Dimage Scan Elite - slides scan blue?

[Rob Wolf]

I have a Dimage Scan Elite (a little dated, but still a great machine).
Negatives scan perfectly, but when I scan slides, I get a blue cast (almost
like having white balance on tungsten) and the contrast is very low. The
slides themselves are in excllent condition. The film is Kodachrome.

I've tried the Minolta TWAIN driver and vuescan, with the same results from
both. A scan of an empty slide frame is perfectly white.

I've tried ICE off (I know it won't work on Kodachrome), as well as auto
expose for slides on/off, color matching on/off, and nothing changes the
output. I can adjust the output to get a bearable result, but it's nothing
like the original slide.

Any suggestions?

Thx in advance
Rob

 

[Maris V. Lidaka Sr.]

2 suggestions using Vuescan:

On the Color Tab select "Options: Advanced". Then adjust "Brightness blue"

And/or [I read this somewhere but haven't tested it] on the Input Tab
(again, select "Options: Advanced") select "Media: Slide Film" rather
than "Image" as generally suggested. Then follow the directions in
"Advanced Workflow Suggestions" in the Help file, using an unexposed slide
or cropping a clear portion of a slide with that film. I understand that
some slide film may have some sort of color cast despite looking perfectly
clear.

Maris

 

[Ken]

I have a Dimage Scan Elite (a little dated, but still a great machine).
Negatives scan perfectly, but when I scan slides, I get a blue cast (almost
like having white balance on tungsten) and the contrast is very low. The
slides themselves are in excllent condition. The film is Kodachrome.

I've tried the Minolta TWAIN driver and vuescan, with the same results from
both. A scan of an empty slide frame is perfectly white.

I've tried ICE off (I know it won't work on Kodachrome), as well as auto
expose for slides on/off, color matching on/off, and nothing changes the
output. I can adjust the output to get a bearable result, but it's nothing
like the original slide.

Kodachrome can be a problem and underexposed are even worse. Vuescan has a
Kodachrome setting that can work well. Select scan type of Slide and then
select from the color panel.

Especially if the slides are underexposed it may be worthwhile to use the
advanced settings on the color panel and adjust the brightness. It may also
help to increase the exposure time.

You may find that Vuescan has problems with noise in the deep shadows.
Minolta scanners seem to vary a bit and whether you have this problem or not
is luck, but Vuescan doesn't seem to cope as well as the Minolta software.
Then the only option is the Minolta software and using the curves
individually for each color to obtain a decent picture.

 

[Mendel Leisk]

I have a Dimage Scan Elite (a little dated, but still a great machine).
Negatives scan perfectly, but when I scan slides, I get a blue cast (almost
like having white balance on tungsten) and the contrast is very low. The
slides themselves are in excllent condition. The film is Kodachrome.

I've tried the Minolta TWAIN driver and vuescan, with the same results from
both. A scan of an empty slide frame is perfectly white.

I've tried ICE off (I know it won't work on Kodachrome), as well as auto
expose for slides on/off, color matching on/off, and nothing changes the
output. I can adjust the output to get a bearable result, but it's nothing
like the original slide.

Any suggestions?

Thx in advance
Rob

This is the only way I've been able to get half decent color balance
out of Velvia100F, starting in Vuescan, with previously scanned
Vuescan raw file. It's basically throwing in the towel with color
balance in Vuescan, but I liked the results, so far (not many tryed
this way, though):

In Vuescan:

Device|Media type: Image
Device|Bits per pixel: 48 bit RGB
Crop|Buffer%: 0
Color|Color balance: none
Color|black point: n/a
Color|white point: n/a
Color|brightness: 1
File|Tiff file type: 48 bit rgb

Then, in Photoshop, working with the tiff:

levels:
..01 wp and bp
With the "autocolor" settings:
"find dark and light colors"
"snap neutral midtones"

Then apply light s-curve and unsharp mask, if you like.