I have a lot of my grandma's old B&W negatives from the 1930's-1960's..they are large and vary in size from 4 3/4 x 2 3/4 inches to 35mm(several in between these sizes too)....I remember she had an old box camera....I have a HP Photosmart scanner which can only take 35mm film and the Epson Expression 636 without the transparency unit....I want to buy another good scanner under $2000 that will take odd shaped film....I have read many forum discussions and so far all I get is perhaps the Minolta multiscan....is this correct? are there any other scanners that will take odd sized negatives? Thank you

-- linda murakata (lmurak@aol.com), May 01, 1999

Answers

Linda: For such a wide variety as what you have you might want to consider the Microtek Scanmaker 4. This unit has a separate "drawer" for scanning transparency material up to something like 8 X 10. The resolution is not as good as the Photosmart (1200 compared to 2400 DPI) but at ubout $700 it looks like a nice solution to your problem. If you want higher resolution you can jump to the Scanmaker 5, but that will bust your 2000 dollar budget by a little bit. Now - I do not have any experience with these units - so anyone who has might want to jump in here and condemn or praise the unit(s). I've only read the specs - and Microtek has a very good reputation for scanner technology.

BTW - I've had limited luck just putting large negatives in the small- print-holder that comes with the PS and scanning them in as "pictures" then reversing them in Photoshop. This only works with B & W negatives and you have to tweak the contrast etc. This will, however, not be great quality - but it's fun to do anyway....

Des

-- Dan Desjardins (dan.desjardins@avstarnews.com), May 02, 1999.

I have the transparency unit for the epson expression 636, and I have been pleased with the scans. Since you already have that scanner you might want to consider getting the transparency unit.

-- Gary Wayne Howard (cam17@ix.netcom.com), May 06, 1999.