@@lukepeeters5178 Uh hello this is interesting for someone like me who summer vacation toured Europe from 1989 thru 2000 and would like to digitize best 40% percent of the best his travel photos but does not have $3000.00 usd laying around for a used good condition for Nikon super cool scan 9000. So if I could get a good 350.00 so I can easily view my European Vacation memories PC or on the web easily it would be great.
Hey, dont lose hope. Try looking for Epson RX700 on second hand market. They should be around 15-20$ nowdays and they scan perfectly (look for one with film holder though).
@@imabigsandwich1292 For some people that shoot mainly film, they don't even own DSLR's/mirrorless cameras. If you take into account the price, it's much more expensive : camera (if don't already have a good one), macro lens, copy stand/tripod, light table, negative holder and a software to convert (Negative Lab Pro), it's way more than $900, close to $1000. The scanner will run you between $300-$500 depending on the model and software you buy (Silverfast is expensive, but has a ton of features), it's more reliable than having to setup a camera/tripod rig every time you want to scan.
@@Ryan-lu9km Well for Kyle, he's got an xt4 already, that produces excellent colors and dynamic range, and even a full proper setup with premade parts are gonna be wayy cheaper then his 3500 dollar nikon coolscan. But for the average joe, it can be a pain in the ass to setup a mirrorless/dslr setup, though unless you are a kid that got sucked into this hellhole by instagram. I think most people probably already have a somewhat decent dslr/mirrorless camera, so it can be pretty cheap, especially if you have a bit of diy skills. Though it's gonna take even more work with cutting, sanding, gluing etc. I personally convert my negatives with Davinci so I don't have to buy NLP or adobe. But again it takes a lot of figuring out and elbow grease. But of course the end result can beat the pants off of any budget scanners like flatbeds or plusteks. Especially with slide film that takes a lot of dynamic range to get everything out of it. It's really about convenience vs end result.
@@imabigsandwich1292 In theory most cameras can beat the Plustek (14 mp vs 24 or higher with most DSLRs), but there's another scanner called Primefilm XAs, costs about the same ($500 on B&H), and does true 4300ppi (24.5 mp) scans, auto advances the frame, and easily is much more compact than any camera rig.
using the plustek 8200i Ai at the moment (non pro) for my 35 mm positives and negatives, at first I got meh results. After a week now the results are great at least for my usage (saving the images from the past). I have a lot of cracks in my negatives (the positives are all ok) - some are over 30 years old (not well stored during the years). The cracks were really visible on all the scans. I viewed some TH-cam videos where people said to use nose grease for 'filling' the cracks, tried that and I could not believe the results. The cracks disappeared. After an hour of restoration I got out of nose grease so I found a good alternative is silicone oil. I apply it with a soft brush and then 'dry' it with a cloth. No cracks anymore. I use an iPad Pro as a second screen next to my MacBook Air m1, works great in my workflow. I still have to scan over 5000 slides 😎
Those Nikon Coolscan 9000's go for as much as $4,500 on eBay. I just can't justify spending that much. However, solely based on this review, I bought a PlusTek. I've previously owned a Coolscan LS-4000. I still have in fact, but it needs to be serviced. But the price of getting film scanned is outrageous these days, so I think getting back into scanning is worth it. Great review btw!
I've owned a Plustek for a few years, now. The image quality is amazing, especially considering it was about $90 back when I bought it. I think the reason to upgrade to one of those super Nikon or Kodak scanners is not for better image quality, but because the Plusteks are so tedious to use for large batches.
I picked one of these up a few weeks ago, and was actually comparing it against the coolscan as well! I decided to take the difference in price and spend it on my first 6x7 setup, a Mamiya 7 and 65mm f/4. Keeping the old flatbed for those big negs!
@@ucevrim plustek do a scanner in 120 flavour called the Plustek OpticFilm 120 Pro. It’s £2000 which I guess is around $3000. I think you’d probably get better results from dslr scans even though it’s more of a pain.
Great comparison. As a drum scanner owner I can tell you the reason why you are seeing the extra dust and scratching on the Plustek scans is due to the lighting system employed inside the scanner. Perhaps the Plustek is lighting the negative more obliquely in a way that is more revealing. You probably came to this conclusion already but I'm not about to read thru 300 comments!
I bit the pillow and bought the new 8300ai Plustek because it appeared to be the best dedicated scanner being made today. It's good. It's really good. It's no drum scanner, but you can only tell when zoomed waaaay in. For being sub-$1k, it'll surprise you.
9:13 an employee at the lab I went to today happened to mention that dust inside the scanner can cause streaks on the scans, so I'm assuming that that's what those are. I wonder what the stuff in the top corner is though.
Dear Kyle, you did a pretty good job. I wanted to see the differences between these particular scanners. Just like you I was really surprised with the quality of images form plustek 8100. If you want to get such a good result, but you dont have opportunity to buy Nikon Super Coolscan, plustek looks reasonable to purchase. I suppose all the problems with dust and small white spots in your pictures linked to the absence an infrared filter in 8100. If someone wants to avoid these problems they can buy Plustek OpticFilm 8200i SE which contains an infrared filter to avoid problems that Kyle McDougall mentioned in this video.
I agree, I bought the Plustek 135i about a month ago, it has infrared that works great. It also does batch scanning, a tray of 4 slides or 6 negatives, but only 35mm film, which is all that I have. I've done more than 2500 slides and have been super impressed. I paid $400, and am very happy with my purchase.
The difference in the amount off dust and scratches may be down to the light source. Like a diffuse light enlarger makes dust less seen than a condenser light source enlarger. The condenser can be a bit sharper but the diffuser is easier to work with. Imacon realized that for their later models.
There's no way for me to justify buying a high end film scanner, but I was concerned about the quality of something more affordable like the Plustek 8100. Seeing the results of flatbed scanners and "Kodak" scanners I didn't think there were any good options. Your excellent comparison helped me to see I was wrong. While it's not perfect the Plustek is definitely good enough to give me what I'm looking for. Thanks for putting in the effort to make this video!
I was considering buying a Plustek but ended up choosing a Coolscan 5000. It was a bit more expensive but the ability to scan a whole roll of film in one go is a game changer.
Yep probably more expensive now but you can get a good deal if you look around. I found a Minolta multi pro for $300 a couple of months ago and that has even higher resolution than my coolscan.
I'm still scanning with a Minolta Dimage IV. It's a pain to use but the results are good for posting on social media. I've made only a few prints and the results were good too.
Back in the day of enlargers using a condenser light source versus a diffusion source impacted the scratches and dust printed from negatives. I have no idea what LED does with negatives and if there is a difference in the light path before it illuminates the negatives, but it is a possible explanation.
there is a new Plustek 8200 out now... ...and there is also the Reflecta RPS 10M which hits at 10'000 dpi...it would very interesting to see those 2 newer 2022 scanner compared to a fuji 100mb camera sensor scan ...
