Monday, June 13, 2016

REVIEW: Epson Perfection V850 Pro Scanner (Part I–35mm Slides)

Epson Perfection V850 Pro Scanner
Epson Perfection V850 Pro Scanner

I’ve been enjoying scanning since the early 90’s back when I had my HP ScanJet IIc, but when that scanner was retired due to interfacing and software problems with more modern computers, I had a long search trying to find something that was good enough for my quality bar. Years later, I’d find the Epson Perfection V750 Pro scanner, and it was all that I hoped and more. I used it for years and it never let me down.

Fast forward to 2016, and I got the opportunity to upgrade my v750 to a v850 and see what was new. In addition to the obvious faster scanning speed, here were a few of the big improvements:

  • New Light Source: The V750-M Pro features a cold cathode fluorescent lamp (CCFL), while the V850 Pro features ReadyScan® LED for fast scans with no warm up time required and uses less power.
  • Improved Film Holders: The film holders that come with the V850 Pro are stiffer for more consistent results. The V850 Pro ships with eight film holders: 35 mm slides, 35 mm film strips, medium format 6 x 20 cm and 4” x 5” (two each). Among the holders includes, two sets of anti-Newton ring film holders and features five-step multi-point height adjustment. The V750-M Pro ships with four film holders: 35 mm negatives, 35 mm slides, medium format and 4” x 5”.

35mm Slide Scans via Epson Scan 5.11

While for my personal use, most of my scanning ends up being reflective scanning of prints and documents, I thought it would be fun to do some testing with slides this time. I was never a big slide shooter as I preferred prints in the film days, so I didn’t have any of my own to use.

For the 35mm slides featured here, Adrian E. Stepan was kind enough to share some of his slides I could scan. These images were taken with a Fed-3 rangefinder with Voigtlander snapshot skopar (25mm f/4) shot on Fuji Velvia 100.

No post-processing was done on these photos beyond what the scanner software does at scan time. Click the pictures to see the full-size tiff that the scanner software generated. With typical modern post-processing techniques, these images could be significantly improved.

You may view these images, but you may not print, save, edit, redistribute or use them for any purposes other than viewing while your browser window is open reading this article. After leaving this article, please delete all downloaded images.

Here were the Epson Scan Settings:

Epson Scan Settings for these 35mm slides
Epson Scan Settings for these 35mm slides

Here’s a video that shows how the following slides were scanned:


Epson Scan USM Med Dig Ice Qual 3200 24-bit #004

Copyright Adrian E. Stepan - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED


Epson Scan USM Med Dig Ice Qual 3200 24-bit #022

Copyright Adrian E. Stepan - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED


Epson Scan USM Med Dig Ice Qual 3200 24-bit #013

Copyright Adrian E. Stepan - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED


Epson Scan USM Med Dig Ice Qual 3200 24-bit #017

Copyright Adrian E. Stepan - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED


Epson Scan USM Med Dig Ice Qual 3200 24-bit #009

Copyright Adrian E. Stepan - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Click here to see a full gallery of these slides and more.

35mm Slide Scans via SilverFast SE 8.8

In addition to Epson Scan, the v850 includes the SE version of the most highly regarded scanning software in the industry – SilverFast SE. Click here to learn more about SilverFast upgraded versions, and contact me if you would like a special discount to purchase a SilverFast upgrade.

Using the same slides as above (with the same restrictions previously mentioned), I performed scans using the more labor intensive but higher quality SilverFast SE software. Here’s a screenshot of what this software looks like, but view the video to see my exact workflow:


SilverFast SE 8.8.0r3

Here’s a video that shows how I scanned these slides:

 

 


SF880r3_USM_iSRD_AutoCCR_3200ppi_48-24_MEOff_10

Copyright Adrian E. Stepan - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED


SF880r3_USM_iSRD_AutoCCR_3200ppi_48-24_MEOn_22

Copyright Adrian E. Stepan - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED


SF880r3_USM_iSRD_AutoCCR_3200ppi_48-24_MEOn_13

Copyright Adrian E. Stepan - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED


SF880r3_USM_iSRD_AutoCCR_3200ppi_48-24_MEOn_17

Copyright Adrian E. Stepan - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED


SF880r3_USM_iSRD_AutoCCR_3200ppi_48-24_MEOff_03

Copyright Adrian E. Stepan - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Clearly the extra effort is rewarded with significantly better results as you can see from the images above. The fact that this excellent software is included, certainly helps you to make the most of this scanner if you are willing to invest the time into learning how to use this software properly.

See my videos here and in the future to learn more about how to use SilverFast AI.

Click here to see a full gallery of these slides and more.

Conclusion

Check back for my next installment where I’ll have a lot more video footage of these scanners in action, additional media type scanned, and so much more.

Where to order

Click here to learn more or order at the B&H web site. My friends at Amazon have it available here.

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