Newbie questions

Maine-iac · Aug 23, 2009

I'm a newbie to hybrid photography, but an "oldbie" in traditional silver-based photography--40 years of darkroom chemistry tinkering and printing, both B&W and Ciba(oops!)Ilfochromes.

Now I'm about to give up my wet darkroom (but not film!) and get a scanner, printer, and learn how to scan negs and transparencies and print them.

I already have Photoshop 7 (not Elements, but the full version) which I've played around with enough to have learned the basics. Can't say I love it, and am loathe to invest the money in CS4. Question 1: Who's used Lightzone enough to have an opinion on it. (I'm a PC user and will not be switching to Mac, so Apple lovers, please don't advocate for your toys.) I shoot mostly MF these days, though I have some 4X5 stuff to scan as well from when I still used my view camera. Will Lightzone do pretty much what I need to make high quality B&W and color prints? I'm not into excessive manipulation--just the usual dodging and burning, contrast control, etc., to achieve an expressive print.

Question 2: I'm considering an Epson V-700 scanner (the Nikon 9000 is simply out of my price range at this point) and an Epson 3800 printer. I know the 3800 is pricey, but I'm afraid I might get eaten up by ink costs with the 2880 or HP9180, and the 3800 seems to be more economical as well as enabling larger prints. Is this a reasonable combination to get me exhibition quality prints (assuming I'll learn how to do everything properly in due time)?

Thanks for your advice.

Larry

pellicle · Aug 24, 2009

Hi

Maineiac said:
Question 2: I'm considering an Epson V-700 scanner (the Nikon 9000 is simply out of my price range at this point) and an Epson 3800 printer. I know the 3800 is pricey, but I'm afraid I might get eaten up by ink costs with the 2880 or HP9180, and the 3800 seems to be more economical as well as enabling larger prints. Is this a reasonable combination to get me exhibition quality prints (assuming I'll learn how to do everything properly in due time)?

I'd say yes to this but you will need to learn about colour management and stuff like that if you want your screen to look close to your prints. Its a long road but ultimately I feel that its more reliable and reproducable than using using filters on the enlarger certainly I've never got contrast issues under control with cibachrome though I'm not an expert.

at the risk of starting a fight, depending on your negatives (or chromes) sharpness I've found that the Epson will do quite well in comparison with a 9000 assuming your negative is big. If you're using 645 then no, but if you're using 6x9 or 6x12 with LF optics then I think that the extra sharpness of the 9000 is a little wasted.

I suspect that operator experience and post processing handling will make a difference. However my findings are that with 400ISO Negative that a 4990 can sharpen up to go close to matching a 9000 but if you try to sharpen the 9000 you'll have a grain fest quickly enough (without using stuff to reduce the noise). I might have to put this up on a blog page.

PeterAM · Aug 24, 2009

I am in a somewhat similar situation in that I am starting to shoot some film again and am trying to figure out how to handle the processing and scanning issues. I already have a 35mm film scanner but really do not want to develop film myself;don't have any capability for scanning MF film.
I noticed that you live in Scarsdale; I live in Edgemont. Just this morning I visited a lab in Harrison (PDK) to see what their capabilities are. My plan at this point is to have a lab develop/contact print 35mm and develop/scan 120 until I can determine what my volume will be and whether or not I should get a scanner for MF work. I'll give PDK a shot for the first few rolls and see how it works out. My Internet research is in synch with the other post; a flatbed won't cut it for smaller MF and serious printing.
As far as the printer is concerned, I have a 3800 and am very pleased. I had been using a 2200 (with a RIP for B&W) for several years and while good for color, it was just adequate for B&W; used quite a bit of ink, in small, pricey cartridges. The 3800 appears to be more cost efficient and the prints are infinitely better.
Like you, I also use PS7, but am starting to use Lightroom, in the hope that it will be adequate for most of needs.

wogster · Sep 1, 2009

Maineiac said:
I'm a newbie to hybrid photography, but an "oldbie" in traditional silver-based photography--40 years of darkroom chemistry tinkering and printing, both B&W and Ciba(oops!)Ilfochromes.

Now I'm about to give up my wet darkroom (but not film!) and get a scanner, printer, and learn how to scan negs and transparencies and print them.

I already have Photoshop 7 (not Elements, but the full version) which I've played around with enough to have learned the basics. Can't say I love it, and am loathe to invest the money in CS4. Question 1: Who's used Lightzone enough to have an opinion on it. (I'm a PC user and will not be switching to Mac, so Apple lovers, please don't advocate for your toys.) I shoot mostly MF these days, though I have some 4X5 stuff to scan as well from when I still used my view camera. Will Lightzone do pretty much what I need to make high quality B&W and color prints? I'm not into excessive manipulation--just the usual dodging and burning, contrast control, etc., to achieve an expressive print.

