Re: Sprintscan 120 issues/findings (comments welcomed)

["Ernst Dinkla" <E.Dinkla@xxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message -----
From: <rafe.bustin@verizon.net>
To: <scan@leben.com>
Sent: Monday, April 15, 2002 8:43 PM
Subject: Re: Sprintscan 120 issues/findings (comments welcomed)
> I don't believe that the behavior in question (histograms
"compressed"
> on the low end) is an advantage or benefit -- nor have I heard
anyone
> claim that.  It is a bug, IMHO, though (also IMHO) not a
terribly serious
> one.  Others disagree about the severity and impact.
>
> I don't believe there's any significant information being lost,
since it's
> such a small portion of the tonal range that's being wasted
(unused.)
>
> What I have discovered, and still don't understand, is this
"fix":  to set the
> monitor gamma (in NikonScan, deep in one of the Preferences
menus)
> to 1.0.  Try it and see if that doesn't "fix" the problem.  I
have no idea
> what other unintended consequences might arise from doing that.
> I have no idea what the relationship is here, whether it is a
bug, or
> if there's a valid theoretical link between gamma and black
point
> that we've all overlooked.  I don't use this fix, myself.
>
> What's also interesting is how well NikonScan does at properly
> "inverting" negatives of all the different film types I've
thrown at it.
> And it does this (apparently) without using any canned
"profiles" or
> "film terms."

Whether it is significant, a bug or anything else doesn't matter
to me. The information of the data scanned is far more
transparent in the histogram through the positive>negative
routine than by scanning it as a negative right away. The
function of analogue gain to get the histogram in the middle was
made very visible too. Changing the gamma in the curves resulted
in what one would expect which is something I couldn't get right
with a negative scan. That the cause may be hidden in a gamma
setting in the preferences makes it worse in my opinion. Using
the default settings brings it back again. Maybe the 'universal'
negative quality of NikonScan is only possible with the loss of
shadow information. At least they could have informed us of that
approach. It doesn't work for everyone and everything like so
many universal solutions.

I should have written; this other method works for me, how
NikonScan does it goes beyond my understanding.

Ernst



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