Silverfast SE - New, confused and frustrated

[snoopylanka]

Hi all Experts,

I just bought a plustek 7200 Scanner which included Silverfast SE. Though I'm normally no idiot, I certainly feel like one with this software.

I've checked tutorials, but the tools in the ScanPilot bar do absolutely nothing. Just doing some test-scans with my slides, the results are horrible.

Any help from anybody out there?

Thanks a million
Snoopylanka

[RAG]

snoopylanka,

Have you set the options already, and did you check out the tutorials available at http://www.silverfast.com/show/tutorials/en.html or did you mean the tutorials you downloaded with the software?

[snoopylanka]

Hi RAG,
thanks for your reply and the link to the tutorial. Unfortunately this is not for the SE edition of the software and doesn't really do me much good. The assistance included in the software package is even of less help.

Snoopylanka

[snoopylanka]

RAG,
can you maybe give me a short tip how to avoid the overload of blue colour in all of my slide-scans? The original slides are quite good in colour.
Thanks!

[RAG]

snoopylanka,

You need to color calibrate your system and make sure that you are selecting the appropriate film type in Negafix. You will also want to make sure that you have set the options in SilverFast. For example if you don't have the correct Gamma Gradation set for your monitor (Mac Vs PC) you won't get the correct results.

Another thing to try, if you haven't is to check the box in Negafix for CCR.

If you can find it I recommend that you read the book: "SilverFast?: The Official Guide" as it will provide you with a wealth of information about capturing images.

[snoopylanka]

Thank you once again RAG,

it seems that with the SE version of Silverfast I am unable to calibrate my system. The price for an upgrade appears rather outrageous to me, so in the end I have a scanner that is no good to me.

Remaining frustrated ...

[degrub]

Slides or negatives ?

If slides what is the film type ?

Are you using a LCD or CRT to view the images ?

Can you access an on screen display to adjust color temperature on the screen ? If you can it should be set to 5000 K or 6500 K depending on preference. Sometimes these are called "warm" or "warm white".

You may be able to use the "color cast slider " to eliminate the blue cast on the image. Otherwise, you should look at using the curves tool ( 4th from the left if i remember correctly) in the blue channel.

[snoopylanka]

Thank you Degrub,
I have about 4,000 slides with all sorts of different film-types. I am using my notebook display (Fujitsu Siemens Amilo7405).

I'm not a total computer-dummy, but have not been able to adjust on screen display anywhere, no matter how hard I try.

Colour cast slider gives some improvement, but nothing compared to original slides. I give up!

Thanks anyway.

[degrub]

The Dmax on that scanner is fairly low, but that should not affect the color balance, only block up the shadows. It does use a cold cathode Flourescent lamp which can take 15 - 20 minutes to stabilize. That could be part of the issue.

The other factor is what you are seeing. The lcd panel is probably set to about 9000 K color temperature which would give blue whites, even if the scanner and software were correct. Do you have an external VGA port ? DOes the onboard graphics allow the option of adjusting the output to the display ? You might be able to get a cheap 15/17 inch CRT and use that if it does. If you cannot make any adjustments with the graphics chip output, you will want a different PC to use for scan adjustments for any scanner or any software.

You may also have issues with how the SF software is set up for CMS. Check Ian's tutorials if you haven't already -

http://www.computer-darkroom.com/sf5_contents.htm


It is possible that you have a bad scanner also. If you can get your hands on a IT8 slide target you could scan the target and use the color picker to read the actual RGB values the scanner is seeing ( eliminates the LCD issue) and see if there is a real issue.

[anneguo]

HELLO!
thanks,it's very clear.I like this.
thanks :)