Got the 8200 because i needed the Infrared dust detection function which works really great. But other than that there's not really any technical difference at all between these two. They are both really good somewhat affordable 35mm scanners and all WAYYYY better than the flatbed scanner method or these cheapo photo scanners that just use a crappy camera lens with interpolated 5 megapixel or so and extreme JPEG compression. Sure it can get tedious to manually advance the film holder but you also learn to only scan what you REALLY need which saves some time. I also use the Multi Exposure mode to get ALL the dynamic range i can get from it and usually save neutral scans with a bit of safezone around the image so i can crop and adjust everything afterwards. And yes i too always scan at the maximum "blown up" 7200 DPI and later scale down to the actual effective DPI. It's the best i can do for now because i really cannot afford the cash for the Nikon scanner. But it would definitely be my first choice if i had the money.
I have just purchased the Plustek 8200i to archive about 40 years of images that I've taken before I went digital when the Canon 5D was first released. I have to say that I was impressed with your comparisons and thought the differences were marginal and results impressive with room to improve in processing. I'm not looking for a fine art result and think that very few images will progress to print and then only for family/friends who'd just be happy to hold a print. Undoubtedly there will be some images I would like to pay more attention to and print and if LRC or Ps don't quite do the job Topaz AI will probably get me close to the result I want. Frankly the time to scan each image with the Plustek does concern me with unknown years left of my retirement. Thank you for your excellent video.
michaelmcphee2930 Hi! I also want to scan my photo archive. Could you tell me if you’re scanning your archive with 7200 dpi resolution or less? I think to buy a Plustek 8200i only for scanning archive in maximum resolution. watch footage on a large plasma TV with a large zoom. thanks for the answer)
@@vitaliipiatnytskyi1816 I only use 7200 rarely for the images I want to make large prints. Otherwise I use the lowest settings for speed. I haven't displayed on plasma TV so cannot comment on that. For the money there is nothing as good.
@@michaelmcphee2930 Thanks for the answer. I agree, for the price this is a good scanner. But I decided to scan my archive in the laboratory on the Noritsu HS-1800. It will handle scratches a little better when scanning at high resolution. The cost of scanning one 35 mm film is $5, in Ukraine.
*Kyle McDougall* I use flatbeds for decades and the 3 major problems are very LOW speed, sometimes obviously unfocused results (for unknown reasons) and sometimes a hardnacked bug that scans out of the frame. The Plustek 8100 seems to be a very good choice. There is still a question open: *How fast is the Plustek 8100 when scanning 35mm, if you want a 6000x4000 photo?*
Im only shooting 35mm, was planning to buy a epson scanner then this video came. I received my plustek yesterday ^^ !!! From crappy scan from the shop to this, I'm trully happy with my purchase
The difference on the amount of visible scratches might be due to the light source used, if it is the same as enlargers, a more diffused light will hide defects and give smoother tones, while a condensed light source will give more sharpness but make scratches and dust much more visible. Maybe plustek wanted to take as much detail as they could with their inferior optics with the cost of showing more dust, thats probably also why the detail it gets is also pretty good
I think the term is collimated light. With the CoolScan as well, you'll see a lot more scratches and various dirt (usually minerals from the water when the development wasn't done with distilled water) that do not show up at all when digitizing with an SLR or making paper copies in the dark room. I've scanned hundreds of black and white images from the eighties on my CoolScan, but have pretty much given up on scanning black and white over camera digitizing due to the amount of scratches and grime (even though camera scans are clearly less sharp than the CoolScan, even when using a high quality macro lens)
I think you're diagnosis is correct. The difference in light sources is what's accounting for the difference in surface imperfection visibility in the scans.
@Kyle McDougal the fuji frontier and noritsu are the brand of scanners that labs generally use and a lot of photographers use them as well. Noritusu are still current but frontiers are no longer made. I have a frontier and it does give better colour separation than the coolscan, but the coolscan is still very good. The Coolscan also has very good and fast digital ice and I think its being engaged perhaps in your workflow, even though I know you said it wasn't but I think it still is.
The reason why the scratches show up more might be because of which side of the film is scanned. This is also observable when doing camera scanning - depending whether you scan the emulsion side or the reflective side, scratches are more or less prominent
@@KyleMcDougall oh yes, but I mean that the sensor placement might be different between the two scanners I noticed that my Plustek 120 is built so it scans the shiny side (according to the manual) while usually the emulsion side is scanned. That's where my guess comes from Thanks for the great video, I think the Plustek scanners are indeed great value for the money
Been a user of the Plustek for several years now and for the dust and dirt, the Plustek definitely reveals more, and from what I understand that may actually have to do with sensors and lights and things. I would be curious to see if you used the glass when scanning on the Coolscan. If you scanned the negatives on the CS first, this would definitely increase the dust once brought into the Plustek. I've found that some PEC pads remove probably about 70% of the dust in a single wipe, so you might want to look into that! They're a miracle haha. Love the video, they're all great!
Annnnnnnd the price of Plustek 8100's just skyrocketed. I was actually shopping this scanner within the last few weeks as my at-home method, so it's funny you made this. Thanks for the real-life comparisons!
Been using a a Plustek since the original 7200 came out 15(?) years ago. Only use it for B&W (mostly Tri-X w/Vuescan) and always been quite pleased with results (yeah, be ready to ride Mr. Clone). It tends to exaggerate grain a bit, but I can now get the same level of resolution that I got in an optical 14in print... in a 30in inkjet- and can edit small details in wide angle shots with relative ease!
Nice stuff dude, used to use a Nikon scanner at uni. I found in LR if you select two pics and hit C, itll give side by side where the both zoom in and out on the same part together.
Excellent video as usual, Kyle. I’ve had the Plustek 8200 for a couple of years and have occasionally preferred the results to Lab scans. The advantage being able to rescue slight exposure mistakes and tweaking files in Lightroom beyond what was viable with Lab jpegs. The weird dust and scratch thing has been a consistent problem with way too many hours spent spot healing in post. I’m gradually moving towards a hopefully superior DSLR scanning set up. It’s not been cheap and it’s also not as fast as some claim but I can only imagine it’s the best option going forwards. The Nikon Coolscan is wonderful but the ebay prices are getting wild. For the same money you could have a full Negative Supply set-up with a high quality DSLR and macro lens. I’d love to see a comparison between those options. In theory the DSLR should yield finer detail, larger more malleable files, a substantially quicker workflow and no worries about mechanical failure. The ONE issue it may have and this could be it’s Achilles Heel is... can it produce those beautiful colours and avoid having files that look well... too digital? It’s the $3000 question. At least it is for me because in the end I care about colour more than absolutely anything else. Obviously it would be too expensive for you to make such a video but I think it’s a comparison that many, many film shooters would love to see.
For sure. It's something that is requested often. Unfortunately would be tough for me to pull off, as you mentioned, without investing in a setup that I'd likely never use again. I'm very happy with the 9000. All about just finding what works best for you. We're all bound to have different preferences.
The scratches showing on the Plustek is probably because it uses a less diffuse source of light than the Coolscan 9000. The Coolscan 5000 will show the same scratches. How about testing the OpticFilm 120 Pro?
