Silverfast Ai Studio missing profiles

[DJ]

Trying to use Silverfast Ai Studio ( 6.5.0r5 OS-X ) I cannot scan negatives. The "Negafix" profiles are all missing, and the download link on this site just goes to a page which say they are installed with the software, which they aren't.

Please make the profiles available, as there appears to be no way to scan negatives with this software without them, as I cannot disable negafix either.

[LSI_Heidorn]

Dear DJ,
this seems to be a Bug, not missing Profiles !

Please contact support via online form, if i remember it correctly you are to delete The Preferences AND the Negafix Profiles folder before relaunching SilverFast and it should rebuild the Negafix Profile folder !

Greetings,


Nils Heidorn, R & D, LaserSoft Imaging AG

[DJ]

The profiles are definitely missing, there's nothing in the folder.

I did as you asked, and deleted both the preferences folder, and the negafix folder. Upon relaunch Silverfast does re-create them, but there are still no profiles, just a zero length file called "Others".

[DJ]

Well, the solution you proposed has done something, as the preview now works ok as opposed to before it was black, and I do see different films in the dialog, although they are all in the ASA/ISO Dialog, and the other two are redundant.

So, thanks for the work-around, and I hope you get the bug fixed soon :)

[LSI_Heidorn]

Dear DJ,

thanks for your feedback, to be sure:
Does it work now as expected ?!

Greetings,


Nils Heidorn, R & D, LaserSoft Imaging AG

[DJ]

Unfortunately no.

The pre-scan now actually understands negatives and reverses the image so they look right, but something is still very very wrong.

During the first pre-scan (after deleting the preferences and negfix dirs), as I watch the image building and filling the pre-scan window, it looks great, just as I'd expect, but the moment it finishes, Silverfast does *something* to it, and blows out everything so it's totally overexposed, by a significant amount, like ramping up the brightness by 400%.

No matter what I do in Negafix or anything else, I cannot get it back to looking normal, it wipes out at least 50% of the exposure. The negatives are fine, I know this, the're not over exposed, but Silverfast, or some "auto" part of it, is blowing out the negatives completely. The final scans are also blown out, so at the moment, I am unable to scan negatives.

I have a couple of screenshots to show exactly what I mean, if you have somewhere to send them.

[LSI_Heidorn]

Dear DJ,

yes, SF does some Automatic to the negative inversion !

Please try to resize the scan crop to exactly one negative without border...
That negative *should* look fine then.
You can further influence the exact look by then selecting a different / suiting film type.

SF tries to detect the orange mask only in the selected scan frame and if the scan frame still selects the whole flatbed this obviously cannot work !

Let me know if it works if you follow this scheme...

Greetings,


Nils Heidorn, R & D, LaserSoft Imaging AG

P.S. if you have an Ai Version and you blow up the negafix dialogue to show the expert settings you can switch off this "auto-orange-mask-detection" by deactivating a little checkbox.

[DJ]

Can I not turn off any automated process completely? Whatever it is trying to do, it doesn't really work, it still blows out all the highlights to every frame every time.

I just want to scan a negative in a linear fashion using the full range of the scanner, without Silverfast doing anything to it at all, the same as I do with transparencies ( which works fine ). It looks like the curves in the profiles are the problem, they're WAY way off being right. Transparencies are great, look just like they should, and when running through a pre-scan on negatives, negatives look just like they should, but as soon as pre-scan is finished and it starts applying these profiles, it throws it completely out. How do I *stop* Silverfast from using these profiles/curves?

How can I bypass this and create a proper ICC managed workflow for scanning negatives?

As it stands, it seems to me Silverfast cannot be used for scanning negatives. :(

[LSI_Heidorn]

Dear DJ,
as of now DIlverFast is the best Tool for scanning negatives, you can cite me on this :-)

Please examine your usage:

-1- Reset all your previous doings by pressing the thrash button until the preview area is empty and redo the prescan.
-2- select the negative you want to scan.
-3- select a suitable Film Profile
-4- press the automatic button ( shutter icon, second icon from the lft in the upper, horizontal toolbar )
-5- *now* ( and not before ) start to change Histogram / Gradation Curves if you need to.

Please also consider to read the manual...



Greetings,


Nils Heidorn, R & D, LaserSoft Imaging AG

[DJ]

Allow me to elaborate

The method you describe is a subjective, "mess around with the settings until you like the way it looks" scan, I want a "calibrate it once and don't change it again", accurate ICC managed scan. If I'm going to be adjusting image parameters, I want to do it in Photoshop, the right tool for the job, all I wanted from the scanner is *accurate* data. I don't trust my eye, it's subjective, like everybody else's eye.

Please don't misunderstand, I have no doubts at all that Silverfast can produce very "pleasing" results, but I don't want pleasing, I want accurate. With no way to disable Negafix or remove all "auto" functions and have a fully ICC managed workflow, this is not possible. I guess I just kind of expected this to be present in any scanner software, I understand now that it is not the case, so as I must use Negafix and cannot bypass it, I will now concentrate on the problems with that.

