Slide/film scanner - for Mac
Discussion
I've got a load of slides and negatives I'd like to scan into my McBook Pro, mainly 35mm, but some 126 and even some 110 stuff as well. I'd rather do itself myself than sending the stuff elsewhere, as I could do with a bit of a project.
Budget is about £100 to maybe £150(ish). I've had a look at the usual sites like Amazon and Google, but nothing obvious is leaping out to me.
Which scanner, or websites for inspiration, would people recommend?
Budget is about £100 to maybe £150(ish). I've had a look at the usual sites like Amazon and Google, but nothing obvious is leaping out to me.
Which scanner, or websites for inspiration, would people recommend?
I had a go at this a few years ago with a 35mm slide scanner borrowed from a friend. Because it wasn't a particularly expensive scanner, the quality was 'ok-ish', but the process just took forever and I got fed up with it.
It wasn't just the continual cleaning, loading and unloading of each slide, but faffing around with the software and saving each image and all that.
If you send it away for professionals to do it, the quality will be excellent as they use really expensive automatic scanning machines. The machines often cost around £5000 each.
It costs about £250-300 to have 1000 slides or negatives scanned, and honestly, I think its worth every penny to not have to do it yourself.
It wasn't just the continual cleaning, loading and unloading of each slide, but faffing around with the software and saving each image and all that.
If you send it away for professionals to do it, the quality will be excellent as they use really expensive automatic scanning machines. The machines often cost around £5000 each.
It costs about £250-300 to have 1000 slides or negatives scanned, and honestly, I think its worth every penny to not have to do it yourself.
I bought an Epson V550 flatbed scanner to scan the 35mm film I develop. It cost about £170, but the quality is good and does slides etc.
The only thing to remember is that the Epson software painfully slow. I'm surprised it was released it's that bad. I'm using Silverfast at the moment as you can get it free if you have an Epson scanner amazingly.
The only thing to remember is that the Epson software painfully slow. I'm surprised it was released it's that bad. I'm using Silverfast at the moment as you can get it free if you have an Epson scanner amazingly.
Lord Marylebone said:
I had a go at this a few years ago with a 35mm slide scanner borrowed from a friend. Because it wasn't a particularly expensive scanner, the quality was 'ok-ish', but the process just took forever and I got fed up with it.
It wasn't just the continual cleaning, loading and unloading of each slide, but faffing around with the software and saving each image and all that.
If you send it away for professionals to do it, the quality will be excellent as they use really expensive automatic scanning machines. The machines often cost around £5000 each.
It costs about £250-300 to have 1000 slides or negatives scanned, and honestly, I think its worth every penny to not have to do it yourself.
I scanned in about a thousand slides at my Mum's a few years ago with a cheapo scanner and a laptop I had access to. Yes, it was fairly tedious, but I've got a bit of time on my hands and there's only so much Netflix anyone can watch.It wasn't just the continual cleaning, loading and unloading of each slide, but faffing around with the software and saving each image and all that.
If you send it away for professionals to do it, the quality will be excellent as they use really expensive automatic scanning machines. The machines often cost around £5000 each.
It costs about £250-300 to have 1000 slides or negatives scanned, and honestly, I think its worth every penny to not have to do it yourself.
I'm obviously being a catastrophist, but some of the stuff is irreplaceable and I wouldn't feel happy sending it off to risk being lost/damaged.
Dibble said:
I scanned in about a thousand slides at my Mum's a few years ago with a cheapo scanner and a laptop I had access to. Yes, it was fairly tedious, but I've got a bit of time on my hands and there's only so much Netflix anyone can watch.
I'm obviously being a catastrophist, but some of the stuff is irreplaceable and I wouldn't feel happy sending it off to risk being lost/damaged.
That's entirely fair enough if you are happy to do it yourself. I'm obviously being a catastrophist, but some of the stuff is irreplaceable and I wouldn't feel happy sending it off to risk being lost/damaged.
You clearly have far more patience than me
I'm not too au fait with Mac OS but I think the key is not the scanner itself but the driving software. Some scanners come with a version of Silverfast but if they don't then you can use Vuescan instead. This is their Mac page:
https://www.hamrick.com/macos-big-sur-scanner-soft...
It's free to try but does cost to unlock the full version. It seems Silverfast will run on MacOS as well:
https://www.silverfast.com/show/macos-bigsur/en.ht...
