OpticalLimits

Digitising analog slides with a camera

stoppingdown

I definitely need to digitise my old analog slides because I need to get rid of them and make room.
In the past (actually, lots of years ago) tried with a paid service offered by one of the most reputed photo shops in Milan, but got very, very, very bad results.
When I was still shooting analog I owned a classic slide scanner, but it was slow and expensive. Now I see there are very cheap products (around 100-150€), but I suppose their quality is cheap too.
I have a hi-res flatbed scanner, but I think it would be really slow to use.

So I'm thinking of using a camera body with the Sigma 105mm macro lens. What do you think of this adapter?

https://www.amazon.it/JJC-Adattatore-digitalizzazione-pellicole-negative/dp/B09TP2R92Q

I think it should be ok also because I could preview the images with the camera connected to a monitor, and process only the good ones.

What do you think in general for this job?
Thanks.

toni-a

I did it once with the camera, results were great but you have the challenges of lighting and mounting the slides.
In the past slide duplicators were common, if you can still find one your issue is solved

stoppingdown

I bought the one mentioned in my first post. While the Sigma 105mm ƒ/2.8 macro is not in the list of supported lenses, there's a Laowa with the same parameters. The thing can be mounted with no extra adapter rings (anyway some are provided with the package), but I have a problem with the focus breathing of my lens: focusing at the required distance also “zooms in”, so the slide gets substantially cropped. I need to find another extension (not extension tubes, it is to be mounted in front of the lens) or try with a different lens. In the end, I should be able to fix that and the product seems good. I'll let you know.

davethebirder

I had not thought of the issue of focus breathing ..... why not an extension tube ??

Slightly OT.
Many years ago a friend of mine and I set a a web site called ... "76 Station Rd Hippies" a site to remember the 10 years or so we lived in that hippie household .. (super crazy times and then some 🙂 )........ we copied all our slides using his Nikon slide copier which was fairly speedy .... the time consuming part was de-spotting my slides which had unfortunately had been stored in various lofts, some slides required 2-3 hours each of painful cloning out mould and dirt ..... (using photo-impact)

.... sadly some time ago my friend past on along with the access details to the site, but for years the site remained, always surprising me how long it would continue to do so every time I visited it .....

Three days ago while talking about the house with a friend I googled it and it had gone .... with not a mention of it's existence or traces thereof ..... straight away I found all the images on my computer and quickly sent them to all of my hard drives ....

nothing lasts for ever ..... but that's a subject of deep scientific debate .....

stoppingdown

davethebirder wrote
I had not thought of the issue of focus breathing ..... why not an extension tube ??

It was the first thing I tried, but... it seems it doesn't work. Same issue.