LaserSoft Imaging

I too have an issue with dark slides on Plusteck OpticFilm 8200i

I would like to understand several things:

1) There is repeated mention of tighen the red fame in the prescan before scanning - is this because this information is take by the scanning software to determine what the scanner should be doing relative to how bright the scan should be done - or is this so that when the scan results come back how the software should scale the image on the range of black and white extreem?

2) When doing multi scan it is clear that the second scan data comes back brighter than the first scan. Is this because the the scanner is told to use brighter light or is this because it runs the scanner slower (it seems that the multi scan runs about the same time so would seem to indicate the light is brighter).

3) When doing multi scan is there anyway to change the blending of the two scans so one could use this approach to get a scan brighter.

4) On the red frame - should the software automaticly select the range of black and white - right now with dark slides I manualy adjust to get the best possible picture .

5) If the software can instruct the scanner on how quickly or how bright to do the scan it sure would be great if there were some control in the software to adjust this between the prescan and scan so you could adjust the brightness and then do a prescan again and if ok go for the scan.

johnh...

The red scanframe needs to be set around the image content because that definse the histogram.
The histogram is used for many calculations and wrong data will disturb that.


Multi-Exposure does one normal and one high exposure scan.
That is correct.
The exact way this is done depends on the individual hardware.

No, MultiExposure is not meant to influence the brightness of the image.

No, SilverFast will not automatically adjust highlights and shadows.
This has to be doneusing the image auto adjustment or the pipette tool.

SilverFast can not adjust the brightness of the scan with this device.
This is done by the scanner's firmware.

kind regards,
Arne Ketelhohn.

Silly question: How many of you with dark slide problems are powering your PlusTek scanner with 110v power source, and how many with 220v?

While it may not make a difference, the darkness I get reminds me of a 220 light appliance plugged into a 110 outlet.

Attached image is a comparison of one set of results: on the left, PlusTek 7200 scanner in a 220v outlet; on the right is PlusTek 7600i scanner in a 110v outlet; in my view the one on the right, while having more scratches, is brighter, sharper, and better contrast. No matter what I do, I can't get the 7600i scanned slide to look as bright and sharp as the 7200 scanned one.

To date, I've been assuming the 7200 has a better/brighter bulb. I bought the 7600i for the better iSRD capability, but the tradeoff so far is darker slides. Unfortunately I'm moving away from a house with both types of outlets and my slides are all packed up, so I can't try the same slide with the 7600i in a 220.

Views?

download/file.php?mode=view&id=794

A follow-up to the dark scans problem: I finally had time this week to try some scans with the Plustek 8200 again, using version 8.0.1r20 of the Silverfast software. I'm feeling cautiously optimistic that the problem has been solved. Only one dark scan was produced after upgrading the software, the first scan. I wondered if the update had been installed correctly, so I ran the Silverfast uninstaller to remove everything and then reinstalled the update, and have not had a problem so far since doing that.

Hope this is working for others who have had this problem.

Make sure your scanner is not connected when you install so the drivers can be updated.

You can also remove the "Plustek****.framework" folders from the directory
/Library/Frameworks.
And then reinstall SilverFast.
This will make sure you are using the latest drivers.

Kind regards,
Arne Ketelhohn.

I recently purchased a Plustek 8100 with Silverfast 8 SE Plus and I'm having the same issues as the scans posted here. The scan results deteriorate as I do more scans. The same slide scanned at the beginning of the session looks far better than when it's scanned later in the evening. I'm getting frustrated and am really close to returning the unit. I don't know if it's a hardware or software issue...I've heard that Plustek and Silverfast have been pointing fingers at each other saying it's the other one's fault. Is there a software upgrade available?

That does not sound like a driver related issue.
That seems to be temperature related.

kind regards,
Arne Ketelhohn.

