Finally! The scanner I bought, after much research and thinking and much temptation to spend £500, is the more reasonable Canon Canoscan 8600F. And here’s my first scanned slide, all the way back from 1988, at a market in Morocco…

To be honest this is my third scan of this slide since it actually had a few scatches. and i resized it a little as it was a bit too big for showing on a site…
If anyone is curious here is the scan file http://iphi.net/pics/photography/Scan10001.bmp - i did let the scanner do a medium amount of scratch correction, and here’s the first scan without any correction http://iphi.net/pics/photography/Scan10001_uncorrected.bmp . Both are 22Mb so download only if you are curious!
So far I am quite pleased with the canon software tool that came with it. It did a great job of detecting all 7 negatives on the 2 strips i put in, then scanned them all. With medium scratch/dust correction it took about 6 minutes per scan at 2400 dpi - I dont think i need to go that high for most of my slides. If you look closely you can see that it didn’t quite get the negative edges correctly, although I suspect that if I paid more attention putting the strips in and if i paid more attention when using the tool, I would get a better result.
I actually got a better result than with Silverfast SE which also comes with the scanner, but that could be wrong settings in SF. It insisted to scan only 600dpi so it was hard to compare. And it didnt have the scratch reduction tool, but again there might be a way.
I was told to give vuescan a try but vuescan didnt want to know about the 8600F just yet. oh well. in a few versions maybe.
Anyway, scanning tips and software suggestions most welcome

let me first quote:

Pentax MZ-M—This is a close runner up to the ME for the best Pentax bargain. It’s a stripped-down MZ-5n without autofocus, built-in flash or matrix or spot metering. However, it has all the great ergonomics and controls of the MZ-5n: manual shutter speed dial, easy exposure compensation, exposure lock, and depth of field preview. It is remarkably light, 324 grams for the body including batteries, and goes to 434 grams and fits in your pocket with a 40mm f/2.8 lens. Sure, it doesn’t have automatic flash or autofocus, which limits it in some situations, but for outdoor/ travel photography it is great. The one thing that it really lacks is the big viewfinder of the ME. Its viewfinder is actually quite bright, but its magnification is way smaller than the ME, which makes it harder to focus. On the plus side, its split-image central focussing area appears to be especially accurately calibrated. It has a plastic lens mount, which some people deplore, but I haven’t had any problems with it. There is a traditionalist prejudice in favour of metal, but as noted in regard to the ME and MX, metal bends. I have come across used cameras with metal mounts that have bent, making the lenses very hard to remove, but I have yet to hear of a plastic mount that has broken or worn out.

It certainly is light, I’ll see how it performs tomorrow

Since my last post I have spent some time looking at my budget, considerably reduced since I am between jobs and since there are a lot of purchases done since the robbery in October...

I have also spent some time looking at how much the cameras I liked in the Canon and Nikon range still cost, both on ebay and with dealers, and realised maybe since I was not bought into a system I could possibly look at the other brands...

* Olympus is still going strong creating some nice digital cameras (especially this year) and they also have some very nice lenses. I used to like some of their film cameras.

* Minolta is gone, but was purchased by Sony. So all the recent Minolta lenses work happily on the new Sony alpha. That's pretty cool.

* Pentax has released some good digital cameras, and the brand new K10D is just awesome. And almost every lens released in the past 30 years will work with them. And they made some awesome lenses. There's literally hundreds to choose from, if you don't need autofocus (and I'm pretty good at manual focusing)
2007 camera + your grandfather's prime lenses = how cool is that?

You guessed it, I did the smart thing and bought an used film Pentax camera, with an eye to snap some lenses and save for the K10D (or GX-10D as Samsung calls it). Or possibly it's successor as maybe they'll even make a pro level one.

The K10/GX10 is cool. All the usual features, very good manual/semi manual functions, anti shake, and weather proofing/sealing. All for the "prosumer" prices. Sweet... so sweet it's hard to get your hands on, it seems.

The one I bought for now is extremely simple, about the same kind of features my A1 had (with the motor). And it's light. And it's FILM

I also got my hands on a decent flatbed scanner with a film scanning implement. I picked the canon 8600 as it was a good price. I know, its not like the super duper film scanners but it will have to do! Besides, if it turns out that after I scanned all my film I have a nice pile that really deserves better quality I can always invest in something better then. Or pay to have the handful professionally scanned. Whatever

I am strill trying to get my hands on another pentax body, a more pro one... or even an old digital Penatx "ist"...

OK, I'm still a camera geek

I want a new snazzy high end digital camera. And a new snazzy high end film camera

And boy is it sexy stuff…

I was a Canon person for years myself - had an A1, saved for an F1..., used to give the “rebel” as a wedding gift to friends to convert them to SLRs… but in the past 5-6 years I have been lusting after Nkons. And Canon made it easy by not making lenses compatible.

First the F100, which i still hope to pick up second hand somewhere. Best in viewer handling I have ever played with… just a dream of a camera. and have you *seen* the F6 ohmygodididntknowtheydidslrslikethatimgoingtofaint - although at that price you can almost get a medium format… and the F100 is pretty hot for a quarter of the price… and quite cheap second hand. 

Anyway on the digital front I keep looking at the SLRs then buying a happy little compact while i wait for the next generation of digital.

Thats what happened 18 months ago when i bought the Finepix F10, which was an awesome camera for the price. So the temptation is to buy a similar one. The screen on it was great, the pics it took pretty good, and the battery life incredible.

And that got stolen.

But… maybe its time to jump the SLR jump… at the moment the Pentax K10D (released any day now) looks really good. And I mean really really good.

anyway, as always my heart is torn in multiple directions, and my head is not helping - there’s all sorts of good choices for good reasons

OK, I am a camera geek.

Went to London today and managed to get a quick museum nip in. I usually go to te V&A but today I went next door to the Natural History museum cause they had the following, and i try to catch it every year:

http://www.nhm.ac.uk/visit-us/whats-on/temporary-exhibitions/wpy/index.jsp

There were a lot of stunning pictures, a lot of technically impressive one. And then there’s some I simply liked.

One guy I noticed was Peter Lilja, i really like his simple shot of an hermin because the composition of it is so interesting. So I looked him up:

http://www.peterlilja.com/

And yes, I very much like his eye for composition and interesting framing…

and she caught my eye cause she’s swiss, at first:

http://www.daisygilardini.com/portfolio.html

the site is as difficult to figure out as can be, but check out her portraits of seals, i love them :D

I used to live in an absolutely heavenly region, the little white house on the edge, there

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