Of course you need the right connector for your Mac - it would be USB on a PC but I don't know what your Mac has. I think you may struggle to get good results with your budget though. A 35mm film scanner won't cope with your bigger negatives & for those you'd need a flatbed scanner - Epson are often recommended (V550/600). For just 35mm then look at Plustek scanners (8200i SE) but I'd highly recommend that you get one with IR dust & scratch removal as it really helps cut down post processing time.
There are quite a few posts on scanning slides if you do a search
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
Someone will be along now to say just point a camera at the negatives.
https://www.hamrick.com/macos-big-sur-scanner-soft...
It's free to try but does cost to unlock the full version. It seems Silverfast will run on MacOS as well:
https://www.silverfast.com/show/macos-bigsur/en.ht...
Of course you need the right connector for your Mac - it would be USB on a PC but I don't know what your Mac has. I think you may struggle to get good results with your budget though. A 35mm film scanner won't cope with your bigger negatives & for those you'd need a flatbed scanner - Epson are often recommended (V550/600). For just 35mm then look at Plustek scanners (8200i SE) but I'd highly recommend that you get one with IR dust & scratch removal as it really helps cut down post processing time.
There are quite a few posts on scanning slides if you do a search
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
Someone will be along now to say just point a camera at the negatives.
Have you considered one of the standalone negative scanners which are very compact and very easy to use, I bought an Agfa branded one a few years ago to scan a load of 35mm negatives and was quite pleased with the results, most have an LCD screen so you can take a look at the image before you scan it. It scanned to a SD card which you could then transfer to your Mac. The only issue I found with the one I bought was that it wasn't very good at scanning slides which it tended to burn out.
I've looked on Amazon and they seem to cost between £50 - £200, the Kodak branded ones seem to get good reviews.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/KODAK-Scanner-Convert-Neg...
I've looked on Amazon and they seem to cost between £50 - £200, the Kodak branded ones seem to get good reviews.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/KODAK-Scanner-Convert-Neg...
It may be helpful to check out this review of scanners
As has been mentioned, if you can stretch to one with IR dust removal it will make further clean up and editing easier.
For reference, the following 2 photos were scanned using an (old) dedicated film scanner - Nikon Coolscan 3 with IR dust removal (now discontinued) using Viewscan software. Although they are available used, they have an outdated SCSI interface so would be a nightmare to connect to your Macbook Pro - you're better off with a new one as per the review above.
glencoe sunset by conradsphotos, on Flickr
whitby_flags2 by conradsphotos, on Flickr
The following was using a DSLR and slide copy setup:
Sign by conradsphotos, on Flickr
Buoys by conradsphotos, on Flickr
ETA:
126 “Instamatic” film is actually the same physical width as 35mm, but with a different image size:
Introduced in 1963, the 126 film cartridge film is 35mm wide, and the image size is 28 x 28mm. The viewable area of 126 negative film is about 26.5mm x 26.5mm.
The standard 35mm filmstrip contains 24mm x 36mm frames.
As an example, the scanned area for the Plustek OpticFilm 8200i SE listed in the reviews at the top is 36.8 mm x 25.4 mm so you may lose 1.1mm from the top/bottom of a 126 frame.
110 film is smaller at 16mm wide physically and image size of 13mm x 17mm.
Larger formats such as 120, 220, or 5x4 would not be handled by a 35mm scanner, but you didn't mention any of these sizes.
Also, it may be worth looking at getting a fairly recent film scanner used from eBay. You should be able to pick up something very good (even going over your budget), but then re-sell it after scanning your images for pretty much the same as you paid for it, so overall no/little cost.
As has been mentioned, if you can stretch to one with IR dust removal it will make further clean up and editing easier.
For reference, the following 2 photos were scanned using an (old) dedicated film scanner - Nikon Coolscan 3 with IR dust removal (now discontinued) using Viewscan software. Although they are available used, they have an outdated SCSI interface so would be a nightmare to connect to your Macbook Pro - you're better off with a new one as per the review above.
glencoe sunset by conradsphotos, on Flickrwhitby_flags2 by conradsphotos, on FlickrMr Pointy said:
Someone will be along now to say just point a camera at the negatives.
