UKC

Due to ill-health and accidents, I've got loads of time on my hands !

I was looking through my boxes of slides and came across some pretty good stuff (IMHO) that I would like to scan.

My previous efforts have been OK (a few examples in my album) but I'm sure for a small outlay far better results could be achieved. I used an Epson V300 flatbed.

What would you suggest for a reasonable investment ? If anyone has something second-hand , I'm open to offers !

In reply to Pyreneenemec: I have an Epson Perfection 1640 that scans slides and makes a very reasonable job of them but does it slowly. OK if you have lots of time on your hands.
Yours for a tenner!

In reply to Andrew Lodge:

Thanks but I don't think it would be an improvement on my V300.

In reply to Pyreneenemec: you can get a specific scanner thing that scans your slides and puts them on sd cards. Aldi did one a while ago. They were quite expensive though. amazon has this selection for an idea

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss/279-2557567-1018124?url=search-ali...

In reply to Pyreneenemec:

I would try to pick up one of the Nikon 35mm scanners second hand - I used to have the Coolscan IV and it was superb. When I upgraded to the medium-format version I sold it for about £250 on here, but there are usually a few on ebay.

In reply to Adam Long:

I looked into this not long ago and Nikon don't make them anymore and spares or repairs were said to be problematic. Secondhand ones seemed to be pretty expensive too. In the end I got a Canon 900F which seems pretty good to me, much much better than my previous old Epson one... I don't know if it would be any better than the one the OP already has though.

This subject often comes up, doing a search would perhaps show other threads) but oddly there doesn't seem to be any obvious solution - too small a market probably, and not one that could grow.

I looked into this because my Minolta Elite scanner takes too long to scan slides (though it does a good job). I ended up using my digital SLR with 100mm macro lens on a tripod, pointing straight down at a light box on which I put the slides one by one. And if you have suitable camera software (e.g. EOS Utility for Canon EOS cameras) you can plug the camera into the PC and use Live View on the PC's screen to see the camera viewpoint, take the photo and have it automatically transferred to the PC immediately.

This is way faster than a scanner and good enough quality for most purposes - I can always do a high resolution scan of the best photos using my scanner.

In reply to Pyreneenemec: i have an epson perfection V700 photo, and its great! 35mm, 120 and large format, slide and negative all good, resonably fast once you get the settings sorted. i also prefer its ease of use to the nikor coolscans (ive used a wide range of film scanners during my degree years) i think i picked mine up new for around £400

In reply to Pyreneenemec:

I looked at that one too but I couldn't persuade myself that I could justify spending the extra money - the Canon 9000F was about 140€ IIRC. I was tempted by the number of slides the Epson could take in one batch though.

What resolution do you generally scan slides at?

I use about 2000x1400 or 3000x2000 for stocking photos for speed and size, but it will go a lot higher for images I want to work on.

In reply to Larey:

I have the same, and it is very good, but not fast. In choosing a scanner, don't get too hung up on resolution, instead search for the scanner with the biggest ability to capture light versus dark. DMax OD where 3.5 is acceptable, 4.0 is good & 4.5 is excellent as well as digital ICE as this will save you hours!

I previously had a Coolscan IV which broke down - the bill from Nikon for repair was breathtaking!

HTH Steve

In reply to Pyreneenemec:
How many slides are you planning to copy?
I had about 150 to copy and decided it was easier to get them done for me. I used http://www.mr-scan.co.uk/prices.html and thought for home use the results were really good, far better than most of my original digital photos.

In reply to Adam Long:
I sold it for about £250 on here
Think I'd sell mine for for that! Only used for 1 massive session spread over 3 months

In reply to Pyreneenemec: Maplins sell a cheap slide scanner which is excellent. Either puts scanned slides onto a sd card or straight onto your computer. Wife copied 200 slides a very short space of time. good quality.

In reply to everyone :

Thanks for the suggestions and advice, I'll see what I can find on Ebay ! To be honest, for what I will do with resulting images, the Epson V300 is fine, but just SO slow. I've got 30 years worth of slides : hols, climbing, fishing, cycling and kids ! I haven't calculated exactly how many but it's certainly in thousands !