Hello Rafe, I don't know if you have experience with drum scanners and
the new Nikons, and i read your post that "i cant prove it" with
interest. I don't know what is wrong with the Tango in that example,
and i would not want one myself. And i think that the entire question
of resolution misses the boat with what really matters, which is shadow
detail in high-gamma films like Velvia, Kodachrome, and vintage
thick-emulsion B&W. I did my comparative scans last summer and i was
knocked out by the difference. One web page that has these comparisons
you can see is here, check the Howtek 4500 vs the Nikon:
http://www.terrapinphoto.com/jmdavis/
Funny. That's my site.
My experience with drum scanners is limited to a few
months with a ScanMate 5000. If you check my site
again and look at the two scans by Dave King -- the
one made on the ScanMate was done on the machine that
I got from Dave.
You will see the night
photograph has about a half stop more shadow detail on the Howtek.
I don't agree with that conclusion. What I see
from Lawrence Smith's two scans is that the Nikon
scan is not in proper focus. This is ISO 100
film pushed two stops. The grain should be clear
in both scans. I know that Lawrence bought his
LS-8000 about the same time as I did and never
liked it very much. He then evaluated an LS-120
and didn't like that much, either. After that,
he got the Howtek 4500.
The better comparisons of dynamic range are near
the bottom of my scan-snippets site, arranged in
the table labeled, "One Perfect Chrome...."
Most of those scans were arranged by Neil Snape,
whom you may know from the Scan Hi-End group.
I will grant you that drum scanners can have better
dynamic range than the Nikons. Even so, I think
the LS-8000 does pretty well in that comparison.
For what I do it's a non-issue, since most of what
I scan is C41 film. On most slides, the dynamic
range is quite adequate.
I have
no regrets. About the cost, I have followed all the Howtek auctions on
ebay for the last six months, and several have sold for less than a
thousand, although to be fair when all is said and done you will
probably want to pay a bit more. After spending $1600 on mine, plus
software, plus spare drum, expendables, etc, i was in to it $3500.
Which is still cheaper than a new Nikon with the Aztek film holder for
it.
The LS-9000 is $1800 new, and I'm not convinced that the
Grecco (Aztek) carrier is a requirement. By all accounts
the LS-9000 is even sharper than its predecessor. (See
Max Perl's scans on my site.)
I've used my LS-8000 for nearly five years now with just
the glassless carrier.
To put this in perspective, this is a $47,000 machine that will
still be working long after a Nikon wears out from daily use.
We'll see about that. My LS-8000 has been working
its little butt off since June 2001. Me, I'd be
wary of owning any machine that could only be
serviced by Aztek.
This
machine paid for itself in one month, and i am going to buy a second
(since one dongle will run two machines, the next one will be only half
the price). I have to say that i compared Kodachrome scans that I made
personally on both types of machines and there is simply no comparison.
And i tried glass mounting the Nikon, i know that the results with
that are very soft without a glass carrier. You may want to check the
Aztek site for the comparitive scans of Nikon using their film holder
vs the stock Nikon.
Aw, c'mon. I've seen that little snippet on the Aztek
site and it's silly as hell. All of the LS-8000 scans
that you see on my snippets site are from my scanner,
with the stock glassless carrier, and with Digital ICE
turned on.
Again, I'll grant drum scanners an edge in dynamic range,
though not enough (for my work or budget) to justify the
huge bother and expense. No drum scanner (to my knowledge)
has digital ICE. If you haven't seen dICE in action, you
don't know what you're missing. And at this point, I
couldn't imagine scanning MF or LF film without it.
Tell you what, if you've got any scan snippets sharper
than what's already posted on my site, send them my way,
and I'll be happy to post them.
In another couple of years I suspect this discussion --
for me at least -- will be totally moot. I figure that's
how long it will take for an affordable DSLR to match
scanned 6x7 format MF film. And when that happens, the
Nikon won't matter much any more.
I do maintain a low-level interest in drum scanners
because I still shoot a bit of LF film. So I watch
the eBay auctions...
rafe b
www.terrapinphoto.com
scan snippets
www.terrapinphoto.com/jmdavis
). I normally run the