This Lightroom Classic plugin is a powerful addition to any film scanning workflow. But since I already had this incredibly sturdy tripod for video and studio work, I decided it would be a good enough option for film scanning. It’s not as convenient as having a copy stand, which will likely be one of the next upgrades. This is not perfect, but it allows you to get the camera perfectly flat overtop of the negatives with a bit of work. Manfrotto XPro tripod with a horizontal center column and a fluid video head. Find the best price for this lens on Amazon. This has been one of the best upgrades to my kit, and it’s my number one recommended lens for scanning negatives. It produces a perfectly-flat focal plane, and handles flares better than any other macro lens I’ve used, in fact, in real world experiments, this lens performs better than lenses that cost more than twice as much, and almost as good as lenses that cost 10x as much. The Sigma Art 70mm macro lens is small, lightweight, and does an exceptionally good job at scanning negatives. But if you want one of these bodies anyways, purchasing a Sony A7III on Amazon through this link will be a major help in keeping this blog running. The camera is likely the least important part of this process - even an old used body with more than 20mp will give you great results. Soon, I’ll certainly pick up a remote shutter release so that I can scan without even touching the camera. I use ISO 50 and a 5-second timer to get the shots perfect every time. It is also jam packed with features that make it easy to scan film. The Sony A7III isn’t the highest megapixel camera on the market, but it has incredible dynamic range, and makes files that aren’t so large that I need to purchase a new hard drive every 6 months. The Essential Film Holder is perfect for using screens like an iPad for scanning, as it’s just slightly too large for a mobile phone. This has been a major help in reducing glare and making it exceptionally quick to scan a single roll of film. It keeps film perfectly flat when scanning with or without film borders, and has a built in clear plastic base that softens the light coming in. This is a simple, 3D printed scanning holder that elevates the negatives off of the light source. Over time, I guarantee at least a few of these parts will change.Įssential Film Holder. Here’s what I used to scan the film for this test. The test is on the next section, so you can skip this little bit of context if you just want to jump right into the action by clicking here. There will be cheaper ways to build a robust scanning rig if you don’t already have these parts lying around. If you’re building a rig for film scanning, I don’t believe this is the perfect setup, but it can be a quick guide for anyone looking to get started. Having a bad input will create a bad output, no matter how hard you try. The setup is the most important part of the scan. I’ve been working to make this image perfect ever since I first scanned it with an Epson V600 over a year ago. So in this article, I’m going to try scanning a single negative on the Gaomon LED tracing table, and an old iPad from 2013 to see which gives the best results. The Negative Lab Pro forums are filled with posts by users wondering what went wrong with their scans, and usually it comes down to the light source, the lens, or shooting without any extraneous light. I personally bought a Gaomon LED tracing table, which has served me well so far, but I’ve never been able to tell if some of the off characteristics in some of my film scans comes from the LED tracing table, or the negative itself.ĭuring a conversation with Nate, the creator of Negative Lab Pro, he mentioned that one of the biggest pitfalls that reduces image quality is when users scan with a cheap tracing table from Amazon. The majority of these tracing tables are actually made by the same manufacturer, but just have a different logo on the edge of them. And when you’re building up a kit, you’ll likely be looking to save money everywhere you can.Īmazon has a plethora of cheap LED tracing tables made under a variety of different brands. For many photographers out there, it may mean spending a lot of money on items for this one specific purpose. DSLR scanning can require a lot of specialized equipment.
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