I just picked up a test print of a new 40"x50" exhibition print from a drum scanned 4x5 negative. Holy hell is it ever crispy. My bank account is going to be ruined ($140 for the scan, which for a drum scan seems to be pretty good). It was scanned by a guy from another forum in Australia. Anyone have any good North American suggestions for sub-$150 1GB 16bit drum scans?

That's insane. Do you have an enlarger? I'd imagine it would ultimately be less expensive to do the printing yourself, even for colour. I hear Ilfochrome is pretty easy to do, and optical printing is the shit. You'd get insane resolution that way.

Drum scanning is like the best thing after getting a real print. I would like to have some work scanned in this way but it's so expensive that I don't have the budget for it at the moment.

I don't have an enlarger or a dark room big enough for a print that large. Can photopaper that large even be bought?

I don't think you can commercially buy photopaper that large, and even if you could, you would have to use a special designed enlarger to get to that size.

That was my hunch. Oh well... Drum scanning addiction will continue unabated until I'm bankrupt.

Just found a service in New York that seems to be much cheaper ($70). Gonna give them a try to see how their quality is.

http://www.drumscanning.com/rates.html

Consider buying one?

I know they are expensive, but if people can demand that kind of money for a scan...doesn't seem like it would take a terribly long time to make it back. A few hundred scans?

Additionally, is it really worth it? Admittedly, I have never seen a drum scan in person, but it seems like you are hitting a point of severely diminishing returns. A 2400 dpi scan of a 4x5 is still a huge file, and approaching the limitations of the film.

I wouldn't buy a drum scanner for a few reasons: Even used they are really expensive (multi-thousands), they are difficult to operate, messy (fluid mounted), and generally a pain in the ass. Plus, no where to put one in the condo. And my wife would kill me.

I've had high resolution scans made from an Epson V750, an Imacon 848, and a drum scanner... and for large prints like I'm currently doing, there is simply no comparison. Sharper, better grain, and larger dynamic range. Even at the highest resolution setting on the Imacon, I still had to resample the image up to the print size I wanted. The drum scan I had to downsample to the size I wanted there was so much resolution. Plus, the drum scans, because they were fluid mounted, had no dust or scratches in the files... a joy to work with.

Drum scans are the shit. My lab here does them http://www.robinimaging.com/

Indeed you can get photo paper that large. I believe you order it on rolls. However, you'd need to have a 4x5 enlarger with a color head. Turns out enlargers of that caliber are extremely expensive. I have found used ones with color heads for around $1500.

You would also need to get a vacuum easel to hold the paper flat, which can be expensive (but can be built easily and cheaply).

On optical prints:

With the latest digital inkjet printers, C prints are somewhat a thing of the past and typically only done for purists. A print with a high end plotter or other inkjet device, on good paper, with dye-based inks and a high quality drum scan will easily produce prints that are superior to C prints.

The real advantage to C prints is archival quality, but were talking about color so you mind as well toss the idea of an archival color print out the window.

And printing color SUCKS. It is extremely time consuming and color correcting is a pain in the ass. It is much more efficient to print color digitally than in the darkroom.

An alternate to drum scanning is super hi-res (Hassy, Red, etc.) bed photography. A lot cheaper, and very successful. I've used it once for gallery prints very nicely. Neko.

What do you mean? Taking a high res digital photo of a print?

Posted by yokes What do you mean? Taking a high res digital photo of a print?

Yes. Or, in my case, a backlit Type-665 negative. The guy I used had a long lens on a 'Blad with a digital back, and shot from across the room. The resolution from the Type-665 is amazing at this level... Neko.

https://www.vancouverdrumscan.com/prices

good quality work and scans, prices are great!!