Hi,

I have found today after a number of unsuccessful searches some sample scans of the new Canoscan D2400UF, announced at 2400 dpi optical resolution and $500. Here is the adress: http://www.myalbum.ne.jp/cgi-bin/a_menu?id=fa268931

This page (in japanese unfortunately, but the captions are in english) in is very interesting, as it has some samples of 4x5" slides scans (taken with good equipment: Linhof Technika and Nikkor lens), together with 645 and 135. It shows what the Coolscan 4000 from Nikon does with small format too... impressive !

I am not (to say the least) particularly impressed by the results of the D2400UF. The scans are *very* unsharp, and though I know that sharpening in Photoshop can help a lot, here the high frequency modulations (i.e. the details) just seem to be absent and not only dimmed. Therefore, impossible to recover...

Currently I am using an Epson Perfection 1200 scanner, and I am relatively pleased with the results, but the extra resolution would be interesting, especially at $500. After seeing these scans, I am not sure now if there is an advantage to go for the Canon.

By the way, there is also a few other samples at the adress: http://www.geocities.com/aanticulturee/scantest.htm

I would apreciate any comment you may have about this question, and which scanner in the sub $1000 range is be your favorite for 4x5".

Pierre Kervella.

-- Pierre Kervella (pkervell@eso.org), June 21, 2001

Answers

Ooops... after having switched from the poor display of Internet Explorer with a cheap screen to the one of Photoshop on a high-res display, I think I unfairly overestimated the "unsharpness" of the Canon D2400UF scans. It seems that it is not possible to see correctly *really* big images on 15" screens... I should have thought about it...

Of course, they are not as good as the Coolscan 4000 scans, but they definetely look better than my Epson's (and are so much bigger...)! Maybe I will buy this scanner after all ;-).

Pierre.

-- Pierre Kervella (pkervell@eso.org), June 21, 2001.

I have had a Canon D2400UF for a week now. I have scanned several 4x5 color negatives and one 35mm color slide with it thus far. On the first 4x5 scan I tried 2400dpi resolution and 48 bit color- it produced an over 300mb file. It is amazing to me to think of a $450 flatbed that can do that! My results with 4x5 have been very good so far, but the 35mm scan I tried at 4800dpi was softer and less detailed than a scan from the same slide done with a Minolta Dimage II $400 slide scanner (2880 dpi). I need to play with this machine more before I write it off for 35mm, and I haven't tried 120 film yet, but for 4x5 color negs at least the results are quite good. As I gain more experience, I will pass along my comments to this forum.

-- David Rose (DERose1@msn.com), June 21, 2001.

Any 4800 dpi scan will always be soft. The optical dpi is 2400. If you scan at 4800 dpi, at least one side is interpolated.

-- Howard Slavitt (info@enaturephoto.com), June 22, 2001.

David, I was considering the new Canon until someone reported that a medium format scan took 15 minutes. This is probably influenced by the system you are scanning into but I'm curious how long your 4x5 scan took.

-- Hap Mullenneaux (hapm@yahoo.com), June 22, 2001.

I'm working for a company developing highend XY-scanners (about $40,000 with true A3 5080 dpi) and I know a lot how scanners work. Problem number one with blurry images are out-of-focus scanners, cheap CCDs and cheap optics. For scanning in high-resolution all three requirements have to be met by high quality components. Therefore I think that Canon is only telling the half truth about the D2400UF - a simple calculation will prove this theory: An A4 scanner has a width of about 8.5 inch (216mm). To scan with 600dpi in one strip (without the ability to move the CCD sidewards) you need a CCD with 8.5 x 600 = 5100 elements. To scan with 1200 dpi you need 10200 elements. To scan with 2400 dpi you need 20400 elements or 2 CCDs. Problem: there exists no CCD with 20400 elements, not even highend! And they do not claim the usage of 2 CCDs. It would be possible to scan the 35MM at higher resolution when the scanner has the possibility to zoom and refocus - but that is reserved for expensive scanners like Fuji Lanovia, Agfascan and others. The VARIO scan technique is also nearly a marketing gag - even if you shift your CCD half a pixel, your CCD elements are too big, because they see 2x2 1200 dpi pixels as one 600 dpi pixel - that improves interpolated resolution maybe with 25%. And looking at the scan of the resolution test chart, I would go further than the tester and would say you could see less than 25 lpi which means there is only a resolution of 1200 dpi. In my opinion Canon has yet to prove that they are really able to receive 2400 dpi.

Also forget about the densities they claim - to get a real density of 3.6 you would have to cool your CCD dynamically and use a very high quality one (with 14bit) and AD-converter with 14bit. It is consumer equipment - never forget this. I personally use a Canon D660U and I am impressed with its ability to capture good scans from photos at 600dpi, although with some redish cast. But scanning 35MM or others is a domain left to film scanners, or better, highend flatbeds and drum-scanners.

-- Robert Niessner (robert.niessner@tm1.at), August 21, 2001.

I have finally purchased this scanner and I did a number of tests on the resolution and true Dmax of this device. The results are amazing! You can find them at the adress:

http://elbereth.obspm.fr/~kervella/Scanners/index.htm

-- Pierre Kervella (pkervell@yahoo.com), October 07, 2001.