The problem as I see it with the profiles in my Silverfast Ai Studio (6.5.0r5) OS-X for Howtek 4000/4500 is not so much the *colour*, but the gamma/slope. It completely blows out all the detail in the scans. I think the colour properties of the profiles for these films are probably very good, but the brightness/gamma of the curve seems to be way off. I've tried the same negatives on Silverfast Ai 6.5.0r5 (Win) for my Epson V750 Pro, and the problem is less pronounced, although they are slightly blown on this too.

I believe these included profiles are not for the Howtek, but were made on a different scanner, or for a different scanner. Obviously the gamma characteristics will be different for each scanner, so the profiles made for one scanner will be useless on another. Maybe the wrong profiles were included in the install? Could you check? Given you say you do not have a working Howtek, and seem reluctant to get another one, I must draw the conclusion these profiles have not been tested. I certainly hope there is not just one set of profiles for all scanners...

Using the method you describe, even using the "Auto" function which I don't want to use, the only way to stop the highlights from being blown is to go into the expert dialog in Negafix, and on each (RGB) channel drag the upper slider all the way up to 255. After this is done, the negative seems ok, but this is a lot of work to do for each and every frame, compared with say an ICC managed method and a fixed calibration.

Another thing which looks like a bug, is in the Howtek version of Ai Studio Howtek (6.5.0r5 OS-X). In the Negafix dialog, there are 3 drop-down boxes, Film-Make, Film Type, Film Speed. The first two are empty, they have only "Other, Delete, Import" in them. All the film profiles appear in the ASA/ISO drop-down, as one long list. On my copy of Ai Epson (6.5.0r5 Win) these 3 boxes are all properly filled.

If there's anything I can do, or information I can provide, or things to try to give you more information, please let me know, I'm happy to help fix this if I can.

[LSI_Heidorn]

Dear DJ,

ICC Calibration is disabled while scanning negatives !
This has to be the way as ICC Profiling is not precise enough in that little corner of colorspace where negatives carry all their compressed and deformed information.
Thats why all negafix profiles have to be done on the specific scanner model...

About your lost highlights:
If you open the expert options there is an "auto" checkbox that you can turn off, and if you manually adjust your orange mask limits, you could save the resulting settings in that very expert dialog.
However i am a bit astonished that you loose a perceptible amount of highlights when using auto in negafix...
Is your "Auto tolerance" slider set to the left side ?!
If not it will "hop" over some spikes and possibly cut off highlights ( this is for non-perfect negatives with dust / scratches that may appear brighter then the orange mask ).

Of course before doing the above you want to be sure that no "normal" image adjustments ( histogram and curves ) are set, so make sure you reset those options before.

We will get a working Howtek Scanner again soon, and i will let our test team check whether the negafix profiles are off...
Hopefully it is not your scanner that is far adrift the "normal" Howtek 4500...

Greetings,


Nils Heidorn, R & D, LaserSoft Imaging AG

[LSI_Heidorn]

ooops, one thing i forgot:

If you really do not want to use negafix or any image correction, you have to do a 48 Bit HDR scan.
Nothing is done to the image data then and you can invert your negatives manually then, only i cannot imagine that you get precise results then without a lot of work...

Greetings,


Nils Heidorn, R & D, LaserSoft Imaging AG

[DJ]

Could you look into the problem of the Negafix profiles not appearing in the correct menu on Howtek Silverfast Ai Studio?

As I detailed before, there are three menus, "Film-Make", "Film Type" and "ISO Speed", and the first two menus are empty, save for "Other, Delete, Import". All the profiles have appeared lumped into the final ASA/ISO menu, as one long list of all film types and speeds.

I'm sure it's not supposed to be this way, as in my copy of Silverfast Ai for Epson V750 all the menus are correctly populated.

It's not a show stopper obviously, but it does slow down the workflow a little, and it'd be nice to have them in their proper place.

Thanks.

[LSI_Heidorn]

Dear DJ,

it sounds as if your negafix profiles are corrupted indeed !

As you already did delete Preferences AND Negafix Profiles, this is something strange as the Profiles are supposed to be restored after that deletion.

Please download the 650r8 Version as soon as we have it available ( middle/end of this week ), deltet prefs & negafix folder again, uninstall the old version of DilverFast and install the 6.50r8 version to check wehther the Negafix Profiles now work as expected.
Please let me know in thes Thread what happens.
All i can say is that the Negafix Profiles work fine here with the 6.50r6 Version...
The r8 Update fixes the banding Problem for the Howtek drum Scanners...


Greetings,


Nils Heidorn, R & D, LaserSoft Imaging AG

[DJ]

Update since installing 6.5.0r8.

Before installing, I uninstalled and deleted everything pertainting to Silverfast on my machine. All preferences, and Application Support directories, plist, everything. A complete clean slate.

I installed 6.5.0r8, installation was clean, no problems. I installed the Docs and Movs packages as well. OS is Mac OS-X 10.4.10 all patches installed.

Problem is unchanged.

When selecting Negative film, the Negafix window appears. The first menu ( usually for film manufacturer ) has "Other","Delete","Import" only. The second menu ( usually for film type ) has only "Other". The Last menu, for film speed, has "Other", and all the film types and speeds in one long list.

These profiles still work of course, but they are all misplaced into one menu, this is not the case with Silverfast for my Epson, where all menus are properly filled. I think it's some small bug which is screwing up the list.

If there is anything you want me to try before I start configuring and calibrating this new version, now would be the time.