Bought a nice Nikon Coolscan V ed and found it is close in quality to my Plustek 8100. The Nikon has a 4.2 sensitivity compared to Plustek's 3.6 - it is better at capturing detail in shadow. I like it's native software, NikonScan-4. The manual focus and grain reduction functions are nice. I use the Nikon with SilverFast-8 software too, but find it's a little buggy at times.. film brands and types not available and some extended tool features disappear at times. No problems using SilverFast-8 with Plustek. I scan old B/W negatives and the one thing the Plustek does that blows the Nikon out-of-the-water is.. it doesn't see every pit or scratch in the film. There must be some improved way the Plustek illuminates. The dust filter in SilverFast removes any pits or scratches that do show up. Coolscan for color and Plustek for B/W seems to be the way to go for me.
I read somewhere that the Plustek has a true optical resolution of 7200dpi. I don't know how true that is, but either way I use mine at 3200dpi. Another thing, if you don't care for the colors with Negafix feature, you'll get better colors scanning as a positive and converting in post. The Nikon does look better though.
I think it's that the Plustek lens doesn't resolve 7200dpi, and perhaps only a little better than 3600dpi. So you would get a large file size with only slightly more detail than a scan at 3600dpi.
Any chance you plan to do a comparison video on DSLR scanning with Negative Lab Pro vs. the Nikon Coolscan 9000 for medium format? Would love to see a deep dive that explores which is more cost and time efficient, as well as diving into the nuances of what budget-friendly DSLRs (full-frame or APS-C) and 1:1 macro lenses can keep pace with the Coolscan.
I've got a v800 and a plustek and I think I prefer the epson because I can batch scan. You're right about the softness of the scans on the epson, but I've found that I could deal with a lot of that by getting the film holder height adjustments dialed in. It takes some time to get it calibrated, but once that was taken care of I was pretty happy with the results.
@@Nitidus The factory 35mm film holder has little feet that move in a slot to adjust height a bit up or down. It's not super precise, but it's plenty for my needs. For the medium format stuff I shoot, I went with a 3rd party film holder from Lomography because it handles curled negatives much better. For that one I had to do a lot of focusing work, though. I ended up shimming it with a stack of cut-up playing card pieces and got it really dialed in.
@@wouldntyaliktono Thanks for answering in such an old comment thread! My V550 doesn't have this but there are 3rd party things that are adjustable and I always wondered whether that can improve my results. The standard 35mm scans I get are really not that nice. 6x6 and 6x4.5 is much better, though sometimes I'm sceptical if my shot was out of focus or if it's the scan.
Thanks for a honest comparison. The difference between the two reminds me of my comparing a Tamron 28-300 against a Canon 28-300. By itself the Tamron looks really good but when put side by side with the Canon the Canon looks better and costs 3X what the Tamron costs.
There was a brief mention about using a separate scan utility to capture the scans, in the plustek, as opposed to using their software? What would that be?
@@KyleMcDougall Vuescan controls the settings? I have an old Plustek 7400 I got when I had a little less disposable funds. I'm debating whether I ought to upgrade or will my 7400 be sufficient? One of the questions is how important is IR correction? If the negatives aren't particularly dirty or damaged, does it make a huge difference? Mostly I'm looking to archive 20-40 year old photos. Some are nice, but nothing pro. I'm also wondering what might be between the $300 and $3000 price points? Anything worth considering?
ive been using a flatbed when i cant or dont want to pay my local film lab to scan cause its expensive like $20 a roll for 35mm film. Developing is like $5 but scanning is expensive. Usually just have the lab process the film cut it for me and then take it home and scan to the best of my ability.
The plustek looks pretty good. My only comment would be that an Epson flatbed would be use to have alongside the plustek. Use the Epson for proofing negatives its quite quick for scanning a whole roll of film at low resolutions, those scans can be used for web uploads and such and use the plustek for final scans of choosen images. Another option is using a DSLR with macro setup for scanning, with B&W film you can easily convert to positive in lightroom.
I had a plustek about ten years ago and returned it because it always had scratches show up on the scans and when I used the scratch removal during the scan it would be like a blurry blob line in the scan. But now I’m considering getting one of these again since paying for scans is so expensive. I’ll just go for a lomo scan look.
Unfortunately Plustek scanner is way out of my budget (maybe someday, haha) but I found a good alternative - Epson Stylus Photo RX700. It cost me only 20$ including local delivery on a second hand market (look at craigslist, olx or similar sites in your country). RX700 has 3200 dpi hardware resolution which is IMO pretty enough, if not overkill, for old negatives and slides from 40s-80s which I have. RX500\RX620 is also an option but they have only 2400 dpi hardware resolution and cost pretty much the same as RX700 now. People literally throw away these scanners because they useless without ink, but scanner still works even without ink and this is perfect for our purposes. So if anyone is looking for a budged alternative - try looking for these (but also try finding one with plastic film holder to avoid frustration). Sure this alternative is worse than two scanners compared in this video, but for casuals looking for a device to convert their old family archives it is perfect (and definitely better than those Chinese Qpix "film scanners" that cost 80$ on Ali).
This video made me take the plunge to get a Plustec scanner. Though those specs you see. Makes me curious if they are in the same place over several photos. That would suggest there is some dust particles inside the scanner.
To all who are looking for Nikon Coolscan quality on a budget for 35mm, I'd recommend one of the Nikon Coolscan dedicated 35mm scanners. A Nikon Coolscan V can be had for around $500 USD and I think it can slightly outperform the Coolscan 9000 with 35mm. The lens in that scanner is optimized for 35mm frame sizes instead of medium format and I think it just barely outresolves the 9000. For even cheaper, you can get a Nikon Coolscan IV! Those can be had for around $350 USD, sometimes even cheaper. It's a bit lower resolution at 2900 DPI instead of 4000 DPI but it still has the amazing lens capable of resolving fine details. I've actually owned all three at different points. The Coolscan 9000 which I paid market price for 5 years ago and the Coolscan V and Coolscan IV which I found in thrift stores over the years (yeah I know how insanely lucky that is). I have no problems recommending both the V or IV over the 9000 if you just shoot 35mm. Definitely worth a look!
I think there's a doctor with a speciality in laser optics that has published data which confirms the 35mm coolscans resolve detail better than the 120 coolscans. He also has guides on how to clean and repair them on his website.
gonna be honest, i think the coolscan is scanning to show the film stock colours better and the plustek seems to be correcting with more true to life colours, the white wall on the night shot was more green on the coolscan and much more white with the plustek
morons... only morons would think that scanners are responsible for the color outputs.. havent you people heard of profiling? its the person using the scanner who decides how the colors come out.
I've scanned 1000's of negatives and slides with my Plustek 7200i and love it. Yes, it's slow but you can do something else like read or watch a movie while it's pottering away. The i version does an infrared pass to remove dust and scratches.
I have the Pustech Opticfilm 135i batch scanner, it scans strips of six negs in a single pass and does a pretty decent job, It's a bit more expensive at £450.00 than the single frame model but worth the money as I'm able to leave it and go do something else, it's also compact enough to fit on my desk.
