Yesterday I had to scan a Velvia slide from my files. Yes, for those of you don’t remember the “old” days, there was a thing called “film” which had to be digitalized before you could use Photoshop on the image. A film scanner was the answer. But, a dedicated 35mm film scanner (rather than a flatbed scanner with a film holder) is now quite a rare beast. I’m not sure such a thing is even manufactured any more. I have a long discontinued Nikon Coolscan 4000, which is certainly adequate for magazine-sized reproduction. The problem, however, is getting the scanner to work with any current computer operating system.
I’m running Windows 7 64-bit on both desktop and laptop machines, but Nikon scanner software was written many years before this OS. I guess I could have kept an old computer around, but no thanks, I don’t want to do that. So how have I been able to use my scanner — infrequently though I do — along with Nikon Scan software on my current machines? Ah, Google to the rescue. Type in “how to use a Nikon scanner with Windows 7 64” and this link appears (there are other links but this is the one I used):
Follow the directions, and all is well. Don’t have Nikon Scan software? It’s still available for download directly from Nikon’s website.
Scanner Part Two
I’m rather shocked that my previous scanner post has generated so many emails (42 have landed in my mailbox so far). To answer everyone at once:
As far as I know, there are almost no dedicated 35mm film scanners currently made, but then I have no reason to keep up on the scanner market. I’m not looking for a new scanner, and I don’t pay attention to what is out there. I bought my Nikon Coolscan 4000 back in 2001, and it still works just fine for my purposes. If for some reason I need a higher res digital file from a transparency, I ship the film out to have a drum scan made. And no, I don’ t want to sell my Nikon scanner.
I’m not in the market for different scanner software. Yes, I know about SilverFast and VueScan, but I see no reason to purchase additional software when I’m satisfied with the results I get with NikonScan. This is especially true since I make very few scans per year.
I’m not scanning my entire film archive, nor do I have any intention of doing so. I only make a scan, or send out for one, when I have a very specific need (which is not nearly as often as you might expect). Indeed, why would I even want to scan all my old transparencies? Assume that I have 200,000 images (not such a big number, since I’ve been photographing professionally for almost 45 years now!). Total time it takes to make one scan (pull image, remove dust, make scan, replace film, enter resulting digital file into database with caption info, etc.): about two minutes under the very best of conditions (not including any Photoshop time needed on the resulting file). OK, 200,000 images @ 2 minutes/image = 400,000 minutes, or just over 833 days straight, working 8 hours per day with no breaks. No thanks.
And…I actually already have thumbnail images of all my slides. The slide itself is a thumbnail. Hold up the slide, look at it.