Scanning 35mm film with Epson v550 and Scan Utility 2 (Mac)

dstembridge · Jan 19, 2024

I just started scanning old negatives and have mostly 33mm b/w, but some color as well. I have an issue that when I scan using Color negative Film as document type, it initially scanned the individual photos as negatives, but now it scans them as positives - and vice versa for scanning as Color positives scans as negatives. (like attached photos)

Also, the files previewed as negative film are cauing the borders to be off, whereas they are fine when scanning as positives.
Any suggestions on what I'm doing wrong?

brbo · Jan 19, 2024

Well, you screenshots look like everything is working as it should.

dstembridge · Jan 19, 2024

brbo said:
Well, you screenshots look like everything is working as it should.

Notice the jeep, on the negatives they have crop marks that cut off the front space of the image. I guess that is the real issue.

Bronson Dugnutt · Jan 19, 2024

It would appear that the frame detection algorithm in the scanning software is less-than-perfect when processing a negative. Are all negatives effected or just these frames in particular? Some frames may be more susceptible than others.

My advice would to be to (1) check for any updates available for the scanning software, (2) go into 'Thumbnail Options' and change the cropping area setting, and (3) slightly reposition the film in the holder, if possible, and rescan to see if the software correctly identifies the frames.

brbo · Jan 19, 2024

Epson Scan 2 is a dumbed down scanning application on Mac. If you can't force it into a mode where you can manually select frames (Thumbnail Options) you will probably need to start looking at Vuescan or Silverfast...

What happens if you disable 'Thumbnails'?

Nopo · Jan 19, 2024

Epson Scan 2 on Mac is garbage, With the serial number of your scanner you can download Silverfast, fully functional.

Download SilverFast Scanner Software for your Epson Scanner - SilverFast

www.silverfast.com

Carlos

Alan Edward Klein · Jan 20, 2024

Why did you select Photo Mode in Mode? Isn't that for prints. Shouldn't you select film or some other setting for Mode?

I also noticed this in the manual. It seems that MAC computers can use the Epsonscan software normally used by Windows if I'm reading this right. That's what I use in my Windows operating computer for a V850 and V600.

Note: With Mac OS X 10.6, 10.7, or 10.8, in addition to scanning with Image Capture, you can download and install Epson Scan scanning software. Epson Scan provides additional image adjustment and photo correction features for enhancing scanned images, and provides an interface for TWAIN-compliant OCR

brbo · Jan 20, 2024

No. Recent Macs can only use Epson Scan 2 which lacks a lot of features of Epson Scan.

Alan Edward Klein · Jan 20, 2024

brbo said:
No. Recent Macs can only use Epson Scan 2 which lacks a lot of features of Epson Scan.

This comment from the manual seems to indicate it will operate with certain MACs. I suppose of someone is running and old mac that might be useful.

Note: With Mac OS X 10.6, 10.7, or 10.8, in addition to scanning with Image Capture, you can download and install Epson Scan scanning software. Epson Scan provides additional image adjustment and photo correction features for enhancing scanned images, and provides an interface for TWAIN-compliant OCR

Duceman · Jan 20, 2024

Epson Scan 2 can be real finnicky when it comes to creating thumbnails. If it continues to misalign the thumbnails, or cut off part of the image, I would suggest going into the "thumbnail options" button and increasing the size of the thumbnail. This will, of course, mean that you will be scanning more than needs be, which could lead to incorrect color parameters if you're setting it to automatic, and that you'll have to crop later, but beyond manually setting the scanned image size yourself for each individual negative, I've found no way around this in Epson Scan 2 software.

BobRetro · Jan 20, 2024

As tempting as it is to use Thumbnail mode, I get better results using "Normal" mode under the "Professional Mode" option. You can create frames and save your settings. You then can just move those frames around to line up with your frames after you preview This has the added benefit of not losing your various settings such as Unsharp Mask, Color Restoration and Digital ICE, which get reset when you use thumbnail mode. I'm using the Windows version, but I suspect the Mac version is pretty similar.

dstembridge · Jan 20, 2024

Thanks everyone, I downloaded SilverFast. It does seem to be similar, but not as easy to use right out of the box like Epson Scan 2. I will keep playing around with it.

PhilBurton · Jan 21, 2024

dstembridge said:
Thanks everyone, I downloaded SilverFast. It does seem to be similar, but not as easy to use right out of the box like Epson Scan 2. I will keep playing around with it.

There is a learning curve for Silverfast. Best to search for Silverfast in messages on this and other forums.

250swb · Jan 29, 2024

dstembridge said:
I just started scanning old negatives and have mostly 33mm b/w, but some color as well. I have an issue that when I scan using Color negative Film as document type, it initially scanned the individual photos as negatives, but now it scans them as positives - and vice versa for scanning as Color positives scans as negatives. (like attached photos)

Also, the files previewed as negative film are cauing the borders to be off, whereas they are fine when scanning as positives.
Any suggestions on what I'm doing wrong?
View attachment 360520
View attachment 360506

From your screenshots it looks like it's working fine. If you scan a negative as a 'Document Type' positive (or slide) it will come out as a negative (top example), just as a slide would come out positive. You are simply keeping the negative as a negative. Is that what you want? If in the second example you change Document Type to Color Negative film Epson Scan converts it into a positive for you, which is normally correct. As for the cropping if you are scanning a colour negative in a 35mm negative holder as a slide (top example) I would assume the software is thinking there's a slide in a slide mount and is trying to compensate for the slide mount.

But it looks like scanning a negative works perfectly if you set the machine to 'Color Negative' so why worry about how it turns out with odd crops when the settings are wrong anyway?

Scanning 35mm film with Epson v550 and Scan Utility 2 (Mac)

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