Result of high res scan from 35mm negatives

fabvista

Sorry if this is a silly question but I'm a newbie. I recently got some 35mm negatives scanned by a Dublin camera shop. I paid for high resolution scanning. I'm really disappointed with the results as the resulting digital images are awfully grainy. My question is should high res negative scans be very grainy or should they be as clear as images from a digital camera? Many thanks.

stcstc

there are lots of factors

the scanner, the person using it, the neg, the size of file being produced,etc et


all of which could cause your prob

Ghost Train

I think yes there should be some level of grain. How grainy it looks might depend on a few things. The particular film type, how it was developed maybe, exposure of photos maybe, the resolution of the scan, maybe to some extent the type of scanner. Maybe you could post an example. Heres a largish scan of a 35mm negitive 200 iso film I did a week or two ago. http://pix.ie/ghosttrain/1231953/size/0/in/album/355133

chevron

And here is one i scanned in last night. Its not the highest res but its still fairly decent.
Color depth 24
DPI 1800

http://pix.ie/chevron/1242685/size/0/in/album/355715

fabvista

Many thanks for your replies and information. Here is a link to one of the scanned pics: http://pix.ie/glowinthesky/1244068/size/0/in/album/355767 . I took photo using regular fuji 200 iso film. No idea of exposure though. The negative would be about 4 years old. I paid the shop enough for the best quality scan they could do. Thanks again.

Ghost Train

That looks normal enough to me... don't see anything wrong with the scanning

Borderfox

Just as a quick question on the topic, would it not be better to get the negative printed out quite large and then scanned as the surface area would be larger? the negative is 35mm, is the dpi of this that allows the better quality..

humberklog

While it does look grainy I would say that this is mostly down to a few factors; slight overexposure when shot was being taken, wrong film for that type shot and the age of the film.
It is hard to get the sharp detail with film that you can easily take foir granted with a good digital. It can be done and done better (just opinion) with good film and a combination of knowledge and experience of the equipment. I don't think that your developer hasn't done their job with your pics, it's just that a few variables were preloaded against them.

All of the stuff on my pix.ie site is scanned negs onto disc, but mostly not going the expensive route (I take it you spent about 12 a roll?) but using 5 rolls developed and scanned to disc for 15euro. I'd reccommend this route if you've a few rolls as you can see the general quality in bulk and if you've a few you want to keep/take further then it's only a matter of bringing in the negs and having them re-scanned at a higher quality by a more professional outfit.
I've added you as a contact on Pix.ie (craanc) if you want to see my results.

chevron

Another route you could take especially if you still use a 35mm camera and will have plenty more rolls of film would be buy a negative scanner.
I got mine on ebay for 65 Euro delivered and i pay 2.99 in my local chemist to get the films developed. (negs only) and scan them in myself.

I think is MY best and cheapest option in the long run especially now that i will be staying with 35mm SLR for quite a while.

You can see how they turn out on my pix.ie here

kumate_champ07

from a 7mp scan on a 50euro scanner(canon 4400f second hand ebay)



(28mm @f2 manual focus with standard canon eos rebel screen so slightly out of focus)


here is a 100% crop, no visible grain!(provia 100f slide film)


edit* just saw negatives mentioned, im sure you were also interested in 35mm transparency/slide film

FX Meister

kumate_champ07 wrote: »

from a 7mp scan on a 50euro scanner(canon 4400f second hand ebay)

If that's the results you get from your 4400F then I think it's time to dump mine and get a new one. I've never been happy with the scans I've gotten from mine.

kumate_champ07

FX Meister wrote: »

If that's the results you get from your 4400F then I think it's time to dump mine and get a new one. I've never been happy with the scans I've gotten from mine.

it could be the software your using or maybe a driver problem. I tried the vuescan software and I could get huge scans but they were really bad, very flat colors and not much detail, even with the smaller scans, 150/300/600dpi

I use canons software for mac osx(It only goes up to 600dpi for 35mm film), I think the windows version is newer, not sure. I was very surprised myself with the results, It would be nice to get 14mp instead of 7mp for some of mt landscapes but Im not sure how to get vuescan working properly, I have the colorspace and the rest set up right I think.

fabvista

I'm learning from all the info. Thank-you.