Digital BW, The Print

Hi ML;
Perhaps I can help a bit- I do a lot of B&W scanning on a Nikon 
8000ED which is probably a better scanner, but unfortunately not as 
good as the price/specs would indicate. I get similar results if I 
let the scanner software do the inversion from neg to pos. I get 
better results if I scan a neg as a positive image and output it to 
Photoshop in 16 bit, then invert. The data is still 'bunched up'(but 
you get all of it) but that has to do with B&W negs not having the 
density range to use the entire dynamic range of most scanners. A 
couple of histogram and curve adjustments still in 16-bit will get 
you a decent tonal range while preserving shadow and highlight 
detail.
> 
  My Minolta multi-pro scanner does not give me
> >good scans from B&W.  The histogram is always 'pushed over' to the
> >left (appears dark with 'blown-out' highlights).  Today I went 
over
> >to a friend's and he scanned my B&W slide on an older AGFA ( model
> >HID)  which looks like a flat bed but isn't and scans either
> >documents or film up to 8x10.  And lo and behold a far superior 
scan!
> >The histogram was nice and 'spread out' and the shadow's all had 
good
> >detail.
> >I have gathered by now that scanning silver halide films is not 
easy.
> >I wonder, as a 'dumb newbie' to the field if someone would step up
> >and tell me the short answers to the following questions:
> >1)Which (not too expensive) scanner is best for black and white?
> >2)Is there any LOSS of Quality using a color slide (or neg) and
> >converting to monochrome (I usually do this in channel mixer after
> >obtaining what looks like the right filtration). Is 
this 'cheating'
> >in any way?

Sometimes scanning a color neg film will produce more 'grain' 
(actually noise) particularly in the blue channel, than slide film, 
but slide film is so much more contrasty that it takes a better 
scanner to extract clean, noise-free shadows. I've found it very 
helpfull when scanning color negs to use the multi-pass scanning 
that some software allows, (Silverfast for one) it reduces the noise 
considerably, though of course the scan takes longer. And as for 
cheating,who cares? You get the best quality you can any damn way 
you can!

Hope this helps

Steve Karafyllakis

http://www.stevekphoto.com