Photo scanner

[Lurial]

I do Photoshop work and im looking to start doing photo restoration on the side...the scanner I have doesn't really have a high DPI. I’m also short on cash...(an artist short on cash...that’s not a stereotype :-/ )

anyway I’m looking for a good bang for my buck scanner...something around $100 that will do a decent job. Any recommendations appreciated.

 

[Guest]

I'm afraid that if you're looking for a neg and slide scanner $100 will only buy you secondhand. A flatbed with a photo attachment will be cheaper and the results would be adequate, but not for serious work.

This is not good news because most older neg/slide scanners are SCSI interface which is no longer supported by Apple and fading fast on the PC.

Also manufacturer's software support for old scanners is negligible. Though it's possible to skip them and use an independent scanning program like Silverfast or Vuescan.

The cheapest serious neg/slide scanners at the mo are Plustek USB range which work with Mac and PC.

As you can probably work out (£1 = $1.60) these are outside the price bracket you mention, though maybe cheaper in US. http://www.jessops.com/online.store/products/76664/show.html

 

[BlueCat57]

I've been looking around too. Tom's Guide has an Analog to Digital article that includes tips about scanning slides. Here's a link:

http://www.tomsguide.com/us/analog-digital-photo-video,review-1415.html

From what I have read in my search (I have yet to buy.) the cheap 5MP units you see aren't worth it.

Dedicated film scanners in the $100 to $300 range go a good job, but are slow.

The scanning services are just outrageously priced. Of course they may do some touch up for you, but $2 a slide and 1,000 slides, you can hire an out of work expert for a month to do it for you.

That leaves scanners with film scanning attachments. The Tom's Guide has some recommendations, but since the article is a year old all the models have probably changed. I'm pretty sure that route I'll go is to buy a flatbed scanner based on the tips in the article. I'll scan at 2,000 dpi and 24-bit color since I don't plan to make prints, just archive the images and view them on a monitor. If I find a special picture or two I would rescan at higher resolution/depth and then clean them up for printing.

Hope this helps. It is a frustrating search since there are many options and scanning film/slides is a secondary task that isn't very glamorous.