Question 2: I'm considering an Epson V-700 scanner (the Nikon 9000 is simply out of my price range at this point) and an Epson 3800 printer. I know the 3800 is pricey, but I'm afraid I might get eaten up by ink costs with the 2880 or HP9180, and the 3800 seems to be more economical as well as enabling larger prints. Is this a reasonable combination to get me exhibition quality prints (assuming I'll learn how to do everything properly in due time)?

Thanks for your advice.

Larry

One thing you may want to check on scanners is how they are focused. There are really 4 methods of focusing a scanner.

1) Automatic focus, where the scanner determines where the media is, and focuses on it.
2) Manual focus, where the scanner focus can be adjusted, either in software or hardware.
3) Fixed focus, with enough depth of field to cover the glass and negative holder.
4) Fixed focus, focused on the glass, with no way of compensating.

Lots of desk top flatbeds fall into the last category, you may want to test this, take a negative where you have a good, well focused and sharp print. Test the scanner in the store, zoom in to double the pixel size, is it still sharp? If not, then look for focus adjustment, if there isn't one, then pass.

pschwart · Sep 1, 2009

Maineiac said:
I'm a newbie to hybrid photography, but an "oldbie" in traditional silver-based photography--40 years of darkroom chemistry tinkering and printing, both B&W and Ciba(oops!)Ilfochromes.

Now I'm about to give up my wet darkroom (but not film!) and get a scanner, printer, and learn how to scan negs and transparencies and print them.

I already have Photoshop 7 (not Elements, but the full version) which I've played around with enough to have learned the basics. Can't say I love it, and am loathe to invest the money in CS4. Question 1: Who's used Lightzone enough to have an opinion on it. (I'm a PC user and will not be switching to Mac, so Apple lovers, please don't advocate for your toys.) I shoot mostly MF these days, though I have some 4X5 stuff to scan as well from when I still used my view camera. Will Lightzone do pretty much what I need to make high quality B&W and color prints? I'm not into excessive manipulation--just the usual dodging and burning, contrast control, etc., to achieve an expressive print.

Question 2: I'm considering an Epson V-700 scanner (the Nikon 9000 is simply out of my price range at this point) and an Epson 3800 printer. I know the 3800 is pricey, but I'm afraid I might get eaten up by ink costs with the 2880 or HP9180, and the 3800 seems to be more economical as well as enabling larger prints. Is this a reasonable combination to get me exhibition quality prints (assuming I'll learn how to do everything properly in due time)?

Thanks for your advice.

Larry

Keep in mind that Epson Advanced Black&White (ABW) is a hybrid that uses
K3 + light cyan and yellow to tone B&W images. If you are looking to make B&W prints using a pure monochrome inkset, the 13" desktops like the R1800 and R2400 might be a better choice. I recall that the 3800 cartridges are pressurized and I don't know if anyone has figured how to refill them.

toyotadesigner · Sep 16, 2009

I'm using LightZone for years now. No need for PhotoSoup at all. I'm shooting with 6x9 and LF, no problems with LZ and hughe file sizes as long as you have beefed up your Windows system with plenty of RAM and a fast graphics card.

My nick in the LZ forum is 'toyotadesigner' (which didn't work here unfortunately).

mrred · Sep 16, 2009

Maineiac said:
I'm considering an Epson V-700 scanner (the Nikon 9000 is simply out of my price range at this point) and an Epson 3800 printer. I know the 3800 is pricey, but I'm afraid I might get eaten up by ink costs with the 2880 or HP9180, and the 3800 seems to be more economical as well as enabling larger prints. Is this a reasonable combination to get me exhibition quality prints (assuming I'll learn how to do everything properly in due time)?

printers....

For printing, you need to ask yourself some questions. Are you going to print in just BW or do you want some colour? I voted BW only because paying for 'prints' are so cheap. Those places cannot do BW properly, so I opted for my own. I looked at the 2400/3800 seriously and saw I was paying for a great colour printer that could do BW. The colour carts world have long dried up before I used them. Instead I baught a 1400 (same nozzle size as 3800) from the epson store ($199) http://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/consumer/consDetail.jsp?BV_UseBVCookie=yes&oid=63066043 and got a 6 shade BW ink set (Ebony6) http://www.inksupply.com/partnumber.cfm?action=search&search_part_number=EB6-1400-SET (95ish) and then got a refill kit (6 4 oz bottles) for just less than 99. QTR to render the shades of black is $50.

So 200+95+99+50=443. It is much cheaper than the 3800 and in my opinion, very close 2nd in quality of print. I have had my setup for about a year, and have maybe used 1/3 of the ink.