Sad to see there isn't much going on in the film scanner world. I do see Plustek is up to the 8300i AI and I wonder how it would stack up to the Nikon Coolscan 9000 today. I am in the market and willing to pay for a Nikcon Coolscan 9000 but need to research if I can even use it on a M1 Apple machine, etc. Might bite the bullet on a 8300i AI and see how it goes.
I am also trying to decide between the 8300i AI and the Coolscan 9000. Considering how much the 9000 is going for these days for a used one, the 8300i AI seems like a better choice. As for the M1 Mac support, if you go with the Coolscan 9000, my preliminary research is that you can buy the VueScan software that will run on M1 and use it with your 9000.
I think these Plustek Scanners really depend a lot on using the Multi Exposure mode to really get a more natural rendition that the Nikon Scanner seem to manage in just one pass. And yes, i too realized how much scratched the Plustek scanner reveals on all of my Negatives. Even on those that actually look pretty well otherwise. Maybe the Nikon one just scans it differently due to the actual effective DPI and Dmax value. Sure it means a lot more manual restoration work on the Plustek Scanners but personally.... i can live with that if these two caveats are really more or less the only things that save me ca. 2700 bucks when i just want to scan at a much higher standard than what other alternatives at cheaper costs have to offer. Especially if it doesn't involve a Light table, a digital camera that saves RAW images and a macro lens, if you use that DSLR "scanning" method.
After all these years nikon is still the probably the best film scanner you can buy. I shot pro back in the 90's and used nikon scanners. The only way to get better quality was sending my negtives and slides out for drum scanning service. This is a good and fair comparison but for those of you who still want to shoot film, I advise you to get the very best possible scans that you can. I don't see the utility in going through the expense of shooting film if one is just going to go for ok scans. I do miss my RZ and have had most of my stuff scanned but now I am content with my sony 6000 for family pics and vacation pics.
Nice and useful comparison. I have both the 8100 and the 8200i models, the latter adds infrared dust and debris removal which should get rid most of the defects. However, this adds a bit of extra time to the whole process and it does not do as good a job as the ICE of my Epson V550 which I use for 120 film. Like you said, a no-brainer for people on a budget who don't want to get into the trouble of DSLR scanning.
I wonder if you have tried something like the Nikon ES-2. If so what are your thoughts on digitizing using a camera with a macro lens rather that scanning?
I was disappointed with scans from 35mm off my Epsom V750 Pro. So I bought a Plustek 8200i earlier this year from Amazon and I’m very pleased with the results.
My Epson 600 is pretty trash for 35mm scans but gives nice results with 120 scans. I got improved results when I switched to the Lomo Digitaliza trays, but I'm seriously considering a Plustek 8200i SE for my 35mm negs.
@@justinkingery2489 get scan dual iv, cheaper and way better than plustek.. plusteks have poor quality lenses, the same reason your epsons suck.. plastic fantastic lenses.
I dont think you can buy Nikon scanners anymore. But after seeing your results I think I will get the Plustek 8200 Ai model with the IR channel to filter out all those scratches and dust particles. I have a V700 now and i'm not satisfied.
The colors on the Plustek seem more neutral. The Nikon seems to have a slight yellow cast. Adding yellow warms the image but also makes colors "richer". A very interesting comparison, Kyle. The Plustek is a very impressive scanner especially for the price.
I use the Pacific Image Primefilm XA (it's Reflecta rpm 10m). It gets 4300 dpi with a 5000 dpi scan. The scan is so high resolution that I see visible grain in Provia. And it's only like $100-150 more than the Plustek.
Seeing grain in any slide film is hard, If I set my epson at the max scan res that it can resolve and flatbed scan a 6x9 slide the scanner literally tells me that it cant handle it because the file size and res is to big and wont let me scan it. TIFF files are like 3gb for ektachrome.
@@pilsplease7561 Yeah, flatbeds don't really resolve grain that well, no matter the format. You'd have to sharpen the image a bit to get some grain texture on a 2400 dpi scan from a V700/V800. In which case, Provia and other slide films won't show much or any grain. The scanner I was talking is a 35mm-dedicated scanner. Probably the best one out there that's for sale currently.
@@eccentricbeing kind of yeah, I typically have my slides scanned by my friend at her lab on a noritsu which is better than any home scans. But I do plan on buying myself a better scanner for scans in a pinch
Thanks Kyle. Very good comparison. I have a Plustek 8200i so I know what this is capable of. Makes me want to load up a roll of Tri-X and head outside.
Regarding the scratches being revealed, I often found my Nikon LS5000 to be quite unforgiving, showing every little scratch while actually printing the BW photo in darkroom with mixing head (diffused light) the resulting print looked immaculate. I would kinda expect your Nikon to have the same light source as the 5000 but then there might be some diffusion element because it needs to evenly illuminate wide strip of film compare the 35mm only LS5000.
And the dust... if you scanned with the Nikon first and Plustek second - it might be just (at least in part) a new that got on the film during handling. Usually when I am going back to some film that I already scanned when it was freshly developped it is much dustier even after dusting it off with air.
Thanks, very solid info and comparison. The Plustek looks compelling from your results. The Amazon reviews seem to confirm your findings of lines/scratches with the first few saying it's a consistent trait.
Plustek 8100 VS DSLR/Mirrorless camera scanning, now that would be a killer video, you would see the next day the Ebay getting full of Dslr´s and Mirrorless cameras :)
Great video Kyle! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼 I got a Plustek 8200 bargain for half the price (usd200) about 5 years ago at B&H. What you are saying is true, the same thing happens to me. First, the tiny scratches in the scan and also the magenta in the shadows. Despite these things I am really happy with the results and it is my everyday tool for my 35mm negatives.
Thanks Kyle, Im 400dollars poorer now haha. Ended up buying the Plustek 8200i SE, because it seems the dust and scratch removal is needed. So now my epson v600 is only going to scan 120 film. You did a really great review!
Nice comparison Kyle. Yes, the Plustek has manual film advance, a bit less smoothness in color rendition, and scans that show a bit more dust. But for 35mm film, is the Nikon 10-12x better to justify the price gap? I really don't think so.
11:41 Did you used multi-sampling with Plustek? If not, you should try it. That magenta was originally 'low' level scanner white noise before negative conversion. Multisampling will probably eliminate it and make it closer to black.
Wow this video is super helpful - thank you and very much appreciated. I have just dusted off an old Nikon F3 I bought 20 years ago (and last used 10 years ago) and put a roll of HP5 through it to test it and all seems well so I want a scanner for 35mm B+W and this review plus the samples is just what I need to make the judgement properly. Its great to see a film scanning expert like yourself test out the scanner. Re the dust etc, I read somewhere that the plustek has fixed focus so maybe has a smaller aperture (with greater DOF) than the Nikon so the plustek may be getting the film base side in focus where the dust likes to sit - just a guess. Anyway thanks again for the thoroughness and the samples - very helpful indeed.
