Digital BW, The Print

Frank --

I will be very interested in hearing about your Polaroid 120 experience. 
Will your prior disappointment with the Minolta and Silverfast keep you 
from trying Silverfast with the Polaroid? I have a low opinion of 
Polaroid's alternative software -- Polacolor Insight.

Thank you for persevering with your thorough medium-format scanner search.

-- Victor Landweber


At 09:28 PM 1/28/2002 +0000, you wrote:

>Earlier in this post I said that I scanned the same color negs on
>a Nikon and on a Minolta Pro.  I will now scan those same negs
>on a Polaroid 120.  I'll get them to my friend this week so I can
>add a more informed opinion to our options.
>
>  After working with my Minolta for 3 months, trying Silverfast HDR
>(much too much grain) as well as the Minolta software, I am
>dissatisfied and cannot recommend the product for any negative
>scanning.  The problem is squarely placed on the grain aliasing.
>There are other problems such as the highlights blow out very
>quickly, but I would be happy to simply get an answer for the
>graininess.
>
>I have scanned b&w and color negs as slides, negs (both b/w
>and color) and as 16 bit linear files.  I have oversampled 16
>times, added Gem, Ice and Roc, added gaussian blur and used
>the smudge tool.  I have tried the workarounds that have been
>offered on this list.  I have not tried Neatscan (or whatever)
>because I have a Mac.  I have also not tried VueScan.
>
>I will say that the negative carriers and the software is a pleasure
>to work with.  Ergonomically, this machine is great.  The problem
>is in the results from negatives.  Slides look great.
>
>I am considering selling the Minolta Pro.  If anyone out there
>wants it, I will send it to Minolta warranty service, first , so they
>can completely go through it , and then send it off to you.  I will do
>this for $300 less than what any Minolta Pro is selling for on the
>web.