Scanning Slides of Astro-images

Hi there Gang,

I am contemplating getting hold of a Slide Scanner to archive my
slide-based
Astrophotographs.

I'm on a budget of about £250 and Jessops do a model for about this price,
with the
following spec:
Jessops Primefilm Model 3650U
48-bit colour depth
2400x3600 resolution
USB interface
Software (incl. Adobe PhotoElements v2.0) provided.

Is this reasonable buy or are the better models on the market for a similar
price?

Is the maintenance cover £34.90 worth the cost (I suspect not?).

Are these series of Scanners suitable for scanning colour and B&W
astrophotography slides
to produce high enough quality images for projection using an LCD Projector?

My computer is a P4/2500 with 1 GB Ram and Windows XP

regards

Robert

"Robert Williams" wrote in message
news:FB12c.4357$6Z.3782@newsfe1-win...
Hi there Gang,

I am contemplating getting hold of a Slide Scanner to archive my
slide-based
Astrophotographs.

I'm on a budget of about £250 and Jessops do a model for about this price,
with the
following spec:
Jessops Primefilm Model 3650U
48-bit colour depth
2400x3600 resolution
USB interface
Software (incl. Adobe PhotoElements v2.0) provided.

Is this reasonable buy or are the better models on the market for a
similar
price?

Is the maintenance cover £34.90 worth the cost (I suspect not?).

Are these series of Scanners suitable for scanning colour and B&W
astrophotography slides
to produce high enough quality images for projection using an LCD
Projector?

My computer is a P4/2500 with 1 GB Ram and Windows XP

What film have you used? It depends how grainy the photos are. I find that
that resolution is fine for most "high street" films of 400 ASA and above
and OK for 200 ASA.

If you're going to use an LCD projector then the projector is unlikely to be
much above 1024x768 and the dynamic range is not huge so the scanner and the
film will be well beyond that. I would check out the projector rather than
the scanner.

The Jessop scanner does get good reviews for the money.

Stephen

I've got a PrimeFilm 1800 AFL (it's two models down from the one you're
looking at) for daytime shots it's fantastic. Also it does do a good job
with Astro shots to (although I've not had many successes with
Astrophotography yet ) There's a couple of scanned images on my website
(www.cjdawson.com) In the Gallery, the shot is the really bad saturn shot.
Now if you think that the shot is awful, bear this in mind.... I took the
shot using an 8" SCT, and 35mm camera in prime focus. The image is Saturn
on a stanard 4" * 6" print was about 2mm across, and the film was as 400ASA.
That image was scanned in at 1800 DPI (the optical resolution of the
scanner). As you'll see, the scanner is far better than my photography
skills. The 3600DPI scanner that you're looking at will be alot better.

That scanner is alot better than mine, the only advantage that I've got is
that I can scan a whole strip of negatives in one go (provided that the
photo lab remembers that I ALWAYS ASK THEM NOT TO CUT THE STRIP!) Although
it doesn't speed the scanning process is does allow me to just the scanner
to it, less hassle all round. You scanner doesn't have the AFL (auto film
loader) which does tie you to having to sit there whilst you scan each frame
one at a time - which is extremely tedious.

Hope there's something in my aimless rambling that's useful.

Regards

Col.

"Robert Williams" wrote in message
news:FB12c.4357$6Z.3782@newsfe1-win...
Hi there Gang,

I am contemplating getting hold of a Slide Scanner to archive my
slide-based
Astrophotographs.

I'm on a budget of about £250 and Jessops do a model for about this price,
with the
following spec:
Jessops Primefilm Model 3650U
48-bit colour depth
2400x3600 resolution
USB interface
Software (incl. Adobe PhotoElements v2.0) provided.

Is this reasonable buy or are the better models on the market for a
similar
price?

Is the maintenance cover £34.90 worth the cost (I suspect not?).

Are these series of Scanners suitable for scanning colour and B&W
astrophotography slides
to produce high enough quality images for projection using an LCD
Projector?

My computer is a P4/2500 with 1 GB Ram and Windows XP

regards

Robert

Hi there Colin and Steve,

the Film I use is Fuji Sensia 400.

Although this is a 'daylight film', (that's what it says on the box),
I've had some very reasonable results when taking shots of the Moon,
Planets,
wide-angle constellations etc.

Seems that the 3650U model is a fair buy?

regards

Robert

"Colin Dawson" wrote in message
...
I've got a PrimeFilm 1800 AFL (it's two models down from the one you're
looking at) for daytime shots it's fantastic. Also it does do a good job
with Astro shots to (although I've not had many successes with
Astrophotography yet ) There's a couple of scanned images on my website
(www.cjdawson.com) In the Gallery, the shot is the really bad saturn
shot.
Now if you think that the shot is awful, bear this in mind.... I took the
shot using an 8" SCT, and 35mm camera in prime focus. The image is Saturn
on a stanard 4" * 6" print was about 2mm across, and the film was as
400ASA.
That image was scanned in at 1800 DPI (the optical resolution of the
scanner). As you'll see, the scanner is far better than my photography
skills. The 3600DPI scanner that you're looking at will be alot better.

That scanner is alot better than mine, the only advantage that I've got is
that I can scan a whole strip of negatives in one go (provided that the
photo lab remembers that I ALWAYS ASK THEM NOT TO CUT THE STRIP!)
Although
it doesn't speed the scanning process is does allow me to just the scanner
to it, less hassle all round. You scanner doesn't have the AFL (auto
film
loader) which does tie you to having to sit there whilst you scan each
frame
one at a time - which is extremely tedious.

Hope there's something in my aimless rambling that's useful.

Regards

Col.

I did a lot of research before buying my latest scanner- an Epson Perfection
3200 (review here):

http://www.photo-i.co.uk/Reviews/int...200/page_1.htm

They're now only £217 on E-buyer.

This beast is very capable and a high res scan of a 35mm slide will give
40MB tiff or bmp file! In most cases this is way too high a resolution as
you will be at the limit of the film grain (especially with the faster
films) at 3200 dpi. For astro photo scanning you need to probably need to
cncentrate less on dpi but look in detail at other key features like maximum
optical density which will help pick out the faint detail in astro
pictures. Many consumer slide film scanners used for 'normal' photos will
fail you here. Good bundled software is also a consideration.

My second choice was a Cannon scanner with an ingenoius infra-red dust
removal system.

Nevillef


"Robert Williams" wrote in message
news:FB12c.4357$6Z.3782@newsfe1-win...
Hi there Gang,

I am contemplating getting hold of a Slide Scanner to archive my
slide-based
Astrophotographs.

I'm on a budget of about £250 and Jessops do a model for about this price,
with the
following spec:
Jessops Primefilm Model 3650U
48-bit colour depth
2400x3600 resolution
USB interface
Software (incl. Adobe PhotoElements v2.0) provided.

Is this reasonable buy or are the better models on the market for a
similar
price?

Is the maintenance cover £34.90 worth the cost (I suspect not?).

Are these series of Scanners suitable for scanning colour and B&W
astrophotography slides
to produce high enough quality images for projection using an LCD
Projector?

My computer is a P4/2500 with 1 GB Ram and Windows XP

regards

Robert