Note that you cannot print colour. It's not so much as it can't as it is that you have to flush all the black ink out of the system; that's just nuts. This suggestion only really works if it is your second printer or you farm out your colour prints (like I do).

Scanners....

I own 2 epson flatbeds, and despise both. They suffer from focus issues mentioned in above posts. I have had to spend more money to replace trays and get ANR glass (which cripples Digital Ice) and only use them for MF work.

I do have a Plustek 7200i dedicated 35mm scanner of which I am greatly impressed with. It gives about 3200 real DPI and is twice as fast as the epsons. It's still listed on adorama as 299 (7200iSE). Any of the newer ones will work equally or better.

If you consider this scanner, try not to by the more expensive Ai versions as you will be paying just for a Silverfast upgrade. The bad comments about this product have been made mostly due to the slow and ineffective SilverFast. I have read reviews that stated the 7500i had Dust Reduction problems, when the reviewer had no idea it was actually a SilverFast issue. Had they used VueScan, it would have preformed flawlessly. Every process seems to speeds up bay a factor of 2 when using VueScan.

pschwart · Sep 16, 2009

mrred said:
printers....

For printing, you need to ask yourself some questions. Are you going to print in just BW or do you want some colour? I voted BW only because paying for 'prints' are so cheap. Those places cannot do BW properly, so I opted for my own. I looked at the 2400/3800 seriously and saw I was paying for a great colour printer that could do BW. The colour carts world have long dried up before I used them. Instead I baught a 1400 (same nozzle size as 3800) from the epson store ($199) http://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/consumer/consDetail.jsp?BV_UseBVCookie=yes&oid=63066043 and got a 6 shade BW ink set (Ebony6) http://www.inksupply.com/partnumber.cfm?action=search&search_part_number=EB6-1400-SET (95ish) and then got a refill kit (6 4 oz bottles) for just less than 99. QTR to render the shades of black is $50.

So 200+95+99+50=443. It is much cheaper than the 3800 and in my opinion, very close 2nd in quality of print. I have had my setup for about a year, and have maybe used 1/3 of the ink.

Note that you cannot print colour. It's not so much as it can't as it is that you have to flush all the black ink out of the system; that's just nuts. This suggestion only really works if it is your second printer or you farm out your colour prints (like I do).

Scanners....

I own 2 epson flatbeds, and despise both. They suffer from focus issues mentioned in above posts. I have had to spend more money to replace trays and get ANR glass (which cripples Digital Ice) and only use them for MF work.

I do have a Plustek 7200i dedicated 35mm scanner of which I am greatly impressed with. It gives about 3200 real DPI and is twice as fast as the epsons. It's still listed on adorama as 299 (7200iSE). Any of the newer ones will work equally or better.

If you consider this scanner, try not to by the more expensive Ai versions as you will be paying just for a Silverfast upgrade. The bad comments about this product have been made mostly due to the slow and ineffective SilverFast. I have read reviews that stated the 7500i had Dust Reduction problems, when the reviewer had no idea it was actually a SilverFast issue. Had they used VueScan, it would have preformed flawlessly. Every process seems to speeds up bay a factor of 2 when using VueScan.

It is much cheaper than the 3800 and in my opinion, very close 2nd in quality of print.
No reason it should be 2nd in quality. I use an R1800 (also 1.5 picoliter droplet) with a selection of MIS B&W inks. The output quality is outstanding
and I can print with an all-carbon inkset with no colors required. I have successfully switched back and forth between color and monochrome cartridges with no ill effects; all that was required was printing a few purge patterns. The 1400 is cheap enough to dedicate to B&W, and this is more practical. I may get one of these to replace my aging R800 ...

mrred · Sep 17, 2009

pschwart said:
It is much cheaper than the 3800 and in my opinion, very close 2nd in quality of print.

I only stated that because I have a friend that has a 3800. It has better mechanics and spray patterns that under extreme scrutiny creates slightly better results.

Yes, I have no plans on giving up my 1400.

It's good to know that I can purge my colour. I might get a set...

pschwart · Sep 17, 2009

mrred said:
I only stated that because I have a friend that has a 3800. It has better mechanics and spray patterns that under extreme scrutiny creates slightly better results.

Yes, I have no plans on giving up my 1400.

It's good to know that I can purge my colour. I might get a set...

I'm surprised to hear that. I use my R1800 for digital negatives. I am in the process of calibrating a 3800, but the results so far are not as smooth as the R1800. I was thinking the 1400 would give equivalent results. It only has 6 colors, but that's all I need for printing on matte paper or making negs. Re mechanics -- the 3800 has more features, but I'd say the R1800 is built to the same standard. Both are mostly big plastics boxes

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