Problems scanning colour negs.

[Paul C]

I recently bought an Epson F-3200 film scanner which came complete with SilverFast Ai. It seems to work well with transparencies and B&W negs but, despite following all of the advice in the manual, I'm getting some very odd results with my Fuji NPS 160 medium format negs. The prescan comes out with a distinct magenta colour cast, but when I scan to file it changes to shades of light green and green-blue. I've tried altering levels in Photoshop but am finding it almost impossible to get anything resembling actual colours. I also followed your President's advice about using the Auto-Tolerance, which made a slight difference to the prescans but none to the saved files.

Any ideas about what I may be doing wrong. Any help would be apprreciated as I have hundreds of colour negs I need to scan.

[RAG]

Hello Paul,

Have you done any color management of your computer, in particular your screen? If not it is highly recommended. You should first address your screen and then your print and scanner so that you get consistent results.

[Paul C]

Many thanks for your prompt reply and suggestions.

Although I haven't calibrated the screen or printer I did calibrate the scanner with the SiverFast colour chart. Also, the extreme difference between the results from my neg scanning cannot be put down to this as my transparency scans are almost perfect. I've noticed that other contributors to this forum have experienced similar problems. One even enclosed screen shots that looked almost identical to the results I've been getting.

[RAG]

Paul C,

What happens if you use the Epson Scan software?

[Paul C]

Hi Rag

I've not tried it, but thanks for the suggestion, I'll give it a go.

[Paul C]

Thanks Rag

It seems to have done the trick. New scans near perfect with Epson Scan - I don't think I'll be using SilverFast again.

[RAG]

Paul C,

That is a shame, because SilverFast give you far greater control over your scans.

[Paul C]

Dear Rag

I agree that SilverFast has more controls but unless I can overcome the problem with colour neg scanning I can't see how I can make use of them.

[RAG]

Paul,

Did you contact LaserSoft technical support? Due to the high volume of help requests, they may not respond over night, but they will work with you to resolve this issue. Give it a try if you haven't already.