Imacon 848 issue - diffusion?

[Petr Polyakov]

Hi everyone!


Did anyone try to put a diffuser in Imacon 848? I’m struggling with the harsh film grain on 135 format film. As far as I know, one of the differences with 949/x5 and 848 scanners is a diffuser based in front of the light source.

Any solution for the harsh grain and color noise appeared in 3F on the negatives?

The denoise apps and PH doesn't work properly. So maybe someone had an experience on how to enhance the work on 848?

Thank you,

Petr

 

[MattKing]

Thread title edited slightly.

 

[Patrick Robert James]

Your negative looks really underexposed to me.

 

[Petr Polyakov]

Your negative looks really underexposed to me.

Hi Patrick! I've checked the negative, it's absolutely correctly exposed. That's the grain that appears on almost all scans from the scanner. Especially in blacks, like here in the mid frames. See attached

 

[brbo]

Well, the first example does seem underexposed. There is no detail in the woman's top.

If the negative is not underexposed, maybe there is a problem with scanner's CCD cooling? Do 848s also have Peltier element CCD cooling like the latest Flextights?

Do you have a raw (.fff) file of the scan?

I have a scanner (Minolta 5400) with diffusor that you can toggle on/off and the effect is subtle. I doubt that it would help much with such grainy negatives. Placing a diffusor into light path of a 848 might screw things up if scanner doesn't have robust enough routines for adjusting CCD exposure as diffuser will noticeably decrease the light reaching the sensor.

 

[Petr Polyakov]

Hi!

Sure, here's the link for the raw tif file: https://www.dropbox.com/s/6zigbtv2bom1yfu/Petr003- 008(1).tif?dl=0

Do you think Minolta has similar diffusor to X5 scanner? I look at all my X5 scans, and they are much less grainy even in very underexposed negatives.

Maybe there is an option for manually controlling the exposure of the scanner?

 

[Patrick Robert James]

I took a look at the raw scan and your negs were lightstruck. It is pretty evident from the streaks on the side of the images. You either have a handling or developing issue, but the scanner is probably not the problem. My guess due to the streaks on the negs is it happened in the developing tank. That doesn't mean that you don't have a problem with your scanner but it isn't possible to tell with these negs.

 

[250swb]

I've had a look at the TIFF's and I also think the negatives look under exposed, such that even if there wasn't the noise there wouldn't be any detail in the blacks anyway. The noise is in the shadows, not the highlights, which also suggests the negatives are under exposed. For example the photo with the cigarette look at the highlight on her right shoulder which isn't great but ok, and then the shadow just below which is full of noise or grain. I think if you could start from scratch and reset to default any scanner adjustments, sort out where the light leaks are coming from, and work out what you were metering from to give so much under exposure. Colour negative film can take a lot of over exposure, but it looks like you've gone the opposite way.

 

[Petr Polyakov]

I've had a look at the TIFF's and I also think the negatives look under exposed, such that even if there wasn't the noise there wouldn't be any detail in the blacks anyway. The noise is in the shadows, not the highlights, which also suggests the negatives are under exposed. For example the photo with the cigarette look at the highlight on her right shoulder which isn't great but ok, and then the shadow just below which is full of noise or grain. I think if you could start from scratch and reset to default any scanner adjustments, sort out where the light leaks are coming from, and work out what you were metering from to give so much under exposure. Colour negative film can take a lot of over exposure, but it looks like you've gone the opposite way.

Hi!

I attach here another example on a different film:

The color noise is still very much evident...

Maybe this example will help?

PETR- 005.tif

Shared with Dropbox

www.dropbox.com

Thank you,

Petr