Topic: On scanning...

[ChristopherCoy]

I hate asking this question, but unfortunately if I'm going to pursue this 52 roll project, scanning is going to be a necessary side effect.

I don't understand resolution, dpi, and all that jazz, and only know enough to be able to put an image on a screen. And I'm not looking for a full lesson on the matter either.

However, can someone review my steps below and tell me where I might be able to improve? All I really want to be able to do is get an image on the screen and have it look nice, without posting something that could be right clicked, and printed.

Using an Epson V500 and CS5, this is what I do:

1. Overview scan the image in .tiff format using the 'system preferences>print/scan' option on my iMac. (no formal scanning software)
2. Scan/save the image in 800dpi
3. Open the image in CS5
4. Adjust exposure, offset, gamma, brightness, contrast to satisfaction.
5. Use sharpen filter once, to compensate for scanner focus inconsistency.
6. Use reduce noise filter once on "2" to compensate for scanner introduced noise.
7. Manually remove any dust from scanner bed.
8. Crop out film edges (i scan with surrounding sprockets etc.)
9. "Save for web and devices" as .jpg, max width/height 1000px, and 75% quality.

I posted my first 52 roll project post, and last night I reviewed it an clicked on an image until it was viewed full size on my screen. I was surprised at how large it was, and would prefer that they aren't posted as large as they are. Should I just set the max width/height at 640px instead of 1000px?

Again, I'm not looking for a full resolution lesson right now, just wanting to know if I'm doing it properly and any areas where I can improve.

Thanks!

[LT]

Two points - these are from my experience ... Pshop has a million ways to do the same thing , so others might do this differently:

1. If the image is too big once saved, then make it smaller as you say I find that somewhere between 500 and 700 on longest side to be best for web display.


2. Resizing will cause the image to soften, so it is better the resize in the software first then some additional sharpening, and finally save. For the additional sharpening, I use USM set at radius of 0.3 and amount at 30%. I apply this several times as necessary - it all depends on the severity of the resize/ size of original file, but I find about 2 or 3 applications works well.

Hope that helps.

[ChristopherCoy]

Ah... so resize the image down to 500-700 pics using the file>automate>fit image thing, and then sharpen, instead of the other way around.

Thanks Leon!

[LT]

I use image size to resize (cs4) - don't know if that is the same in cs5.

I still do the main sharpening before resizing (to deal with the loss of sharpness from scanning) but then do an additional small sharpen (settings above) to deal with the softening of the resize.

[Photo_Utopia]

Everybody's  method will differ slightly and I'm presuming you'll be scanning 35mm in which case I think 800dpi is not quite high enough to extract detail from that format. I scan 35mm at 2400dpi then downsize in automator or with an action I would also echo the advice to sharpen last.
I have a V500 workflow that works well here:
http://photo-utopia.blogspot.co.uk/2010/11/scanning-with-epson-v500.html

My modus is this (I scan 120 mainly)

Dpi is set at 1200
Bit depth is 48 bit—this allows for more file manipulation with less chance of banding in smooth toned areas.
I'd agree with Leon about the size for web, I'll normally make the longest side 750-800 pixels that's about as big as I'd go.
If you're using Epson scan you'll notice 90% of the time it'll clip the highlights so its important to set the white point to the far edge of the histogram.

The scan will look flat in photoshop, so I do a contrast sharpen and curves adjust. The colour scan noise I remove by converting to L*a*b mode and using blur on the a&b channels to give a more monochromatic noise.

Regards
Mark Antony

[Late Developer]

Looks reasonable but a few suggestions...

1. Keep your scanner bed / lens as clean as possible at all times (saves dust spotting in Photoshop)
2. Once you've got your TIFF clean and cropped how you want it (BUT BEFORE ALL THE CONTRAST, GAMMA, ETC - AND ESPECIALLY SHARPENING) save a copy as your "master" file.
3. Save a copy of the "master" file as a JPEG and do all the changes / tweaking on the JPEG. If you screw up, you can always save another copy as a JPEG and have another go.
4. Resize
5. Sharpen last and only after re-sizing.

