you measure Dmax and Dmin _with_the_same_setup_ - that is, during the one scan. Nikon may argue that their Dmin is measured with the exposure set low, and Dmax with the exposure set as high as possible. This means that they can get up to another 2 to 4 stops(!!!) into their claimed DENSITY RANGE. Which might explain why they use the term Density Range and not Dynamic Range - Dynamic Range certainly means the range that can be covered without changing the setup i.e. the range available at one instant. So I can see it is quite possible that Nikon MAY be able to argue that they cover a Density Range of 3.6 for the LS2000 or 4.2 for the LS4000, although you have to do a couple of separate scans to see it, which is not quite what you would want and certainly not what people are assuming when they read the spec. The mere presence of exposure controls on the Nikon scanner tends to support this idea. So the LS2000 MAY in fact have a density range of 3.6, but it's Dynamic Range could still be 2 (or is it 4) stops less than this - i.e. 3.0 or 2.4. Is it coincidence that most the measurements I have seen are in this range, from memory about 2.6? (I assume people have been measuring Dynamic Range, not Density Range). Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
Re: filmscanners: Re: So it's the bits?
At 01:09 13/01/01, Tony wrote: But they aren't AFAIK claiming a DMax figure, nor even an OD range (DMax-DMin), but a wibbly-wobbly bit of slipperiness called 'dynamic range'. Really this is all horribly reminiscent of output power specs for HiFi amps - 'RMS', 'Music Power', 'Peak' and so on, all gibberish without qualifying terms. Caveat emptor! No, they are claiming even more specifically ... and I quote from http://www.klt.co.jp/Nikon/Press_Release/ls-4000.html ... Density range 4.2 ... Contrary to the view put by others (that I am being naive in expecting some vague truth in advertising and that there is no way any action would be successful), there have been some landmark successes in recent times in which advertisers were prevented from lying, some even had to repay money. I am talking Australia here and have no idea what goes on in litigation-central USA or the UK. Since usable density range is one of the single most important characteristics of a scanner, and hence a characteristic which is (or should be) involved in everyone's decision making process when buying, consumers have more than the usual right to know a vaguely defensible (by measurement) figure. I will write to Nikon - whether or not they listen to me I really doubt that this claim will remain for long in these litigatious "truth-in-advertising" times, unless it can be substantiated. I am sure you and others will disagree, but no harm in hoping. Of course there is always the possibility that the useful density range of this scanner _is_ 4.2, in which case I will be very pleased to have Nikon let me know this fact, and be one of the first to line up and buy, even if I have to sell my ... um ... ... house? I remember the Peak Music Power days and used to indulge in a bit of hi-fi salesman baiting on this topic. Often good fun on a hot Saturday afternoon, hi-fi shops being air-conditioned. Anyone want do discuss the crystal clarity of music if you use oxygen-free speaker cables? You know of course that in "ordinary" speaker cables the oxygen molecules get in the way of the electrons, causing them to slow down and rattle around, so the music comes out "muffled". I LOVE hi-fi salesmen. :)!! Julian [This PS is relevant and is copied form another post I just wrote after having a Revelation.] PS There is another issue that comes up here - I have assumed that Dynamic range (which until now I would say is the same thing as density range) is Dmax - Dmin where you measure Dmax and Dmin _with_the_same_setup_ - that is, during the one scan. Nikon may argue that their Dmin is measured with the exposure set low, and Dmax with the exposure set as high as possible. This means that they can get up to another 2 to 4 stops(!!!) into their claimed DENSITY RANGE. Which might explain why they use the term Density Range and not Dynamic Range - Dynamic Range certainly means the range that can be covered without changing the setup i.e. the range available at one instant. So I can see it is quite possible that Nikon MAY be able to argue that they cover a Density Range of 3.6 for the LS2000 or 4.2 for the LS4000, although you have to do a couple of separate scans to see it, which is not quite what you would want and certainly not what people are assuming when they read the spec. The mere presence of exposure controls on the Nikon scanner tends to support this idea. So the LS2000 MAY in fact have a density range of 3.6, but it's Dynamic Range could still be 2 (or is it 4) stops less than this - i.e. 3.0 or 2.4. Is it coincidence that most the measurements I have seen are in this range, from memory about 2.6? (I assume people have been measuring Dynamic Range, not Density Range). Julian Robinson in usually sunny, smog free Canberra, Australia
