Epson 750 - beginner questions

Hi forum - very new to scanning and have a million negs of MF to scan this weekend. Before I do so, I'd like to ask some questions if I may:

1. The manual says that that you need to put the neg shiny side down and so that the writing is backwards. As my eyes cannot seem to see which side is shiny, is there a simpler way to do this? For example, looking down at the scanner, should I put the small writing that describes the film say to the right side and backwards, or to the left side and backwards?

2. What are the best settings/workflow for Colour? I would like to end up with 5MB sized files so I guess 3000 dpi - but would it be best to sharpen, and play around with colour in Lightroom/Photoshop or is it best to to do this at the scanning stage?

3. Same question but for BW.

Really appreciate any help!

Charlie.

1. Actually, the back and emulsion sides should be different enough to easily distinguish. Anyway, you'll have to place the film onto the scanning bed so that writings read backwards, when looking from the light side (= top). There should be markings present on the film holder, do according to them...

2. 3000dpi is a very high resolution scan for a 5Mb file from MF film, if we are taking about lossless format such as .tif that is. A 24bit (8bit per color, RGB) file from a 3000dpi scan of 6x4.5 (smallest MF image size) would take slightly more than 100Mb space on disk!? Are you sure that you really want 5Mb files?

3. Same as 2...

Hi

macaroniitfc said:

Hi forum - very new to scanning and have a million negs of MF to scan this weekend.

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you poor wretch ... I hope someone brings you food and water in your scanning dungeon

Before I do so, I'd like to ask some questions if I may:

1. The manual says that that you need to put the neg shiny side down and so that the writing is backwards. As my eyes cannot seem to see which side is shiny, is there a simpler way to do this?

Click to expand...

look at the neg so that text in your image would be normal, place that glass side up and you have the emulsion down. I personally haven't found much difference on my Epson and it will require you to flip the image (pretty sure, not in place to double check my words here)

2. What are the best settings/workflow for Colour? I would like to end up with 5MB sized files so I guess 3000 dpi - but would it be best to sharpen, and play around with colour in Lightroom/Photoshop or is it best to to do this

Click to expand...

this is my workflow here ... <- click that link

in fact I have a number of 'actions' which I chain and apply in photoshop for each of them. Especially when each 'batch' is photographed in the same lighting colour temperature

3. Same question but for BW.

Really appreciate any help!

Charlie.

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more or less, but without the colour

Thanks guys.

Pellicle - do you have much experience scanning me format colour reversal (fuji 50 and 100)? Reason I ask is that I have just scanned a few and while the "negs" look great, they scans look quite washed out on the computer in comparison. Is this normal?

Hi

macaroniitfc said:

Pellicle - do you have much experience scanning me format colour reversal (fuji 50 and 100)? Reason I ask is that I have just scanned a few and while the "negs" look great, they scans look quite washed out on the computer in comparison. Is this normal?

Click to expand...

not medium format ... but 4x5 and 35mm ... if the slides look good then they'll scan good .. make sure you go back and reset your levels on the scans, don't want to clip ... also, when scanning as linear they may require a little punch

obvious question ... you are handling colour profiles correctly aren't you?