I use a programme called "BD Sizer" (free download) for resizing. All you have to do is import the file, set the size of the longest edge (in pixels - 650 to 680 is my standard setting), set the max file size (200kb), press the "go" button and then save the end result. A load easier than the Photoshop option.

[calbisu]

Hi there Chris,

I scan my medium format images as JPEG, at 2400 dpi resolution, I adjust contrast slightly with the scan software.
I edit the image with PS camera raw, this way you always have a master image you can go back and the image size remains the same, it saves a lot of disk space and is a non destructive edition. Before I used to edit and save with layers but this way I find it much better.
Later on you can save your image as a JPEG, reducing the image size at PS and post it.

C.

[ChristopherCoy]

Everybody's  method will differ slightly and I'm presuming you'll be scanning 35mm in which case I think 800dpi is not quite high enough to extract detail from that format.

I shoot 120 as well as 35mm in equal proportions, so I scan both.

I bought my V500 off of eBay and had to piece it together with aftermarket ac adapters etc, so I dont have Epson Scan. I've heard the name before but never looked it up. I supposed I can probably download a copy of it from the Epson site.

Thanks for the link to your article.




Again, sorry to bring up a conversation about the "d" side of things, but this 52 roll project is really important to me and I really want to present it properly. I appreciate all the help.

[LT]

Chris - I dont want to sound like one of those other more stroppy websites ... but have you searched this forum? There have been quite a few discussions on this matter over the years, with some quite detailed (and excellent) workflows that might help you.

always worth a search

[Alan]

I think a lot of people have a "hybrid" workflow, the main thing is we all use FILM !!

I have the V500 too with a better scanning film holder for 120.

http://www.betterscanning.com/

My scanning settings to many above:

for 120 film I scan @ 1200dpi with everything [sharpening, dust removal etc] turned OFF.
on some occasions I may pre-edit with brightness/contrast before scanning.

After scanning I save the original file before editing.
The only tools I tend to use are as follows and are in sequence:
Rotate
Crop
Contrast/Brightness
Resize to between 500px - 750px
Sharpen between 15% - 25%

I find that a lot of processing increases "grain" or Pixels so a good rule of thumb is to
pre-edit with the scanning software if needed.

A few tips:
for b+w images make sure they are set for RGB and not Grayscale for the net
calibrate your screen as best you can

Best of luck and more importantly have fun

[Alan]

Everybody's  method will differ slightly and I'm presuming you'll be scanning 35mm in which case I think 800dpi is not quite high enough to extract detail from that format.

I shoot 120 as well as 35mm in equal proportions, so I scan both.

I bought my V500 off of eBay and had to piece it together with aftermarket ac adapters etc, so I dont have Epson Scan. I've heard the name before but never looked it up. I supposed I can probably download a copy of it from the Epson site.

Thanks for the link to your article.




Again, sorry to bring up a conversation about the "d" side of things, but this 52 roll project is really important to me and I really want to present it properly. I appreciate all the help.

If you cannot get software - give me a shout and I'll hook you up with a disc copy [ im sure thats not illegal, he has the scanner etc ? ]

[Photo_Utopia]

I bought my V500 off of eBay and had to piece it together with aftermarket ac adapters etc, so I dont have Epson Scan. I've heard the name before but never looked it up. I supposed I can probably download a copy of it from the Epson site.

Christopher my V500 has a combined scan software and scanner driver, how are you scanning without drivers?
Yes you can freely download the Epson software, it should have come with the scanner.

[charles binns]

When scanning I first of all set the image size to whatever I want (I tend to choose 8" x 8"  for 120 6x6 negs, which is an arbitrary size if I'm honest.) and set the resolution to 600 dpi.  The minimum resolution for printing is 300dpi, so by scanning at twice that I could, if I wanted, print to 16" x16".    I haven't printed anything for years but if I wanted to I'd probably go for between 8 and 16 inches width depending on the image.