1. Higher DPI usually means higher Dmax, so realistically the Plustek probably should have a true DPI of ~3000 which is consistent w/ ur results 2. Difference in color could be related to different lightsources & lenses in each unit. AFAIK CoolScans use RGB LEDs, and I personally scan with a Minolta MultiPro which uses a CCFL lightsource, both will produce light with RGB peaks, great for print film scanning because they reproduce color like an enlarger does, whereas the plustek probably uses a simple flat-spectrum LED and potentially low CRI 3. You should try inverting your negatives by hand sometimes. I treat all my neg scans this way because I find color reproduction better compared to NLP. It's simple and saves spending money on a semi-professional plugin Love your style of content man, this is just my 3 cents
According to Plustek web page the 8100 model does not have the IR channel, what explains the number of scratches visible on the scan. The model 8200 and up have the IR channel.
Interesting comparison! I've always wondered how a Plustek would do compared to a Nikon. I use the LS-5000 myself, but it's getting really old and I'm not sure how long it will last. The 8200 seem like a good option. I believe it's more or less the same as the 8100, but with the addition of the IR channel for dust and scratch removal. I find that ICE give excellent results with color negative film and slide film, at least on the scanners I've used. I'm curious about the dust and scratches on the Plustek images. Could you take a picture of one of the negatives with a macro lens (or check with a loupe) to see the amount of dust actually there? I've had a similar experience when scanning old B&W film where ICE doesn't work. Scanning on a flatbed actually gave less dust and scratches than scanning with the Coolscan 5000. Assume it was caused by a combination of less real resolution, but also a much more diffuse light source in the flatbed which gave images closer to what I got from old darkroom prints. With your Coolscan 9000 giving more details than the Plustek resolution cant be a factor with your dust and scratches, but type of light source might be. Anyway, the important part is IMO to be verify that the Plustek don't introduce "dust" that's not there.
@@nakedexposure964 i don't know, maybe the reason I don't get dust is that I develop my own color and bw film and I am really careful with the whole process. might not be the scanner after all :))
Thanks Kyle, extremely helpful. The extra dust and marks on the Plustek might be because it has a deeper “depth of field” than the Nikon and is finding dust that is somewhere else in the optical system? Great review,.
I wonder if the scratches and such are on the non-emulsion side and perhaps the depth of field on the Plustek is large such that it's making the backside of the negative sharp? I recall I was making a darkroom print on my Omega and stopped the lens down so much that I brought the filament of my enlarging bulb into focus! At first I thought it was a scratch on the negative - took me a while to figure that one out! More related, I've noticed I get some weird scratches on the non-emulsion side of HP5 sheets, but seemingly only if I prewash. In any case, it's not normally an issue unless I also stop the lens down and notice that I can sometimes see those imperfections via my grain focuser (though it doesn't normally carry over to the print itself). That's darkroom work of course, but just bring that up since I wonder if it's a related issue with the Plustek (where it has a greater than perhaps ideal depth of field).
Yes the Plustek is such an amazing value. For a new film shooter who wants to save some money on scans this should be almost mandatory. Add in a anti static brush and you should be in business. Some of that gunk you noticed looks a lot like gunk from the final c41 rinse though.
Thanks for this review! Now I really consider to buy a Plustek film scanner, because I am not a big fan of the results when it comes to scanning 35mm with my Epson v600.
This video was truly interesting. I love your photographs in general and I enjoyed the photo comparisons between the two scans. Your videos are relaxing and pleasant to watch. Take care, Manu
I have the plustek and also notice that it shows up any dust or damage, I wish I'd spent the extra for the ICE version. But I rarely shoot film, it's mostly for digitising my back catalog of slides. BTW Plustek also do a medium format scanner that would be more comparable to your Nikon and costs about the same too...
Me: Started to think about getting a budget scanner literally two days ago but feeling scared of the potential gap between this and professional lab scans. Kyle: Uploads a video completely resolving my problem. Thanks man, you're awesome. So if I understand this correctly the difference regarding b/w scans should be pretty minor? Also the dust and damage on the Plustek's scans may be due to the fact that it doesn't have any dust-removal software. I've found info that for that you'd have to go for 8200i version.
Hey Michal, glad it helped. As for the dust removal, just to note, I didn’t use it on the Nikon for these scans. But yes, the 8200 does add it. I’d be curious to see how well it works.
@@KyleMcDougall Oh, sorry, I must've misunderstood. In that case I also have no idea where it comes from. Currently this 8200 seems the most tempting to me
For most people, the Plustek would be their best option. Most people can't afford or justify spending several $1000 on a scanner, so for $250, the Plustek has amazing quality.
Great video Kyle! I was considering a Plustek scanner for a long time, until I found a Minolta 5400 for the same price and got that one. Considering that 35mm film is not that high resolution anyway, you get almost all the detail that is there with the Plustek. I would assume that the difference between your Nikon and a Plustek 120 would be more noticeable, but for 35mm the Plustek is a great option. Also, it has a great advantage that no Nikon or Minolta scanners have : warranty and the peace of mind that comes with it!
I'd imagine the 5400 is better all round? I read many reviews and nearly replaced the Plustek with one before I decided to stop being lazy and use the camera. The Minotla was supposed to be so sharp some have taken the lens out and made a camera lens with it!
@@kronkite1530 It is very sharp indeed, to the point where I don't apply any sharpening at all to my images afterwards.But if you already own a Plustek I don't believe that you would see that much of a difference, the Plusteks are decent for 35mm film. The 5400 is a 20 year old scanner and with that you get all the risks that come with it. I got mine from someone who I knew that he barely used it, in fact he had only scanned a roll of slide film in 15 years! I would be very hesitant to buy it from an unknown seller.
This is a fascinating video. I used a 1,800dpi Plustek film scanner about 16 years or so ago, and loved being able to get the scan exposure just right. For me this had as much value as anything else, and I am now trying to work out whether I would be more pleased with a £250 Epson scanner over the Noritsu scans my favoured lab is providing. For now at least, the Plustek 120 is out of my budget.
Great comparison. Kyle, it you’re interested in having some drum scans for comparison or as a reference/baseline, let me know. I have a Screen 1045ai in my office and would be happy to scan several samples for you from your reference negs or reversal film.
Such a solid comparison, Thanks Kyle
Yo, do you still use your V600?
@@sigibergmann9356 the key is to skip this step!!! or just shoot digital
Thanks man 🙏
@@lukepeeters5178 but skipping it is hard if you cant afford a 1000$ scanner haha
@@lukepeeters5178 Uh hello this is interesting for someone like me who summer vacation toured Europe from 1989 thru 2000 and would like to digitize best 40% percent of the best his travel photos but does not have $3000.00 usd laying around for a used good condition for Nikon super cool scan 9000. So if I could get a good 350.00 so I can easily view my European Vacation memories PC or on the web easily it would be great.
Me watching this video with great interest knowing I have $30 in my account.
same...
Facts😭
Hey, dont lose hope. Try looking for Epson RX700 on second hand market. They should be around 15-20$ nowdays and they scan perfectly (look for one with film holder though).
@@sarmatiko Thank you, will check it out!
It’s like you’re my conscience
Wow, thank you bro. Think I might look into that and start shooting a lil more 35
It’s definitely impressive, especially with how much cheaper it is!
Come to the darkside with dslr/mirrorless scanning bro, it's faster and even higher quality with insane dynamic range for slide film scanning.
