Digital BW, The Print

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Michael" <michael3442@...> wrote:
>

Big SNIP

> 
> Is the lesson to be learned this: when the original scene is very low contrast and the darkest point is equivalent to a mid-grey, scan the negative so the midpoint slider points to the lowest end of the histogram mountain? This seems to prevent the scanner from making these mid-grey areas from turning pure black.
> 
> All comments and other ideas appreciated.


Nikon scanners (according to Nikon) apply curves adjustments AFTER, not before, the scan.  If your Epson scanner does likewise, then any adjustments are better done in PS after the scan. Again, in NikonScan, the only prescan adjustment that makes sense is the exposure, say, to bring up the shadows and shift the histogram accordingly.

So, the first order of business should be to determine when Curves adjustments are applied.

For the heck of it, you might also try scanning your negs as positives and inverting in PS.  You will get a very different histogram to work with.

Harry