I scan the negative as a tiff file and do all the levels, curves, contrast adjustment etc, in Photoshop  - I never use the scanner software.

I was advised by a professional to always set the file size when scanning to whatever size you would want to print the image to so that's what I do.  Actually I have found no real difference to scanning at the native size (ie size of the negative) with a resolution of 4800dpi.  However, if you ever wanted to produce huge prints - you are better off setting the physical size at the scanning stage.

Once I have an image I want to publish on the web I creat a copy and resize it to 800 pixels wide (which should fit most people's screens) and save it as a jpeg using the Save for Web and Devices function on Photoshop with quality set to 70%.

Hope this helps.

[jojonas~]

this is all very interesting!
I mostly just adjust levels if I feel the need to in the epson scanning software and scan so I have a jpeg-file at a bit over 1000 pixels on the short side and... yeah that's pretty much it. if I want to print it I'll make the file larger and also check for dust n stuff.

A few tips:
for b+w images make sure they are set for RGB and not Grayscale for the net
calibrate your screen as best you can

I'm curious, what do you mean here?

[Francois]

Chris:
Here is the link to the drivers for your scanner Epson

As for me, what I mostly do is scan 48 bit color, open in CS3, adjust levels (I use the white dropper to set the white balance at the same time), resize image (image-Image Size) using the "Bicubic sharper (best for reduction)" setting. Convert to 8 bit, save for web and devices.

I usually reduce the images to 600 on the widest side as this prevents printing the images at any size bigger than a postage stamp. Sometimes, I apply an unsharp mask right after I adjusted the levels or in the end when it doesn't look good enough for me... but most often I don't even bother with that.

[SLVR]

Leon, How is it that resizing the image smaller causes the image to soften? I find 100% of the time it sharpens my images. In photoshop.

Depending on the source of the file when resizing i will use a bicubic sharper when reducing to sharpen while not sharpening the grain. If it were a digital (eek i know) file they usually come out sharp so adding more sharpness gives a weird look. I use just bicubic for that.

My process goes as follows:

Cut neg
place in holder
clean everything as much as i can, blow negs with a blower thing i have.
Launch SILVERFAST
prescan one frame to get size and rotation of the frames set
pick and choose which ones to scan and scan one at a time.

settings are usually 4800dpi (for 35mm, around 800 for 120 comes out with around a 50mb tiff file regardless), 48bit > 8bit, saturation 20-25, no sharpening, digital ice set to correct level 17 (for C-41) do not use auto it will take forever.

In photoshop i do some spot removal on dust, no sharpening, save out original then save an alt at 1750 px either wide or tall with bicubic sharper for flickr. Files are saved out at 4800dpi and i will reduce if i need to. But the data is there, why reduce it?

i feel like i get great results. Sharpness has been a HUGE pet peeve of mine which lead me to buy my V700 and tell off the cheaper scanners. I did do some 110 with the unsharp mask set to auto in silverfast though, while grain was increased as expected the images came out shockingly sharp sans artifacting.


Untitled by nownownownow, on Flickr

[mcduff]

Hi tintin. Anytime you do interpolation you will get  softening as you are 'rebuilding' the image with pixels of a different size. The edges which will have been reasonably sharp will get replaced with pixels that will be statistically determined. It may appear sharper as it is lower resolution but when compared to if you had scanned it at that resolution it is not as sharp.  Leon's suggestions for sharpening are what I would have considered acceptable and correct back in the day when I was prepping for the press and in line with what I do (when I am not lazy). Leon is right about the stuff ;-)

I have been scanning at 4800 dpi with my v700 but thinking of dialing down to 3200 as I really wonder if the optics of the v700 can warrant 4800. I place emulsion side up (despite how it does not make sense other than not having to flip the images - which is no biggie).