@@imabigsandwich1292
For some people that shoot mainly film, they don't even own DSLR's/mirrorless cameras.
If you take into account the price, it's much more expensive : camera (if don't already have a good one), macro lens, copy stand/tripod, light table, negative holder and a software to convert (Negative Lab Pro), it's way more than $900, close to $1000.
The scanner will run you between $300-$500 depending on the model and software you buy (Silverfast is expensive, but has a ton of features), it's more reliable than having to setup a camera/tripod rig every time you want to scan.
@@Ryan-lu9km Well for Kyle, he's got an xt4 already, that produces excellent colors and dynamic range, and even a full proper setup with premade parts are gonna be wayy cheaper then his 3500 dollar nikon coolscan. But for the average joe, it can be a pain in the ass to setup a mirrorless/dslr setup, though unless you are a kid that got sucked into this hellhole by instagram. I think most people probably already have a somewhat decent dslr/mirrorless camera, so it can be pretty cheap, especially if you have a bit of diy skills. Though it's gonna take even more work with cutting, sanding, gluing etc. I personally convert my negatives with Davinci so I don't have to buy NLP or adobe. But again it takes a lot of figuring out and elbow grease. But of course the end result can beat the pants off of any budget scanners like flatbeds or plusteks. Especially with slide film that takes a lot of dynamic range to get everything out of it. It's really about convenience vs end result.
@@imabigsandwich1292
In theory most cameras can beat the Plustek (14 mp vs 24 or higher with most DSLRs), but there's another scanner called Primefilm XAs, costs about the same ($500 on B&H), and does true 4300ppi (24.5 mp) scans, auto advances the frame, and easily is much more compact than any camera rig.
using the plustek 8200i Ai at the moment (non pro) for my 35 mm positives and negatives, at first I got meh results. After a week now the results are great at least for my usage (saving the images from the past). I have a lot of cracks in my negatives (the positives are all ok) - some are over 30 years old (not well stored during the years). The cracks were really visible on all the scans. I viewed some TH-cam videos where people said to use nose grease for 'filling' the cracks, tried that and I could not believe the results. The cracks disappeared. After an hour of restoration I got out of nose grease so I found a good alternative is silicone oil. I apply it with a soft brush and then 'dry' it with a cloth. No cracks anymore. I use an iPad Pro as a second screen next to my MacBook Air m1, works great in my workflow. I still have to scan over 5000 slides 😎
Such an honest and fair comparison. Very reputable and professional. Something welcome on the Internet.
Those Nikon Coolscan 9000's go for as much as $4,500 on eBay. I just can't justify spending that much. However, solely based on this review, I bought a PlusTek. I've previously owned a Coolscan LS-4000. I still have in fact, but it needs to be serviced. But the price of getting film scanned is outrageous these days, so I think getting back into scanning is worth it. Great review btw!
How does the Plustek compare to the LS-4000 in your experience? I am trying to decide between the two for scanning a large number of family photos.
My rationale is that good scans are perfectly fine for 99% of shots, and I can send in the rest for great scans.
I've owned a Plustek for a few years, now. The image quality is amazing, especially considering it was about $90 back when I bought it. I think the reason to upgrade to one of those super Nikon or Kodak scanners is not for better image quality, but because the Plusteks are so tedious to use for large batches.
I have 8200i for 3 years already. I think for home use is more than enough.
I picked one of these up a few weeks ago, and was actually comparing it against the coolscan as well! I decided to take the difference in price and spend it on my first 6x7 setup, a Mamiya 7 and 65mm f/4. Keeping the old flatbed for those big negs!
Would be cool now to have a comparison Video between a Epson V600 (V550) and the Plustek 8100. Nice Video!
Yes 100%
i have both and the plustek is way better. flatbed is simply not a good choice for 35
I don’t own a flatbed anymore, unfortunately. But when I did, the results never came close to this.
@@KyleMcDougall is there a better alternative to v600 for scanning 120 film?
@@ucevrim plustek do a scanner in 120 flavour called the Plustek OpticFilm 120 Pro. It’s £2000 which I guess is around $3000. I think you’d probably get better results from dslr scans even though it’s more of a pain.
Great comparison. As a drum scanner owner I can tell you the reason why you are seeing the extra dust and scratching on the Plustek scans is due to the lighting system employed inside the scanner. Perhaps the Plustek is lighting the negative more obliquely in a way that is more revealing. You probably came to this conclusion already but I'm not about to read thru 300 comments!
For sure. Been suggested a few times now and seems like it could definitely be what’s causing it. Thanks, David.
You have samples. I officially love you.
I bit the pillow and bought the new 8300ai Plustek because it appeared to be the best dedicated scanner being made today. It's good. It's really good. It's no drum scanner, but you can only tell when zoomed waaaay in. For being sub-$1k, it'll surprise you.
9:13 an employee at the lab I went to today happened to mention that dust inside the scanner can cause streaks on the scans, so I'm assuming that that's what those are. I wonder what the stuff in the top corner is though.
Dear Kyle, you did a pretty good job. I wanted to see the differences between these particular scanners. Just like you I was really surprised with the quality of images form plustek 8100. If you want to get such a good result, but you dont have opportunity to buy Nikon Super Coolscan, plustek looks reasonable to purchase. I suppose all the problems with dust and small white spots in your pictures linked to the absence an infrared filter in 8100. If someone wants to avoid these problems they can buy Plustek OpticFilm 8200i SE which contains an infrared filter to avoid problems that
Kyle McDougall mentioned in this video.
I agree, I bought the Plustek 135i about a month ago, it has infrared that works great. It also does batch scanning, a tray of 4 slides or 6 negatives, but only 35mm film, which is all that I have. I've done more than 2500 slides and have been super impressed. I paid $400, and am very happy with my purchase.
i ended up buying a plustek because of this video and so far i regret nothing. Thanks for this comparison.
Nice! Happy to hear that.
The difference in the amount off dust and scratches may be down to the light source. Like a diffuse light enlarger makes dust less seen than a condenser light source enlarger. The condenser can be a bit sharper but the diffuser is easier to work with. Imacon realized that for their later models.
There's no way for me to justify buying a high end film scanner, but I was concerned about the quality of something more affordable like the Plustek 8100. Seeing the results of flatbed scanners and "Kodak" scanners I didn't think there were any good options. Your excellent comparison helped me to see I was wrong. While it's not perfect the Plustek is definitely good enough to give me what I'm looking for.
Thanks for putting in the effort to make this video!
Just bought a plustek and am super happy to stumble across this glowing review! Very excited to start using it!!
How did you end up liking it?
Going to ride my flatbed out for awhile but definitely looking into a new solution in the future! Thanks!
this^
I was considering buying a Plustek but ended up choosing a Coolscan 5000. It was a bit more expensive but the ability to scan a whole roll of film in one go is a game changer.
For sure. The Coolscan 5000’s have definitely gone up in price. But they’re the best of the best.
"bit more expensive"
like 5~10 time more expensive
Yep probably more expensive now but you can get a good deal if you look around. I found a Minolta multi pro for $300 a couple of months ago and that has even higher resolution than my coolscan.
the "magenta" in the shadows of the plustek does make sense as it could be from the neon signs to the left of frame of the car.
