Show Posts
1
Site Information / Re: Photo screening decisions, opinions please.
« on: November 02, 2010, 08:51:24 pm »
The problem with Kodachrome is that the emulsion is quite sticky compared to others like Fujichrome and as a result it tends to be quite a job removing dust and dirt particles that have accumulated on the slide over the years. One solution is to use software to eliminate these dust particles, ICE apparently does a pretty good job but it isn't clever enough to discriminate between what is and what isn't dust. It would appear that the picture I linked to used some kind of automatic dust removal but also removed other fine detail in the process.
As Frank has already pointed out he wasn't aware of the issue having never scanned a slide. When I started to look into the whole process of scanning slides I learnt quite a bit along the way. I started using a Canonscan 4400 flatbed scanner which used an insert to mount the slides, four at a time, into the lid. This gave reasonable results and a couple of images using this method are on this site. I wasn't entirely happy with the results so I then tried to shoot the slides on a lightbox using a macro lens attached to my Canon 40D. This too gave reasonable but inconsistent results. I then bought a Nikon Coolscan slide scanner and I wish I went with this option from the outset! It gives consistently good results and although the scan takes about 30-40 seconds it is by far the best method for scanning slides at home. For dust removal I normally increase the size of the scanned image to 20000 pixels in Photoshop and use the Healing Brush tool to remove any dust or imperfections. When I'm happy with that then I edit the image as normal i.e. brightning, contrast, sharpening etc. and save the image as a copy.
It's a learning curve scanning old slides but it's very rewarding to see old images come to life on the PC!
Andrew
andrewmartin.fotopic.net
As Frank has already pointed out he wasn't aware of the issue having never scanned a slide. When I started to look into the whole process of scanning slides I learnt quite a bit along the way. I started using a Canonscan 4400 flatbed scanner which used an insert to mount the slides, four at a time, into the lid. This gave reasonable results and a couple of images using this method are on this site. I wasn't entirely happy with the results so I then tried to shoot the slides on a lightbox using a macro lens attached to my Canon 40D. This too gave reasonable but inconsistent results. I then bought a Nikon Coolscan slide scanner and I wish I went with this option from the outset! It gives consistently good results and although the scan takes about 30-40 seconds it is by far the best method for scanning slides at home. For dust removal I normally increase the size of the scanned image to 20000 pixels in Photoshop and use the Healing Brush tool to remove any dust or imperfections. When I'm happy with that then I edit the image as normal i.e. brightning, contrast, sharpening etc. and save the image as a copy.
It's a learning curve scanning old slides but it's very rewarding to see old images come to life on the PC!
Andrew
andrewmartin.fotopic.net