[Phil Bebbington]

My scanning always used to be well dodgy, but, some time ago, Leon shared his work flow with me and it improved things tremendously!

On the initial scanning side, I always scan the 120 neg original size at 3200 dpi which gives me a file size of 127 meg. I used to scan smaller, but, I got caught with my trousers down  on a couple of occasions, not having the file size that was needed hence my current scan size. Trousers have stayed in place ever since - re-scanning and re-adjusting is a real pain!

[ChristopherCoy]

Christopher my V500 has a combined scan software and scanner driver, how are you scanning without drivers?
Yes you can freely download the Epson software, it should have come with the scanner.

I haven't the foggiest. I bought the scanner, bought the ac adapter, bought a USB cable, and plugged it in to my iMac.

[ChristopherCoy]

Chris - I dont want to sound like one of those other more stroppy websites ... but have you searched this forum? There have been quite a few discussions on this matter over the years, with some quite detailed (and excellent) workflows that might help you.

always worth a search

I did, but I didn't find specifics that I was looking for. I figured the topic was a dangerous slope, but I also figured this was the best group to get the info from.

[ChristopherCoy]

My scanning always used to be well dodgy, but, some time ago, Leon shared his work flow with me and it improved things tremendously!
!

Oops. Perhaps I didn't search well enough then. My apologies to everyone.

[LT]

Leon, How is it that resizing the image smaller causes the image to soften? I find 100% of the time it sharpens my images. In photoshop.

I've no idea what it does to soften the image, but it does.  I cut my teeth in neg scanning/ digi realisation of negs using a mixture of workflow from Barry Thornton's Elements of Transition guide from 2003 (dont think this is still available, but it was a lifesaver for me), and some tips from a great pro 'tog called Ralph Barker (he used to moderate the Ilford forum, not sure if he still does). The tips in the guide relate back to P'shop 2, so some of the steps are unnecessary with the new PS tools etc, but the message, as Mcduff above reiterates, was that any kind of digital resizes will soften the image.  So a little re-jigging is necessary to counteract the interpolation effect. Just a touch - my 16-bit 1600 ppi scans are resized to 72 ppi at 600 pixels on the longest edge - this requires 3 x sharpening at the above settings to get it back to pre-resize sharpness. No idea why yours doesn't show this, maybe you resize using a different method, which automtically compensates??? who knows.     


Christopher - here are a few that might help, or add to this one:

http://www.filmwasters.com/forum/index.php?topic=1950.msg17006#msg17006

http://www.filmwasters.com/forum/index.php?topic=1329.msg11352#msg11352

http://www.filmwasters.com/forum/index.php?topic=2917.msg27716#msg27716

[LT]

Leon is right about the stuff ;-)).

You mean I'm not just a pretty face?

[Phil Bebbington]

You mean I'm not just a pretty face?

I refuse to take the bait 

[mcduff]

Haha Leon. I won't agree to anyone having a pretty face till they have bought me a few pints ;-p

As to why softness happens, it is simple. Envision you have a complex tile pattern laid out with 3" black and white tiles and at the last moment you have to use 4" tiles. As a compromise you can use different shades of grey tiles for those areas that straddle the former black and white tiles. These grey tiles are the 'softness' that is being introduced. That is what happens when you resample: a new grid is being drawn over the old grid and many (or most) of the new pixels are not going to align with the old pixels therefore they will need to average the value of more than one pixel. Any time pixels start a averaging values = softness.  Whether you do cubic interpolation or not is merely an issue of the algorithm you use to determine the averaged values.

[Alan]

this is all very interesting!
I mostly just adjust levels if I feel the need to in the epson scanning software and scan so I have a jpeg-file at a bit over 1000 pixels on the short side and... yeah that's pretty much it. if I want to print it I'll make the file larger and also check for dust n stuff.

