It's interesting that you like Minolta S/W better than VueScan. I just
acquired a Scan Dual III and the S/W that came with it leaves a lot to be
desired. I'm scanning some old 35mm color slides with a strong red cast. I
suspect that the cast is due to fading of one of the color layers. The
slides are from 1961. With the Minolta S/W, Pixel Polish shows a very good
color correction, but when the slide is scanned, the red cast is back. With
or without pixel polish, the final scans look the same. I have been working
with Minolta Tech Support on this. They have been very helpful, even sent
me a new CD just in case, but the problem remains. Then I tried VueScan. I
enabled restore colors and restore fading. The results were great. I also
found that, with VueScan, I had more efficient work flow. I can set it for
automatic save, automatic scan (scan begins as soon as the holder is
inserted), automatic eject, and to scan all the slides in the holder without
stopping. I ordered extra holders so that I could be loading a holder and
cleaning the slides while the previous load was being scanned. The only way
I could automate the process with Minolta was to use the Scan Wizard, but
that left me with less control over the results and I couldn't figure out
how to automate everything so that I could just keep scanning without having
to setup the wizard every time I started a new holder of slides.
I guess you can see that I like VueScan. However, I do wish I had ICE
because some of the dirt on my slides appears to be imbedded in the slide.
I can't brush or blow it off, even with compressed air. I've been told that
a plug-in is available for Photoshop which works like ICE. However, PS is
out of my league price-wise. So I'm stuck with the dirt or with removing it
all manually in an editor. No way, with over 1000 slides to scan, some
going back to 1953. Also, my budget was nearly busted at $299 for the Dual
III. Scanners with ICE were all more money which I could not afford.
Dave