I'm about to finish up scanning all of my thousands of slides with my CoolScan5000ED and now that I have a D700 and a 55/3.5AI micro I wanted to compare the two. After selling the dedicated film scanner I wanted to still have the ability to quickly scan any of my slides if needed.
So to just show feasibility I purchased a Nikon ES-1 slide holder and used it with my D700, 55/3.5 micro, and PK-13 extension tube. Here is my very first crude attempt at imaging a 40 year old Kodachrome with my D700 - would it have the resolution and dynamic range of the CoolScan? The major downfall of the D700 setup will be it's lack of ICE (dirt and scratch healing) and batch capabilities, but for one-off scanning it may be OK.
For imaging the slide with the CoolScan I used the supplied Nikon software which used ICE to clean up the slide and D-lighting to pull up the shadows. I don't recall the other settings (likely auto WB, some saturation increase, etc.).
For the D700 I shot 14 bit RAW processed in NX2 and simply aimed my ES-1 at my horribly off-color compact flourescent living room lighst for 6 seconds - I have a light table and will use that later on.
Here's the results: Top - CoolScan5000ED, Bottom - D700. For such a crude attempt I am amazed at how well the D700 did. Though I clipped the highlights a bit with the D700, the shadow detail is right there with the CoolScan. Color balance is off, but like I said I didn't even try with a good light source. More to follow with a much better setup for the D700. So far it has passed my feasibility test.
Not much difference on my laptop display.
I've done basically this with a D3, but never had a Coolscan to compare with. Also, I haven't made a print bigger than about 6"x9" picture area. At that size, the print looked very good...full color and tonal range with a Kodachrome 25 original. At first I used a lightbox, but later used a Nikon SB600 flash aimed a translucent plexiglass behind the slide. With the auto exposure flash extension cable, the exposures are mostly auto, and of course instantaneous.
Tomorrow, if I get some time, I'll frame it better, focus it better, and use my 6" light table and make a bit better image (hopefully).
I like my CoolScan5000ED - it really does chew through the slides with the SF210 feeder (once you figure out how to avoid jamming it up), but on some slides it has major flare problems which significantly hurt the image (this is not unique to my unit which has been fully cleaned - these are known for this "issue").
At the very least I may use this D700 + 55/3.5 micro setup to image these challenging slides. I also scored a mint PB-6 bellows with the PS-6 slide holder today off of ebay and I will start using that when it arrives in a week or so. This will allow me to have the camera + lens + slide holder all locked down, unlike the ES-1 (which has size and simplicity going for it for sure).
I don't even own a dedicated flash, so I may have to get an SB400 or something if I the light table doesn't work for me.
Definitely feasible. However, I can suggest a couple of things.
First, use the multiple exposure feature on the D700. Assuming everything is absolutely rock steady, you should get excellent results. Take two shots, with a couple of stop differences between them.
Anyway, try it and see if it works for you.
Nice job. I would however VERY, VERY strictly advice against using fluorescents as a backlight.
FL lights have a very uneven spectrum, even if you buy the 95CRI daylight versions. Depending on what film you use, this will clash against the pigments that that particular film uses, and give you very funky colours. This actually gives most of the colour difference you see in the comparison above.
Halogen is good, but you need to shoot at base ISO as the CCT (correlated colour temperature) is very low. If you use a "normal" halogen spotlight (the small kind, lamps just have two pins you press into the armature) you can use an 80B correction filter mounted in front of the bulb (watch the heat - keep some distance for airflow!) - or alternatively just behind the film sheet. This will lower the amount of noise in the blue channel in the camera by 1Ev, giving you lots of more shadow detail.
If you light the film to be "scanned" by remote flash, use an FL-D or FL-W filter behind the film holder. You'll have to use a slightly "strange" WB setting when you develop the raws, but both noise and colour accuracy will improve.
...........
My negative comment regarding FL lights is even more applicable to device>device transfers than in device>eye transfers. Most recording devices (cameras, scanners) do not conform to the eye metameries, they will be even more sensitive to uneven excitation spectras. To the naked eye, a transparency backlit by FL lights doesn't look very good, to a camera it "looks" even worse.
nikt wrote:
Definitely feasible. However, I can suggest a couple of things.
