Bob:
Have been using a 4990 for about three months. One of the reasons for
getting that particular model was its ability to handle 8x10 negatives.
The scanner produces results of a fairly high quality, such that
digital prints on Crane's Platinotype in my low-end Epson RX510
dye-based printer come out acceptably well. Haven't tried producing
digital negatives as yet, as getting the right kind of transparency
material to take dyes has proven difficult here in Australia. Going to
have to upgrade to a pigment printer.
The Silverfast s/w that comes with it is ok, but I haven't been able to
really get out of it what I was after. I bought the Professional
version of VueScan (www.hamrick.com) on the recommendation of Dan
Burkholder, and have found it is far easier to use, and more
comprehensive. It has built-in in profiles for a very large number of
scanners, and of various film types and brands.
One issue I am still trying to solve is how to manipulate VueScan so as
to be able to scan both high and low tones separately and produce a
single optimised scan to import into Photoshop (or GIMP). So far I have
been able to marry the two separate scans as layers relatively
successfully in Photoshop, but was interested to see if that extra step
could be eliminated. VueScan, like any other complex s/w package, does
require a careful reading of the manual.
The 4990 is recommended.
Cheers,
Peter McDonald
Canberra, australia.
Received on Thu Sep 1 18:25:14 2005
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