I'm still scanning with a Minolta Dimage IV. It's a pain to use but the results are good for posting on social media. I've made only a few prints and the results were good too.
i use a coolscan iii, and although it's now almost 25 years old it's really good.
Back in the day of enlargers using a condenser light source versus a diffusion source impacted the scratches and dust printed from negatives. I have no idea what LED does with negatives and if there is a difference in the light path before it illuminates the negatives, but it is a possible explanation.
For sure, a few others mentioned this as well. Seems like it could be a reason why.
there is a new Plustek 8200 out now... ...and there is also the Reflecta RPS 10M which hits at 10'000 dpi...it would very interesting to see those 2 newer 2022 scanner compared to a fuji 100mb camera sensor scan ...
Got the 8200 because i needed the Infrared dust detection function which works really great. But other than that there's not really any technical difference at all between these two. They are both really good somewhat affordable 35mm scanners and all WAYYYY better than the flatbed scanner method or these cheapo photo scanners that just use a crappy camera lens with interpolated 5 megapixel or so and extreme JPEG compression. Sure it can get tedious to manually advance the film holder but you also learn to only scan what you REALLY need which saves some time. I also use the Multi Exposure mode to get ALL the dynamic range i can get from it and usually save neutral scans with a bit of safezone around the image so i can crop and adjust everything afterwards. And yes i too always scan at the maximum "blown up" 7200 DPI and later scale down to the actual effective DPI. It's the best i can do for now because i really cannot afford the cash for the Nikon scanner. But it would definitely be my first choice if i had the money.
I have just purchased the Plustek 8200i to archive about 40 years of images that I've taken before I went digital when the Canon 5D was first released. I have to say that I was impressed with your comparisons and thought the differences were marginal and results impressive with room to improve in processing. I'm not looking for a fine art result and think that very few images will progress to print and then only for family/friends who'd just be happy to hold a print. Undoubtedly there will be some images I would like to pay more attention to and print and if LRC or Ps don't quite do the job Topaz AI will probably get me close to the result I want. Frankly the time to scan each image with the Plustek does concern me with unknown years left of my retirement. Thank you for your excellent video.
michaelmcphee2930
Hi! I also want to scan my photo archive. Could you tell me if you’re scanning your archive with 7200 dpi resolution or less? I think to buy a Plustek 8200i only for scanning archive in maximum resolution. watch footage on a large plasma TV with a large zoom. thanks for the answer)
@@vitaliipiatnytskyi1816 I only use 7200 rarely for the images I want to make large prints. Otherwise I use the lowest settings for speed. I haven't displayed on plasma TV so cannot comment on that.
For the money there is nothing as good.
@@michaelmcphee2930 Thanks for the answer.
I agree, for the price this is a good scanner.
But I decided to scan my archive in the laboratory on the Noritsu HS-1800.
It will handle scratches a little better when scanning at high resolution.
The cost of scanning one 35 mm film is $5, in Ukraine.
I was already pretty decided on the Plustek 8100, this has convinced me of it's value for money.
Definitely great value for the money.
Invest a little and get the one with infrared, like the 8200 or the 135i. You will be much happier.
*Kyle McDougall* I use flatbeds for decades and the 3 major problems are very LOW speed, sometimes obviously unfocused results (for unknown reasons) and sometimes a hardnacked bug that scans out of the frame. The Plustek 8100 seems to be a very good choice.
There is still a question open: *How fast is the Plustek 8100 when scanning 35mm, if you want a 6000x4000 photo?*
Btw, the link to your photos doesn't work, so i can't see and compare them.
Im only shooting 35mm, was planning to buy a epson scanner then this video came. I received my plustek yesterday ^^ !!! From crappy scan from the shop to this, I'm trully happy with my purchase
Awesome. Glad to hear the Plustek is working well for ya!
The difference on the amount of visible scratches might be due to the light source used, if it is the same as enlargers, a more diffused light will hide defects and give smoother tones, while a condensed light source will give more sharpness but make scratches and dust much more visible. Maybe plustek wanted to take as much detail as they could with their inferior optics with the cost of showing more dust, thats probably also why the detail it gets is also pretty good
Could very well be the case.
I think the term is collimated light. With the CoolScan as well, you'll see a lot more scratches and various dirt (usually minerals from the water when the development wasn't done with distilled water) that do not show up at all when digitizing with an SLR or making paper copies in the dark room. I've scanned hundreds of black and white images from the eighties on my CoolScan, but have pretty much given up on scanning black and white over camera digitizing due to the amount of scratches and grime (even though camera scans are clearly less sharp than the CoolScan, even when using a high quality macro lens)
I think you're diagnosis is correct. The difference in light sources is what's accounting for the difference in surface imperfection visibility in the scans.
The gulf between them is not as big as you’d expect. Some impressive results form the “budget” option
@Kyle McDougal the fuji frontier and noritsu are the brand of scanners that labs generally use and a lot of photographers use them as well. Noritusu are still current but frontiers are no longer made. I have a frontier and it does give better colour separation than the coolscan, but the coolscan is still very good.
The Coolscan also has very good and fast digital ice and I think its being engaged perhaps in your workflow, even though I know you said it wasn't but I think it still is.
I definitely had dust removal turned off in Vuescan, and the scanner only did one pass, not the usual second pass for dust.
The reason why the scratches show up more might be because of which side of the film is scanned.
This is also observable when doing camera scanning - depending whether you scan the emulsion side or the reflective side, scratches are more or less prominent
Thanks, Thomas. Same side was scanned on both machines.
@@KyleMcDougall oh yes, but I mean that the sensor placement might be different between the two scanners
I noticed that my Plustek 120 is built so it scans the shiny side (according to the manual) while usually the emulsion side is scanned. That's where my guess comes from
Thanks for the great video, I think the Plustek scanners are indeed great value for the money
Ahhh, gotcha. Yeah could be!
Been a user of the Plustek for several years now and for the dust and dirt, the Plustek definitely reveals more, and from what I understand that may actually have to do with sensors and lights and things. I would be curious to see if you used the glass when scanning on the Coolscan. If you scanned the negatives on the CS first, this would definitely increase the dust once brought into the Plustek. I've found that some PEC pads remove probably about 70% of the dust in a single wipe, so you might want to look into that! They're a miracle haha. Love the video, they're all great!
I’ll keep that in mind. No glass was used on the Nikon.
Where do you get those pads? They sound like a lifesaver.
Annnnnnnd the price of Plustek 8100's just skyrocketed. I was actually shopping this scanner within the last few weeks as my at-home method, so it's funny you made this. Thanks for the real-life comparisons!
Lucky for you they're still sold new and have a retail price.
I own the Plustek Opticfilm 120 and I must say, it’s pretty amazing! Would definitely recommend
I'd love to try it out!
I have the same scanner and I think the Opticfilm 120 will be more comparable to the Nikon than the 8100.
Been using a a Plustek since the original 7200 came out 15(?) years ago. Only use it for B&W (mostly Tri-X w/Vuescan) and always been quite pleased with results (yeah, be ready to ride Mr. Clone).
