Slide Scanner and Negative Scanner Buyer's Guide

At ScanCafe, we successfully scanned over 2,000,000 images and truly believe we are slide scanner and negative scanner experts.  As such, many of our customers ask us which slide scanners and negative scanners we use and why.  Thus, we decided that it makes sense for us to create our own negative scanner and slide scanner buyer's guide to help you with your research.

That said, we would be remiss if we did not first point out our critical assessment of slide scanners and negative scanners. It is our belief that the average consumer should not buy a high end slide scanner or negative scanner. It takes time to learn how to scan, and it takes even more time to do the actual scanning.  At $1000+ for a good slide scanner, you are better off letting ScanCafe do the slide scanning and negative scanning for you. We can scan 4,000-5,000 slides and negatives for the price of a good scanner, and we can literally save you 1 to 2 years of manual labor.

That said, pro photographers may want to buy a great slide scanner or negative scanner to use for small projects. They can send the big scanning projects to us which they'll never have time to scan. Therefore, we are handing over great slide scanner buying tips based on our experience of scanning over 2,000,000 images.

1. Flatbed or dedicated slide scanner and negative film scanner?
Flatbed scanners ideally should not be used for scanning slides and negatives. You should only use flatbed scanners for print photo scanning. While flat beds have improved significantly in their ability to deliver high resolution film scans, they still do not come close in performance to dedicated film scanners. Flatbeds might be okay for the occasional scan but not for a digitization/archival project.

2. What Resolution/Quality?
We recommend scanners that are capable of 4000dpi since these meet the needs of the hobbyist and the professional although we only recommend scanning at 3000 dpi.

3. Color sensitivity or bit depth?
The greater the bit depth, the more vibrant color, detail, and contrast in your scans. We recommend at least 8bit depth (per color channel, i.e. 24bit for RGB) for the hobbyist and 16bit for the professional.

4. Dust and scratch removal?
Kodak's Digital ICE is an absolute must have and should be compatible for the different types of film material used historically (Kodachrome, Ektochrome, Elite Chrome etc). Kodak's Digital ICE is a ground breaking technology that uses a white light scan and an infrared scan to determine the location of dust and scratches. Most high end scanners will allow you to control the level of ICE to use on your film since there is some loss of texture/sharpness in certain film types. Overall, ICE should be used on majority of your scans (not blindly though). You will find some websites recommending Vuescan or Silverfast software that are also capable of dust and scratch removal. However, for the hobbyist Kodak's Digital ICE is the way to go. Vuescan and Silverfast are "scanner software" solutions that give you full control of your scanner so you better take the time to become an expert if you use them.

If you find that your scanned slides and negatives could still look better, you should explore various photo restoration options for slides and negatives.

5. Size of slides?
Now this is a tricky subject. Most slides are of the standard size and the film is rectangular. Some slides are square in shape (super slides) and some are rectangular in the vertical direction. The Nikon 5000ED does not scan the entire area of these non-standard sized slides. You will have to either sacrifice some of the area or choose and alternate scanner such as Nikon's 9000ED or a high quality flatbed scanner such as EPSON 4990.

6. Which slide scanner should you buy?
It is nearly impossible to beat Nikon 5000ED and Nikon 9000ED scanners. These are the slide scanners and negative scanners we use. You can get them at RitzCamera or check out Pricegrabber.com.

That said, we will continue to add more and more slide scanner and negative scanner comparisons on the site over the next few months which will further assist you with your research.