First, use the multiple exposure feature on the D700. Assuming everything is absolutely rock steady, you should get excellent results. Take two shots, with a couple of stop differences between them.
Anyway, try it and see if it works for you.
Thanks - I've never used this, but I'll give it a try.
jhinkey wrote:
So, you are saying that using my slide viewing light table as a light source is a bad idea?
- John
If the light table uses "normal" fluorescents you get yellowish pale skintone, greens that tend to cold & to bright and almost no purples at all. This is with PERFECT whitebalance.
This is the D3x shooting a reference target - from the same spot. The only thing that differs between them is that in the first one (the one where the orange really is orange) I've killed the ambient fluorescent lights by nuking the scene with a set of studio strobes.
And a composite of the two - for better visibility
The colour difference is very visible. And this is with quite good quality fluorescents (the best you can get for normal shop use). Do note that the whitebalance and exposure curve brightness is virtually perfectly equal between the sets.
John, you've found your stable mate... the Suede talks your language...
With your new/old gear set up on a tripod, I imagine mounting a flash as Keith suggested and lighting the slide that way would work well. I'm beginning to think as this gets ever more complicated that rather than trying to do this myself, I should wait until you get your setup fine tuned and send you the SIX slides I have to copy so you can do it for me...
theSuede wrote:
If the light table uses "normal" fluorescents you get yellowish pale skintone, greens that tend to cold & to bright and almost no purples at all. This is with PERFECT whitebalance.
This is the D3x shooting a reference target - from the same spot. The only thing that differs between them is that in the first one (the one where the orange really is orange) I've killed the ambient fluorescent lights by nuking the scene with a set of studio strobes.
And a composite of the two - for better visibility
The colour difference is very visible. And this is with quite good quality fluorescents (the best you can get for normal shop use). Do note that the whitebalance and exposure curve brightness is virtually perfectly equal between the sets....Show more →
Thanks a ton for this feedback and information. This is why I like this forum - lots of active intelligent folks willing to share in a very nice way.
I'll dig out my light table and see what I have. I also have some IT8 transparency slides somewhere as well - these may be handy for calibration.
Hi everybody.
I don't post very often but always have a look here. This thread took my atention because I've been using some similar equipment to "scan" my BW negative films and I'm very happy with the results.
D700+Nikon 50/1.8 E+ PK-13 tube + some extension rings+Acura slide copier+SB600. Shot tethered with Nikon Camera Control and open the raw files in Capture NX.
Never tried slides but color negative film is much more complicated to achieve the right colors.I'm looking for a good and cheap 55 AI micro to improve the scans.Some examples can be seen on my Flickr,the BW pics are made this way : http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaha/
John, have you had the chance to do any additional work on this? I'm curious as to the results as it might give me justification for a 55 micro and make scanning slides (and negatives) cheaper for the times that I really want to digitize them.
huddy wrote:
John, have you had the chance to do any additional work on this? I'm curious as to the results as it might give me justification for a 55 micro and make scanning slides (and negatives) cheaper for the times that I really want to digitize them.
Alan -
I've been away on vacation 'til this afternoon and only got my bellows the night before I left over a week ago. So nothing yet, though I will have some time this week and plan to take a few challenging slides that I've scanned with my SS5000ED and re-image them with my D700. The only thing left to do is connect up my light table as the light source, which should not take much time at all.
Looks like I may want to consider something like this if I continue to shoot slides. Do you think this could be modified for negatives with a negative carrier/holder John?
I removed the frosted plastic from my PS-6 and the ES-1. Placing the frosted piece farther away from the slide eliminates all dust concerns, except on the slide itself of course. I use a clean, soft camel hair brush on the slides, followed by some blasts of canned gas.
huddy wrote:
Looks like I may want to consider something like this if I continue to shoot slides. Do you think this could be modified for negatives with a negative carrier/holder John?
Not sure - was there a negative duplicator attachment for the PB-6 bellows?
Keith B. wrote:
I removed the frosted plastic from my PS-6 and the ES-1. Placing the frosted piece farther away from the slide eliminates all dust concerns, except on the slide itself of course. I use a clean, soft camel hair brush on the slides, followed by some blasts of canned gas.
Yes, I thought about this, but did not get to the point of looking to see if it could be removed - I guess it can, so I likely will.
