v700 holders & 35mm

[dfoo]

I recently scanned some 35mm 6400/16 bit and was very disappointed in the sharpness. The film itself is very very sharp, as evidenced with a 10x loupe. However, the scan is super soft. I also tried some very very sharp provia scans, with similar results. I don't think it is a problem with the scanner, as medium format is quite sharp. My first scans were in the 35mm holder. I tried all three heights, and didn't notice a difference. I then tried directly on the glass, that was much less sharp. I then used two pieces of thin glass, and wedged the negative between the two, and scanning. Using the thinnest piece, I got a scan that was quite a bit sharper... I had the epson scanning software set to Film (with film area guide). Does anyone know which lens this uses? Does it use the same lens as with the film holders?

I'm thinking of better the betterscans holders. In your experience will this lead to sharper scans?

[sam_m]

I'm pretty sure "film area guide" uses the lens focused on the scanner glass for sheet film and document scanning, use the "film holder" setting (not sure if that's exactly what its called), you should see a big improvement. I wouldn't scan at 6400, you will get better results at 3200 and upsizing in photoshop using basic bicubic interpolation.

[maddoc]

If you scan film mounted in the film holder, you must use the option "film holder" and not "film area guide", the latter mode switches to the low resolution lens, which focuses on the glass plate. I also would recommend not to scan with 6400 dpi ... I get much sharper scans when setting to 4800 dpi.

I use the the ANR glass inserts from better scanning to hold the film flat. The Epson holder does a very bad job regarding this ... (I have - rough estimation - only about 5% of films that are flat enough to get sharp scans without glass plates) Using TWO glass plates (blow and above the film to hold it flat) is also not good, you add an additionally glass / surface that produces flare (non coated glass) and softens the image.

All the photos in my flickr (120 and 135) were scanned with the V700. Except for the squirky 135 film holder a good machine for the money.

Cheers,

Gabor

PS: One more thing, I have the impression that the driver (software from Epson) sometimes doesn't correctly switch between the two lenses. A restart of both, scanner and scan software usually solves the problem.

[dfoo]

If you scan film mounted in the film holder, you must use the option "film holder" and not "film area guide", the latter mode switches to the low resolution lens, which focuses on the glass plate.

My original, very crappy scans, were in the film holder and I used film holder scanning mode. When I scanned between two glass plates, I used film area guide, and that looks quite a bit sharper. I don't think I could select film holder in this mode, since the scanner software won't find the holder

I'll try the 4800 DPI. I tried, with medium format, 6400 vs 3200, and found better results scanning at 6400 and downsizing (bicubic sharper) to 3200 vs. scanning directly at 3200. I never tried 4800, so I'll give that a whirl!