I finally compared a pro lab scan to my flatbed at home and wow

I shot the same roll of Fuji Superia 400 on my Pentax K1000 and split it in half. Sent 12 frames to The Darkroom in Florida and scanned the other 12 myself on my Epson V600. The pro scans had way more shadow detail and the colors just popped without me adjusting anything. My home scans took me 45 minutes each to tweak in Gimp and still looked muddy in the highlights. I mean the V600 is fine for web sharing but the difference in dynamic range was night and day. Now I'm thinking I should just budget $15 per roll for pro scans and stop wasting time fighting my flatbed. Has anyone else noticed a huge gap between home and lab scans on consumer film like Gold 200?

2 comments

2 Comments

karen_sanchez1012d ago

Oh man that tracks with everything in life honestly. It's like when you try to save money doing something yourself and realize the pros have better tools and know what they're doing, so you end up spending more time and still not getting the same result. I've noticed this pattern with so many things, from baking to fixing stuff around the house, sometimes it's just worth paying someone who does it every day.

garcia.charles12d ago

Yeah totally same thing happened to me with Gold 200. I spent like two hours on one frame from my V550 trying to get the colors right and it still had this weird green cast. Sent the next roll to a local lab and they came back looking like a totally different film stock. The shadows were clean and the grain looked way tighter. Honestly I think the flatbed just can't handle the dynamic range of color negative film no matter how much you tweak. I've basically given up on home scanning for color now, only use the flatbed for black and white since it's more forgiving.