[Reinier]

Hi all,


Toni-a told me about digitizing my slides with a camera. Does anyone have experience digitizing slides this way? What camera and lens should I use and what is an good adapter? And is it as good or maybe even better than scanning slides?


I have still a large collection which I did not have the energy to scan it all, which was very time consuming. I own a Konica Minolta scan elite II, which is a great scanner. But it does not work on my Windows 7 computer, unfortunately.


Hope to hear from you.


Kind regards,

Reinier

[Brightcolours]

Your scanner on windows 7:

http://www.dyxum.com/dforum/how-to-run-o...80321.html

http://www.hamrick.com/vuescan/minolta_s...te_ii.html

 

If you want to use a camera,  a FF one with live view preferably, with a macro lens which reaches 1:1. FF because with APS-C you need to have more distance and these products usually have been made for FF distances. 

I'd use a Nikkor 55mm f3.5 macro or Nikkor 55mm f2.8 macro with 1:1 extension tube because they are relatively affordable, sharp, easily adapted and for 55mm distance there were plenty of such products, like this one:

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/3...apter.html

The one I have can tilt a bit due to its construction, but with live view one can manage.

[JJ_SO]

I did that once, so long ago that I don't know if I got all 135 slides (the 120 ones I managed to finish). It is time-consuming and after a while I started to think about my "other" photography. Becoming a good repro operator doesn't improve other photographic skills.

 

I don't have such a film scanner, only an Epson V750 which can take 6 stripes of film or 24 slides in one go. My approach was from the beginning, to get those files into a Mac. Which were good enough to see on which I could spend some more time or even send them to a proper scan service?

 

None, at the end... my current pictures are better than the ones I took on slide film during the last +30 years.

Slide film was expensive to me, so 36 frames without any other EXIF than the notes on paper are usesles to learn with. Except the Kodachomes, the colors were "interesting", but not necessarily recognizable 

 

But the BW 120 negatives still have some nice jewels in.

 

I got a Kodak carousel projector, detached it's lens and changed the lamp to a 10 W version. Then I put a diffusor in front of it to equilibrate the light fall-off (but it remained and issue). At the best time, I managed to get 80 slides in less than 4 minutes to a Pentax K-m. In front of the body I mounted a Schneider componon-S which I used for the dark-room enlarger. I had to put black tape on it's aperture indicator to avoid red tinted slides. With this method I was fast and got around 9 MP/slide.

 



 



 

The carousel I choose because the slides are always at the same position. I could focus a bit with a quick release rail. No, I focused by moving the projector :unsure: It was too much an effort but I could have done it fully automatically and use the time to put the slides from their standard magazines into the carousels. But after a couple of days it was done, using alternating the two remote controls. At the time we worked reduced hours, so it became possible.

 

Today I would not waste a single day of a weekend. It was necessary for me to do the job to come to the conclusion "my time is more valuable to work with current ideas and do them properly", but before nobody could have talked sense in me.

 

With the negatives, VueScan had an theoretically amazing feature: While SilverFast was doing scans for each frame separately and failed very often to detect or autocorrect them, not to mention dust removal with Infrared, the mechanics of the scanner were constantly stressed. VueScan can do RAW-images of the whole negative holder and later I used them to run single scans on the RAW scan. Quicker and less stressful for the mechanics Unfortunately at the time it was not reliable to detect all frames. Hamrick compiled one version after another and used me as test pilot, he even wanted me to transfer 1 GB DNG (which were not recognized as DNGs from Adobe...) from my place to his office. With a DSL line, able to manage like 300 bit/s upload. He answered quickly but at some time I was pretty frustrated and he commented a moody mail from me with "I don't know what you want, I make 2 million $ per year with it, so it can't be that bad..." To be honest, the other scan apps I tried were partly horrible.

[wim]

Actually, it probably is worthwhile looking into a dedicated scanner for this, as that is easily the fastest and simplest way of doing things. Over here prices start at around 60 to 70 euros, and go up to almost 10 times that. Some or better than others, obviously, but this is likely the most convenient and fastest way of doing things these days.

 

Here are a few links to reviews and some info:

http://www.scanplify.com/best-35mm-film-...r-reviews/

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/explora/pho...m-scanners

http://www.toptenreviews.com/computers/p...onverters/

http://slidescannerreviews.info/

http://howtoscan.ca/negative-scanning/ne...review.php

https://photofocus.com/2015/09/13/review...ith-jumbl/

 

Kind regards, Wim

[obican]

Btw, I'm not sure whether one-shotting negatives with a 1:1 macro lens is better than most relatively cheap film scanners or not. All the results that claim to be better than high-end scanners are taken with using 2:1 or even 3:1 macro lenses and stitching multiple images for 35mm negatives.

[Reinier]

Thanks for your thorough replies, they are most helpful!


I am not completely sure what the easiest option is for me, because I am quite limited. I like the idea of using a slide projector or a Dslr with adapter and macro lens, but I have an APSC camera and no macro lens at this moment. And I am not sure which yield the best quality.


I have been using Vuescan for my could old Konica Minolta scan elite II 5400. But the weird thing is, my Windows 7 computer just does not find the scanner. I have tried all the useal things, but it just does not detect the scanner.


Does anyone know how to solve this?


By the way, I only have 135mm slides.


Kind regards,


Reinier

[Brightcolours]

Thanks for your thorough replies, they are most helpful!


I am not completely sure what the easiest option is for me, because I am quite limited. I like the idea of using a slide projector or a Dslr with adapter and macro lens, but I have an APSC camera and no macro lens at this moment. And I am not sure which yield the best quality.


I have been using Vuescan for my could old Konica Minolta scan elite II 5400. But the weird thing is, my Windows 7 computer just does not find the scanner. I have tried all the useal things, but it just does not detect the scanner.


Does anyone know how to solve this?


By the way, I only have 135mm slides.


Kind regards,


Reinier

Read the dyxum link in my above post for hints?

[obican]

If your slides are already in slide carriers, projector+dslr method is pretty fast. You get to scan as fast as you can click on the projector and the quality is quite acceptable. Otherwise, if you can't get your scanner to work, probably the easiest and fastest way is buying another scanner, using it and selling it afterwards. 

 

Macro rig requires a lot of fiddling at start but when you set one up, it'll be both fast and good quality, especially if you stitch.

[Sylvain]

It's pretty clear that when set up and running, the quality will surpass our flatbed scanners and quite frankly a bunch of the remaining Frontier. Frankly, I've fiddled quite a bit with my epson v750, adjusting height etc that I decided I'd go the macro lens way + autofocus. It was obvious from the very first tests that the scanner got instantly obsolete.  

 

I haven't tried yet but I recently got a E-M5 mk II and am pretty excited about trying it tethered and at its High Resolution mode. It might be a pretty way to avoid stitching, get decent resolution and get cleaner colors. 

 

Then the funny part starts : dealing with orange masks for colour films (many ways to do so, still unconclusive to me, I was doing B&W) and assuming lightroom isn't botching your camera intended color rendition. You can always use your camera maker software ... But in printing, scanning, etc... I eventually concluded that good enough is the target. 

[toni-a]

Stitching isn't a solution when you have hundreds of slides.

I know for full frame slide duplicators you put the slide inside and shoot, you have your picture scanned.

Otherwise I think the scanner is the best choice, BC suggested a software for running the scanner, should be a practical solution