Imacon Precision II suitable for B&W?

[snaggs]

Can get one of these for the same price as a LS-9000.. Now, it would be usefull to scan the odd 4x5.. my questions are;

1) 1800dpi produces pretty large files out of 4x5, this wouldn't be at a disadvantage to flatbeds would it?

2) How painfull is life going to be without ICE

3) How painfull is unmounting trannies to scan them?

4) It can scan 3200dpi for medium format.. how is that going to compare vs the LS-9000?

5) Has anyone tried B&W in one of these? What about Kodachrome?

Daniel.

[jd callow]

1) It has no flatbed peer. 1800 dpi may be less than the latest flatbed, but there is no comparison in quality.
2) The imacon is very sharp and can enhance grain and dust. If at all possible create a clean room for scanning and clean (blow off, de-static) your film.
3) if you have paper mounts its a pain, plastic is no issue.
4) I've never used the 9000. One thing about the Imacon that makes it as good as any non drum scanner is that it bends the film along an arc insuring film flatness. The ls9000 doesn't.
9) I've done both kodachrome and B&W it does a great job with either.

[Baxter Bradford]

The latest version of Flexcolor actually offered a performance boost, so now I get 2040ppi on 5x4 instead of the published 1800. This gives a 440MB file when using 16 bit colour which takes 45min...... As for 120 film, I generally scan at 1600ppi; with 3200ppi the grain is very evident.

It scans all film very well. I have had greatest difficulty getting my set-ups for colour neg. My photo-library outsource their Kodachrome scanning to me, since their Nikon (not a 9000) cannot do a very good job at all on it.

Concur with John, unmounting trannies in card mounts can be a pain if the mount is old and will not separate along the glue. You soon get adept with a scalpel!

Dust removal is a fiddle and would recommend avoiding the Imacon Flextouch software which is supposed to remove dust which it will do, but along with fine detail too!

The lens is great and far excels the pixel-packing lower grade scanners giving facility to up-res if necessary. The Nikon does have a good lens too, but will leave to the better informed about relative performance.

Beware that the Precision II is SCSI and there have been all sorts of connectivity issues on the imaconusers newsgroup. Firewire/SCSI converters rarely work and there are also some cards for Mac G5's which are suspect.

[snaggs]

Ok, well the price I think I have.. (seller is thinking about it), is about $2000 US for the Flextight II.. does this strike you guys as fair?

Daniel.

[jd callow]

they were 15k about 5 or 6 years ago (and about 4k on ebay 2 years ago). I don't know if there is a wear issue with these things. I used one for 5 years. It needed to be sent in for repairs once and the bulb needed to be changed twice. I'd say yes if it includes the film holders you need, focus and calibration materials, the scans look good and if a check of ebay confirms the market value of a used one.

[Bob Carnie]

Good price and good scanner for most needs.
The tango scanner IMO is a better scanner but requires an excellent operator and is defininately not in this price scale
I love the precision 11 we have I would say go for it.

[snaggs]

Well I've gone for it.. now I just have to wait and see if my offer will be accepted... its being mulled over..

Daniel.