Railfan Technology > Ideas for Scanner with 120 Film(21/4x21/4 & 21/4x23/4) Capable

Looking for help and ideas to scan not 35mm but also 120 film of all sizes.Any suggestions would be appreciated.Bill Webb

I have posted many black and white and some color images made from 2 and 1/4 inch by 2 and 1/4 inch negatives and slides. I use an older Epson V550 Photo scanner. The adapter for 2 and 1/4 inch square negatives also takes 
2 and 1/4 inch by 2 and 3/4 inch film. 
Perhaps a newer Epson Photo scanner like the Epson Perfection V600 might be to your liking.
Bob
P.S. You might search Trainorders for photos by refarkas to see some of my scans.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/08/24 05:35 by refarkas.

Thanks for the response .I have quite a few of the 6x7 negs from my 6x7 Pentax and would like to scan them.Do know much about the Epson V850.? The Epson rep says they will  scan the 6x7 negatives. .Bill Webb

No, I have never even seen one.
You might try and find the owner's manual online.
Bob

Epson scanners have a pretty good following on TO, although not an archival image scanner. There have been some software questions related to noise reduction, basically the S/W eliminating a detail instead of noise. There's also some aftermarket software that was popular at one time. There are a number of interesting posts about Epson scanners and various model numbers in the TO archives.

There is a balance for end use, along the lines of wall hanging photos or endless resolution archival use. The Epson v500 I have been using is handy for a few 35mm slides or a strip of 35mm negatives or a couple of 6 x 4.5 images at a scan, but not a serious level scanner. But it works and keeps on working.

I've been using an Epson V750 Pro for years to scan everything from 645 to 4x5 to archival glass plates up to 8x10 and it never skips a beat.
Careful use of the scanning software is key, then saving as .tifs (a non-lossy format) and polishing in PhotoShop is my workflow.
Many examples at nerrp.com

Bob
nerrp.com
 

I am thinking the software issue of Epson is dust removal not noise? Anyway dust removal is a tradeoff as to how much you want to do manually or how wee you stored and cleaned slide. As far archival?? Not scanning for library of Congress. I usually eyeball slide and scan without making adjustments saving that fo PS.

Bob

Posted from Android

The dust control in the Epson 2 software has a tendency to remove things such as letters, etc. or move a small part of the negative somewhere else, I have tried this with Kodachrome and with black and white. I use a photographer's negative brush, check the slide/negative with an Agfaloupe (magnifier), scan, and then remove any dust, etc. in Lightroom/Photoshop. This seems like a lot, but it goes fairly rapidly with practice.
Bob

I have been using a Nikon SuperCoolScan 9000ED for my 120 film and slides and have been very satisified.  A 120 slide at 4000 dpi provides lots of data to manipulate. Nikon dropped these and the 8000 ED (and stopped tech support), but you can still find them in the used market. I do use an Epson for 4x5s but the Nikon will handle your 6x7s.

Martin O'Toole
Marietta, GA

I have the Epson 750 and you can disable the noise reduction/dust removal features easily.  These are often infrared based and don't tend to work well with Kodachrome due to the emulsion differences (although I don't know how they differ, I just remember that it does differ...)
 

I use an Epson 850 Pro with VueScan software and get some nice scanns. I had a Nikon 9000 but it had an untimely death. Finding another one was and is expensive, with an uncertain condition. They are temperamental the older and more use they get.

I've used an Epson V700 and the Epson software for years and still love it.  I've done negatives (and transparencies) from 35MM up to 8x10, scanned hundreds of 4x5, PC, 616 and other odd old formats with excellent results.
I don't know if the 700 is still around.  I'm sure the 850 is expensive but Epson is the go to scanners here.