I think the "darkness" slides is hardware bug. I dont know the real range of exposures (in lux*sec) plustek supports, but I suspect its not so large. The digit 3.5D shows not exposure range, but ADC degrees (12 bit is equial to 4096 steps or 3.6 D in log ). I cant predict film quality if it is out of plustek photo range. To my opinion, plustek is useful thing, but only for good bright slides. It cant "pick up" shadows even in multiscan mode. But if it picks up, it pulls up a lot of matrix and digit ADC-steps noises. Why I think so? When I choose linear mode (BW 16bit -> HDR or COL 48bit - HDR, gamma gr. = 1, multiscan or no), i.e. I switch off any photo calculations, I see accurately cut low zone in "raw" file histogram. What is it? It means that using of plustek for scanning your 40-years films is not good idea. If I d know this feature, if i d know the lowest exposure point I dont buy this "black box". How to decide the problem? I see four ways: 1) To control exposure time. There is such capability in software and hardware, but progs developers dont allow do it from SF. Why? 2) To increase power of LED lamp. Its not so easy, but i open the black box and made new electronic board with LEDs. Now it takes 2Watts instead 0.6 and lights more brightly, so I up exposure (about 1.5 - 2 EV). 3) Dont scan old dark films 4) Buy other "black box"

Sorry for my english

I decided to update driver. So I downloaded ver. 4.0.0.1 and run it. After installation i have watched info about driver version. There is 3.0.0.75. Is it right?

Dear customer,

Unfortunately driver developers often seem to update the information in the driver information file.
So it is not uncommon to find outdated driver numbering or dates there.

kind regards,
Arne Ketelhohn.

kahendrickson wrote:I recently purchased a Plustek 8100 with Silverfast 8 SE Plus and I'm having the same issues as the scans posted here. The scan results deteriorate as I do more scans. The same slide scanned at the beginning of the session looks far better than when it's scanned later in the evening. I'm getting frustrated and am really close to returning the unit. I don't know if it's a hardware or software issue...I've heard that Plustek and Silverfast have been pointing fingers at each other saying it's the other one's fault. Is there a software upgrade available?

That is not the same as the problem I was having. I frequently got dark, slow scans at the very beginning of a scanning session, sometimes after two or three scans. There was no deterioration that increased as scanning went on, just unusable dark, slow scans interspersed with good scans, when scanning at 3600 or 7200 ppi. For some reason slides fared better than negatives. Fortunately, as I reported, the update seems to have resolved the problem for me. I've scanned about 60 negatives since updating, and the scanner finally functions properly. Yours does sound more like a hardware problem, so if you can still return or exchange the scanner, you should probably do so.

Are you using a Mac?


Haver you followed my above instructions on deleting the frameworks and reinstalling SilverFast.
This will install the current drivers which do not show this issue.


kind regards,
Arne Ketelhohn.

Hi,
I came to the forum because I have 1000's of slides; purchased the 8200Ai and Silverfast 8.0 Version 8.0.1r19 and upon getting consistent dark scans of slides that look ok when held up to light, I did a Google search of the problem. I have the same issue as others in this thread. I believe it is a scanner light source problem but what do I know? I get great results when the slide is properly or overexposed, but when it is only somewhat underexposed and having to crank up the midtones, slide the histogram, and lower the contrast to get a usable but poor dark badly color matched image, it's frustrating. I get much superior results on the exact same underexposed slides on my old HPScanjet 4890 flatbed scanner using it's bundled HP software which also restores fade color. I believe the SilverFast software is fine and Plustek didn't put a bright enough lightbulb in the scanner. But again, what do I know?

Rick

Dear Rick,

which OS are you using?


Do you set the highlights and shadows manually or using the image auto adjust (e.g. auto CCR).

Which output bit depth are you using?

Please be aware that the 48/64 bit HDR(i) formats are raw archive formats meant to be processed in SilverFast HDR (Studio).
These do look very dark.

kind regards,
Arne Ketelhohn.

Arne,
I am using Windows 7 64 bit.
I set the highlights and shadows manually.
I am using 48>24 bit color at 2400dpi to create approx 16 meg tiff files from Ektachrome and Kodachrome slides.
Not sure where the image auto adjust is.
Attached is a link to an image of the tools and settings I use. Hope it works.

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set ... =3&theater

Best regards,

Rick