They do struggle a bit more when it comes to medium format and particularly 35mm, but for 4x5 and up they are all that most of us will ever need. Don't get me wrong, those Epsons are honestly great machines and do a fantastic job for us large format guys.
I have been scanning 4x5 sheets on an Epson v700 for about a decade now, and as my skill and printing needs grew as a photographer I figured I had outgrown that consumer model of scanner. It just has a bit more of a learning curve than most modern imaging software. The software was designed to run on such old machines (state-of-the-art at the time) and overall it doesn't really lag and works just fine.
Despite having to use an ancient computer and spending some time figuring out how to operate such old software, they typically run quite smoothly. On top of that the software is usually designed for only one generation of a particular old computer, quite commonly a PowerMac or something similar. Most drum scanners will take outdated computer interfaces like SCSI instead of modern USB connections, which usually means you need an older computer to use it. The wet mounting is supposed to help with light transfer through the film and also significantly reduces dust, scratches and other imperfections. The end result is a scan with incredible resolution, detail, and dynamic range to work with. Once in the scanner the drum spins at a high speed and the scanner reads just a very tiny portion of the film on each rotation, taking in the visual info in an analog fashion through vacuum tubes and other mysterious technology before converting the data from the three color channels into a digital file.
There are many types of drum scanners out there, but they follow a similar process in that the film must be wet mounted to a drum and then placed in the scanner. Now after scanning about a hundred sheets I now have some results to share! What is a drum scanner and why should I care?įor us large format photographers there are really just a few options when it comes to digitizing our beautiful sheets of film: Flatbed scanners like the Epson v700/750 or v800/850, a few very expensive dedicated scanners like the Hasselblad Flextight, or a drum scanner.
I spent much of the last year learning how to properly wet mount film and operate this beast of a machine. Many of you who follow me on social media have heard that I acquired a drum scanner about a year ago.
0 kommentar(er)
