Best source for X5 Flextight scans

brbo said:

Maybe @gezak22 can share the results of his comparison...?

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Time for people to give me crap for sharing postage stamp sized images.

Here are three frames, at least 100% crops, though likely 200%. And shame on me for not keeping notes on how much (if any) sharpening was done. I'll do a better job with the comparison to the X5.

Well, if you think that's not a significant difference, then I'd certainly stick to the Epson flatbed you've got now and not worry about a thing.

The difference is certainly there. I am just of the opinion that it is not worth the effort (cost, size, having to use a separate computer) for me.

But yeah, I thought that was going to be the outcome of this. Nevertheless, I am too curious to not do the comparison to the X5. Once that is done I can put this topic to rest.

gezak22 said:

Nevertheless, I am too curious to not do the comparison to the X5. Once that is done I can top this topic to rest.

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Or start thinking about comparison with a scanner that isn't by design handicapped when scanning larger formats...

gezak22 said:

I am just of the opinion that it is not worth the effort (cost, size, having to use a separate computer) for me.

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Yes, I understand; that's how I had interpreted the situation. In that case, I don't see how it would make any sense whatsoever to consider the Flextight option. The Flextight has a fixed pixel width, so the effective resolution is lower as the format increases. Scans of medium format materials are really good, but I doubt they're very much significantly better than what you would have gotten from the Creo, downsampled and sharpened a bit. And since the quality jump of the Creo compared to the Epson evidently wasn't too relevant for you given the cost & complexity, there's just no way the Flextight would somehow make that coin land much differently.

gezak22 said:

Nevertheless, I am too curious to not do the comparison to the X5.

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I understand; I would be the same. The offer to make you a PII scan still stands if you can't find someone to make you one on an X5.

brbo said:

Or start thinking about comparison with a scanner that isn't by design handicapped when scanning larger formats...

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What I need is a somewhat larger apartment so I can put together a darkroom and do analog prints.

koraks said:

The offer to make you a PII scan still stands if you can't find someone to make you one on an X5.

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I appreciate it.

What I don't understand is that you are fixated on X5 when you will be scanning 120 only and negatives only.

In that scenario Precision II (I would definitely take koraks up on his kind offer to make some scans of your negatives) would offer 99% of what X5 can do and would consequently be much much easier to justify. Seems like you want to stick to your V850 (nothing wrong with that, of course)...

albireo said:

You can get that level of quality on 35mm by spending 150$ on a Plustek 8100.

Nothing to set up, nothing to maintain apart from a mirror clean every 3 years, and a tiny desk footprint.

It will be slower than your DSLR approach, but not that much slower if you're stitching or pixel shifting (Which as you know you should, to make up for the interpolation issues of your Bayer sensor).

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This is not true. The real resolution of the Plustek 35mm would be about 1000 dpi less on full-frame compared to Pentax K-1.

brbo said:

What I don't understand is that you are fixated on X5 when you will be scanning 120 only and negatives only.

In that scenario Precision II (I would definitely take koraks up on his kind offer to make some scans of your negatives) would offer 99% of what X5 can do and would consequently be much much easier to justify. Seems like you want to stick to your V850 (nothing wrong with that, of course)...

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The Precision II does not impress as much as the Imacon 949.

Edit: But upon further reading, the specs are not that far off (while the cost is more in line with the relative performance to the V850), and I have nothing to lose by adding it to the comparison, so I will try to make it happen.

loccdor said:

This is not true. The real resolution of the Plustek 35mm would be about 1000 dpi less on full-frame compared to Pentax K-1.

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We would have to measure that in a side-by-side test. The real world resolution of the DSLR rig would depend on a number of factors. Planarity of the custom rig, how well can you achieve focus, MTF of the lens used.

If it really does achieve 1000 dpi more, it would be probably somewhere around the centre of the image, with decaying performance towards the border - most DSLR lenses are not going to be as good as a decent dedicated film scanner lens at 1:1 - they weren't designed for that after all.

But anyway - we're talking about a price difference of more than 1000$ so even if true, the user is trading a few dpi less for higher consistency, reproducibility of the results (nothing wiggles, gets misaligned, gets out of place), smaller financial outlet and smaller desk footprint.

gezak22 said:

Time for people to give me crap for sharing postage stamp sized images.

Here are three frames, at least 100% crops, though likely 200%. And shame on me for not keeping notes on how much (if any) sharpening was done. I'll do a better job with the comparison to the X5.

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I’m not one to pixel-peep much, but my first impression is that there is a huge difference in this comparison you shared.

I recently talked myself into getting an IQSmart3 to scan all formats with one scanner and I’m really impressed, even coming from Coolscan scanners, despite the Creo being much slower per negative.

ediz7531 said:

I’m not one to pixel-peep much, but my first impression is that there is a huge difference in this comparison you shared.

I recently talked myself into getting an IQSmart3 to scan all formats with one scanner and I’m really impressed, even coming from Coolscan scanners, despite the Creo being much slower per negative.

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Most of the 'comparisons' done to try and stoke controversy don't like to try and compare at a more macro (rather than micro) level, because that's often where a first glance look (as would happen with a print comparison) immediately hand the win to a high end CCD or drum, especially compared to an Epson. They also have a tendency to never control out whether the camera and lens used to make the original neg was actually up to the job.

The biggest issue with both the Coolscan type of scanners and (even more so with) the more consumer grade flatbeds seems to have been not to do with the optics or sensors, but rather the costs involved in making something sufficiently precise, profitable and honest about the MTFsystem performance, rather than the nominal pixel resolution. Unfortunately, 30 years ago, that meant an order of magnitude or more in price difference.

brbo said:

What I don't understand is that you are fixated on X5 when you will be scanning 120 only and negatives only.

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Because (as high end CCD scanners go), it's very, very fast. Something like the Durst Sigma is even faster, and even it draws the line at 3200ppi for 120 (off the same sensor as the IQSmart 3). If a scanner is capable of delivering fundamentally sharp results where you can use all of those pixels, you are going to be able to do a lot more than with one that trails off rapidly above 1200ppi. How often do you print 20x24" off 120?

Oh, and you can extract up to 8000ppi from 120 negs pretty easily with a Flextight 949/X5, you just need to use your hands and photoshop to do the XY stitch.

I recently saw a comparison between a Flextight and DSLR scan of a MF negative. There was little difference, and the Flextight scan was a more difficult process.

Pieter12 said:

I recently saw a comparison between a Flextight and DSLR scan of a MF negative. There was little difference, and the Flextight scan was a more difficult process.

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A properly done CMOS scan should equal a competently done high end CCD scan, much more of it is about stopping onboard DSP/ profiles screwing up the file - and that applies across the board, including camera scanning . Most of the old high end scanners don't have great operating software, and a sometimes rather questionable understanding of colour negs inversion.