Stormfrog said:
I am curious to know how my Nikon LS-1000 Film Scanner stands up to
the next generation film scanners. Like Nikon's new filmscanners Nikon
Super Coolscan 8000 ED / 4000 ED.
Whats the major difference with the technology? I hear there are
enhancements like "Digital ICE", "ROC" and "GEM enhancements". I have
no Idea what they stand for or what they mean but I have seen pictures
of the result when using them.
(for example:
http://www.steves-digicams.com/2001_reviews/nikon_coolscan4000.html
(dont know whatever thats a reliable source thou)
So basically, anyone knows the difference and care to share it with
me?
Is it worth getting a new scanner?
The LS-1000 was a fine scanner in its day and produced very nice basic
scans from 35mm, but it is at least 6 years old and things have moved on
quite a lot in that time. Note that Nikon's latest top of the range
scanners are actually the LS-5000ED and the LS-9000ED.
Function LS1000 LS4/5000ED LS-8/9000ED
Largest Film Format 35mm 35mm 120/220 (6x9cm)
Sample density 2700ppi 4000ppi 4000ppi
Internal bit depth 12 14/16 14/16
Output bit depth 8 14/16 14/16
Optic 6/4 7/3 - ED glass 6/14 - ED glass
Illumination source RGB LED RGBI LED RGBI LED
Sensor 1-line CCD 1/2-line CCD 3-line CCD
Interface SCSI IEEE-1394/USB-2 IEEE-1394
35mm scan time 40s 40/20s 40s
Multiscan none 1/4/8/16x 1/4/8/16x
Dirt/defect removal none ICE3/4 ICE3/4
Grain reduction none GEM GEM
Faded dye correction none ROC ROC
Density Enhancement none none/DEE none/DEE
There is still a comparison of the LS-1000 and other scanners of similar
vintage on Tony Sleep's home page at
http://www.halftone.co.uk/tech/filmscan/menu.htm
and that indicates that even its immediate successor, the LS-2000, was a
substantial improvement, not only in colour uniformity across the field
but because it introduced, for the first time, multiscanning but Image
Correction Enhancement, ICE, which automatically detects dust, dirt and
other defects on colour film emulsion and removes then automatically.
Since all the Nikon scanners use a collimated light source they are
particularly prone to dust and defect detection, so ICE alone saves
hours of hand cloning.
4000ppi is a moderate enhancement. I have said here many times that the
2700ppi of the earlier Nikon scanners was more than adequate for most of
my purposes but I always found the grain to be considerably worse than
on normal chemical prints of similar scale enlargement. That was grain
aliasing and is considerably reduced by the finer sampling density of
the newer 4000ppi scanners. Apart from tripod mounted shots, that is
the real benefit of the higher resolution scan in almost all cases.
Single pass multiscanning is also a big enhancement with a significant
improvement in the noise floor, especially of negatives, albeit at the
expense of increased scan times. GEM is also worth having - at least as
good as NeatImage, and faster, when the level in both are turned down
sufficiently low to prevent obvious artefacts. ROC - well, how much of
your film has faded dyes? But it works when you do need it, though it
could probably be implemented just as well using Photoshop's autocolor
function, particularly if you have full depth data output. I can't
comment much on DEE, since I haven't used it extensively, although it
seemed to be an automated levels adjustment when I played with it, so
probably, again, something you could live without if you had full depth
data output. Of course, the LS-1000 only has an 8-bit output, so these
functions can't even be implemented manually after the scan, although
the scanner itself supports internal levels controls to get the optimum
8-bits from the 12bit ADC.
Should you upgrade? Are you dissatisfied with what you have? Do you
curse excessive grain, due to the aliased limitations of 2700ppi? Does
the uneven illumination of the LS-1000 bother you - or have you never
even noticed it? How much time do you spend retouching dust and
scratches on colour film?