Actually I've had good results with this and it's very quick to "scan" each photo, but has the downside of no IR dust removal. It's also not that straightforward - you really need an old negative duplicator type setup, off-camera flash and diffuser for even illumination and a good close-up lens, so well outside your budget if you don't already have a good macro lens etc..The following was using a DSLR and slide copy setup:
Sign by conradsphotos, on FlickrBuoys by conradsphotos, on FlickrETA:
Mr Pointy said:
A 35mm film scanner won't cope with your bigger negatives & for those you'd need a flatbed scanner
As you only list 35mm, 126, and 110 negs and slides, you may well be ok scanning all of these using a 35mm film scanner:126 “Instamatic” film is actually the same physical width as 35mm, but with a different image size:
Introduced in 1963, the 126 film cartridge film is 35mm wide, and the image size is 28 x 28mm. The viewable area of 126 negative film is about 26.5mm x 26.5mm.
The standard 35mm filmstrip contains 24mm x 36mm frames.
As an example, the scanned area for the Plustek OpticFilm 8200i SE listed in the reviews at the top is 36.8 mm x 25.4 mm so you may lose 1.1mm from the top/bottom of a 126 frame.
110 film is smaller at 16mm wide physically and image size of 13mm x 17mm.
Larger formats such as 120, 220, or 5x4 would not be handled by a 35mm scanner, but you didn't mention any of these sizes.
Also, it may be worth looking at getting a fairly recent film scanner used from eBay. You should be able to pick up something very good (even going over your budget), but then re-sell it after scanning your images for pretty much the same as you paid for it, so overall no/little cost.
Edited by C n C on Wednesday 25th November 20:07
sgtBerbatov said:
I bought an Epson V550 flatbed scanner to scan the 35mm film I develop. It cost about £170, but the quality is good and does slides etc.
The only thing to remember is that the Epson software painfully slow. I'm surprised it was released it's that bad. I'm using Silverfast at the moment as you can get it free if you have an Epson scanner amazingly.
I have an Epsom v370 perfection, never heard of Silverfast before, is there a link to the free software at all, the silverfast site wants me to buy it and the price range is huge! The only thing to remember is that the Epson software painfully slow. I'm surprised it was released it's that bad. I'm using Silverfast at the moment as you can get it free if you have an Epson scanner amazingly.
sgtBerbatov said:
I bought an Epson V550 flatbed scanner to scan the 35mm film I develop. It cost about £170, but the quality is good and does slides etc.
The only thing to remember is that the Epson software painfully slow. I'm surprised it was released it's that bad. I'm using Silverfast at the moment as you can get it free if you have an Epson scanner amazingly.
I'm using exactly the same scenario. Scanned in negs from as far back as 42 years old -and still manageed to get placed in a photoclub competition with one of the images it producedThe only thing to remember is that the Epson software painfully slow. I'm surprised it was released it's that bad. I'm using Silverfast at the moment as you can get it free if you have an Epson scanner amazingly.
steveatesh said:
sgtBerbatov said:
I bought an Epson V550 flatbed scanner to scan the 35mm film I develop. It cost about £170, but the quality is good and does slides etc.
The only thing to remember is that the Epson software painfully slow. I'm surprised it was released it's that bad. I'm using Silverfast at the moment as you can get it free if you have an Epson scanner amazingly.
I have an Epsom v370 perfection, never heard of Silverfast before, is there a link to the free software at all, the silverfast site wants me to buy it and the price range is huge! The only thing to remember is that the Epson software painfully slow. I'm surprised it was released it's that bad. I'm using Silverfast at the moment as you can get it free if you have an Epson scanner amazingly.
steveatesh said:
covboy said:
Therewas a direcct link from Epson when I got my V550 which allowed free download
Cheers I’m check it out steveatesh said:
covboy said:
Therewas a direcct link from Epson when I got my V550 which allowed free download
Cheers I’m check it out You need the serial number from the Epson scanner, and you enter it here: https://www.silverfast.com/show/bundle-epson/en.ht...
sgtBerbatov said:
Sorry I missed this.
You need the serial number from the Epson scanner, and you enter it here: https://www.silverfast.com/show/bundle-epson/en.ht...
Cheers for that, I only have the V370 so didn't work, but worth a go thanks.You need the serial number from the Epson scanner, and you enter it here: https://www.silverfast.com/show/bundle-epson/en.ht...
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