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Want to Buy WTB: Durst Sigma Plus

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Trader history for NortheastPhotographic (1)

Joined
Mar 3, 2011
Messages
1,605
Location
Maine!
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Medium Format
Looking for a complete Durst Sigma Plus, obviously working and with the dongle. Ideally in North America and you should have the capability to ship it or Maine if it cannot be picked up easily.
 
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If you don't ask you don't receive! I'm actually in the process of exploring the purchase of one, but I am putting out feelers in case that falls through. The pandemic has made the process extremely slow as the lab that has it is shut down.
 
Interesting looking scanner, I'd not been aware of these before this thread. A thread on photo.net quotes 30 seconds for a reasonable resolution scan of 4"x5".

My understanding is that it is a pre-press scanner and could be mated to the Lambda printers. It's specs are impressing, and it has many unique features including compressed air connections in addition to ICE. Most interesting for my purposes is also it's use of Fuji Image Intelligence for color neg conversions. I"m hoping to add higher end scans to my shop with consitent color from my Fuji Frontiers.
 
Amazingly there are not. I have two friends/fellow lab owners who run them though so I get my info from them.
 
I wonder how many of these Durst units were made? - they would have the advantage over drum scanners of speed.

I think they're more comparable to a very high speed Imacon level scanner. Though higher resolution, and yes much faster. The scanners actually utilize an APO Rodagon D 75mm macro lens and a halogen light source.
 
I think they're more comparable to a very high speed Imacon level scanner. Though higher resolution, and yes much faster. The scanners actually utilize an APO Rodagon D 75mm macro lens and a halogen light source.

I think their big selling point was their raw speed relative to quality - their resolution is about the same as an Imacon for 120, a little better for 4x5 & not much better than a Frontier (and nowhere close to an Imacon) for 135. On the other hand, outputting a several hundred mb full res scan in 15-30s is remarkable even today. They seem to have existed on the cusp of higher speed databus connections and greater RAM but just before the market shifted to digital. I take it that they can spit out 16-bit files as standard? The other thing I'd be interested to know is how heavy they are...
 
Re comparison to Imacon/Frontier....

It's about 4000ppi for 35, 3100ish for 120, and 2500 for 4x5. The files are 14 bit really but are packaged 16bit (I think that's actually more universal than most makes want to admit). Plus it has an auto feeder for BOTH 120/35, that's huge for my workflow. I believe the UI in use is more like a normal scan software package than the ultra basic interface of the Frontier.

As for weight, it's a honker. Freight service to move them is prerequisite.
 
It's definitely not for the home user. It's the size of a desk and will cost around $5k+. For home users shopping in that price range you can't go wrong with an IQSmart2 or 3. Plus those are a lot easier to find and get serviced.
 
It would be illogical to own and operate these outside of a lab

I know, that's why I'm interested in finding out some of the practicalities of them.

Re comparison to Imacon/Frontier....

It's about 4000ppi for 35, 3100ish for 120, and 2500 for 4x5. The files are 14 bit really but are packaged 16bit (I think that's actually more universal than most makes want to admit). Plus it has an auto feeder for BOTH 120/35, that's huge for my workflow. I believe the UI in use is more like a normal scan software package than the ultra basic interface of the Frontier.

As for weight, it's a honker. Freight service to move them is prerequisite.

Is it nearer 200 or 300lbs? I've never been able to find either a weight or size spec for one. Numbers I've seen indicate 3800ppi for 135, 3000ppi for 120, 2500ppi for 4x5.

I wonder if the scan size limits are partly for speed & partly so that it doesn't hit limitations of 32-bit file formats - it could feasibly scan the entire roll as one big file at blazing speed, then break it up into individual files afterwards. I'd be really interested to see any of the manufacturers' documentation.
 
If this deal works out and I can acquire one finally I’ll share the full specs, and you can of course send me film to be scanned with it.
 
For those who are interested & can read French, here's the production specs of the Sigma Plus

Durst_Sigma_plus.jpg

I really don't want to sound like Mr Grumpy, but just to make things crystal clear, I've long had a commercial case for buying one of these machines, however they always seemed to have about the same prevalence as hen's teeth in the UK so I never went seriously looking for one. On the other hand, I found a 105mm Rodagon-G pretty much immediately, so sometimes luck can strike...

I would be interested to see what the user interface offers in the way of controls & whether a user generated LUT could be used to define colour inversion etc - and whether the TIFF is uncompressed or LZW only.
 
Amazingly there are not. I have two friends/fellow lab owners who run them though so I get my info from them.
Hi" I just noticed this post from 2020, I currently own and operate a Sigma Scanner, I am looking for a technical answer to an issue I am having, I see that you mentioned that you know of someone who operates this unit, anyway of being put in contact with them? I would appreciate that , thanks. Kim
 
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