A few tips:
for b+w images make sure they are set for RGB and not Grayscale for the net
calibrate your screen as best you can

I'm curious, what do you mean here?

have you ever noticed when you edit your image to where you want it and save it
then view it online it looks much darker than you viewed it before uploading it?

if yes the image was set as grayscale >

info here >

http://photoshop4artists.blogspot.ie/2009/04/cmyk-vs-rgb-knowing-which-color-space.html

[LEAFotography]

I've been wondering why everyone else's scans look so good in comparison with my own, a good time to experiment with scanning to get better web versions from my negatives. Thanks for all the useful tips and links folks

[LT]

It always amazes me when these thread arise, that we know so much about these things ..... considering we are a bunch of luddite king cnuts.

 

[Francois]

Online images look different because of the profile used. The web is built around the sRGB profile. Anything else just looks different. On grayscales, I think it might be worth saving them as RGB images just for that. Thing is grayscale doesn't support profiles as we know them.

I must say I always find it a bit paradoxal that digital manipulations affect sharpness and contrast in such a negative way. On one hand, being pure mathematics, the system should be perfect. But on the other hand, little errors creep in here and there as you apply filters and effects.

One thing that's pretty nice with photoshop is that you can make a special action set for doing such repetitive tasks. Then, it's just a matter of pressing the go button and waiting for it.

Typically, simply adjusting levels shouldn't affect sharpness of the image since it involves a singular pixel level change. Resizing down can make things more fuzzy since the system makes a series of cubes which it averages and reduces to a single pixel. What gives the impression of increased sharpness is the fact that being smaller, there is less detail to see and the lines become sharper. But if there is lower contrast, the image will loose still more contrast making the image look fuzzy.

It all has to do with each individual image. As Leon likes very soft graded tones, just shrinking will make the image blah. But since I make my images with starker contrast, reduction doesn't affect them quite as much.

I think that makes some sense? But it's just my 2¢ worth.

Since I don't want to spend hours scanning, I usually scan for the web at a low resolution (600 DPI for 35mm) and do minimal work on the images. I rescan if I want enlargements.
For calculating what size scan I need, I sometimes use this (http://dl-c.com/Temp/downloads/ScanCalc/Default.htm)
It should run just fine on a mac if you install Wine or Winebottler (http://winebottler.kronenberg.org/) which give unix based systems the ability to run windows programs without installing windows itself. It runs very well on Linux so it should run just as fine on OS X.

[gary m]

Here is a workflow that I just looked at recently- http://skink74.wordpress.com/2013/01/07/film-scanning-workflow/

[jojonas~]

Here is a workflow that I just looked at recently- http://skink74.wordpress.com/2013/01/07/film-scanning-workflow/

that colour managing part looked good! still too much for me to read though. I just don't have much patience for this stuff hehe

[original_ann]

I always scan the 120 neg original size at 3200 dpi which gives me a file size of 127 meg.

So... a Gigabyte per roll?  You must have a lot of storage?  I feel so inadequate right now.  I scan all of my film - every roll I've ever shot in my life is scanned.  But I make really small file sizes:  Like 6" square @ 400-600 dpi.  If and when I need it for a print I use On One Perfect Resize. 

... is everyone wincing right now?   

[ChristopherCoy]

... is everyone wincing right now?

No. I do everything twice.

If I ever do want to print digitally, I'll go back and scan/re-edit.

[Phil Bebbington]

Ann, my way certainly isn't the logical or sane  way. However, it helps my insecure/OCD way that I look at tasks - 12 images all scanned the same bloody size and yet I may only use 4 frames, if I'm lucky. The drives fill up - good  job I don't shoot that much. Fits and starts for me. Nothing since October at the moment 

[Francois]

... is everyone wincing right now?   

I think I'm going to be grinding my teeth all night!
But while on the subject of weird digi manipulations, I just discovered a program which I think might be of some use some day.
Does it happen that you get a badly blurry image of something you really want?
Well, I just got Smart Deblur Portable from Portableapps and I think it's pretty amazing. I haven't tried it out with some of my images but just looking at the demo image, I think it's quite promising!