It tends to exaggerate grain a bit, but I can now get the same level of resolution that I got in an optical 14in print... in a 30in inkjet- and can edit small details in wide angle shots with relative ease!
Nice stuff dude, used to use a Nikon scanner at uni. I found in LR if you select two pics and hit C, itll give side by side where the both zoom in and out on the same part together.
Excellent video as usual, Kyle. I’ve had the Plustek 8200 for a couple of years and have occasionally preferred the results to Lab scans. The advantage being able to rescue slight exposure mistakes and tweaking files in Lightroom beyond what was viable with Lab jpegs. The weird dust and scratch thing has been a consistent problem with way too many hours spent spot healing in post.
I’m gradually moving towards a hopefully superior DSLR scanning set up. It’s not been cheap and it’s also not as fast as some claim but I can only imagine it’s the best option going forwards. The Nikon Coolscan is wonderful but the ebay prices are getting wild. For the same money you could have a full Negative Supply set-up with a high quality DSLR and macro lens. I’d love to see a comparison between those options. In theory the DSLR should yield finer detail, larger more malleable files, a substantially quicker workflow and no worries about mechanical failure. The ONE issue it may have and this could be it’s Achilles Heel is... can it produce those beautiful colours and avoid having files that look well... too digital? It’s the $3000 question. At least it is for me because in the end I care about colour more than absolutely anything else.
Obviously it would be too expensive for you to make such a video but I think it’s a comparison that many, many film shooters would love to see.
For sure. It's something that is requested often. Unfortunately would be tough for me to pull off, as you mentioned, without investing in a setup that I'd likely never use again. I'm very happy with the 9000. All about just finding what works best for you. We're all bound to have different preferences.
The scratches showing on the Plustek is probably because it uses a less diffuse source of light than the Coolscan 9000. The Coolscan 5000 will show the same scratches.
How about testing the OpticFilm 120 Pro?
If I could get my hands on the 120 Pro I would, but definitely don't want to have to go out and buy that one. Not cheap!
Bought a nice Nikon Coolscan V ed and found it is close in quality to my Plustek 8100. The Nikon has a 4.2 sensitivity compared to Plustek's 3.6 - it is better at capturing detail in shadow. I like it's native software, NikonScan-4. The manual focus and grain reduction functions are nice. I use the Nikon with SilverFast-8 software too, but find it's a little buggy at times.. film brands and types not available and some extended tool features disappear at times. No problems using SilverFast-8 with Plustek.
I scan old B/W negatives and the one thing the Plustek does that blows the Nikon out-of-the-water is.. it doesn't see every pit or scratch in the film. There must be some improved way the Plustek illuminates. The dust filter in SilverFast removes any pits or scratches that do show up. Coolscan for color and Plustek for B/W seems to be the way to go for me.
I read somewhere that the Plustek has a true optical resolution of 7200dpi. I don't know how true that is, but either way I use mine at 3200dpi. Another thing, if you don't care for the colors with Negafix feature, you'll get better colors scanning as a positive and converting in post.
The Nikon does look better though.
I think it's that the Plustek lens doesn't resolve 7200dpi, and perhaps only a little better than 3600dpi. So you would get a large file size with only slightly more detail than a scan at 3600dpi.
@@rklee65 The true resolution is 3250 ppi, when scanning at 7200 ppi.
Any chance you plan to do a comparison video on DSLR scanning with Negative Lab Pro vs. the Nikon Coolscan 9000 for medium format? Would love to see a deep dive that explores which is more cost and time efficient, as well as diving into the nuances of what budget-friendly DSLRs (full-frame or APS-C) and 1:1 macro lenses can keep pace with the Coolscan.
I've got a v800 and a plustek and I think I prefer the epson because I can batch scan. You're right about the softness of the scans on the epson, but I've found that I could deal with a lot of that by getting the film holder height adjustments dialed in. It takes some time to get it calibrated, but once that was taken care of I was pretty happy with the results.
Does the v800 just have a thing to set the film holder height or did you do something special to tweak it?
@@Nitidus The factory 35mm film holder has little feet that move in a slot to adjust height a bit up or down. It's not super precise, but it's plenty for my needs. For the medium format stuff I shoot, I went with a 3rd party film holder from Lomography because it handles curled negatives much better. For that one I had to do a lot of focusing work, though. I ended up shimming it with a stack of cut-up playing card pieces and got it really dialed in.
@@wouldntyaliktono Thanks for answering in such an old comment thread! My V550 doesn't have this but there are 3rd party things that are adjustable and I always wondered whether that can improve my results. The standard 35mm scans I get are really not that nice. 6x6 and 6x4.5 is much better, though sometimes I'm sceptical if my shot was out of focus or if it's the scan.
Thanks for a honest comparison. The difference between the two reminds me of my comparing a Tamron 28-300 against a Canon 28-300. By itself the Tamron looks really good but when put side by side with the Canon the Canon looks better and costs 3X what the Tamron costs.
I just bought a Plustek 8100, the timing is wild
There was a brief mention about using a separate scan utility to capture the scans, in the plustek, as opposed to using their software? What would that be?
I used VueScan with both scanners. And then converted using Negative Lab Pro in Lightroom.
@@KyleMcDougall Vuescan controls the settings?
I have an old Plustek 7400 I got when I had a little less disposable funds. I'm debating whether I ought to upgrade or will my 7400 be sufficient? One of the questions is how important is IR correction? If the negatives aren't particularly dirty or damaged, does it make a huge difference? Mostly I'm looking to archive 20-40 year old photos. Some are nice, but nothing pro.
I'm also wondering what might be between the $300 and $3000 price points? Anything worth considering?
ive been using a flatbed when i cant or dont want to pay my local film lab to scan cause its expensive like $20 a roll for 35mm film. Developing is like $5 but scanning is expensive.
Usually just have the lab process the film cut it for me and then take it home and scan to the best of my ability.
The plustek looks pretty good. My only comment would be that an Epson flatbed would be use to have alongside the plustek. Use the Epson for proofing negatives its quite quick for scanning a whole roll of film at low resolutions, those scans can be used for web uploads and such and use the plustek for final scans of choosen images.
Another option is using a DSLR with macro setup for scanning, with B&W film you can easily convert to positive in lightroom.
I had a plustek about ten years ago and returned it because it always had scratches show up on the scans and when I used the scratch removal during the scan it would be like a blurry blob line in the scan. But now I’m considering getting one of these again since paying for scans is so expensive. I’ll just go for a lomo scan look.
Unfortunately Plustek scanner is way out of my budget (maybe someday, haha) but I found a good alternative - Epson Stylus Photo RX700. It cost me only 20$ including local delivery on a second hand market (look at craigslist, olx or similar sites in your country). RX700 has 3200 dpi hardware resolution which is IMO pretty enough, if not overkill, for old negatives and slides from 40s-80s which I have. RX500\RX620 is also an option but they have only 2400 dpi hardware resolution and cost pretty much the same as RX700 now. People literally throw away these scanners because they useless without ink, but scanner still works even without ink and this is perfect for our purposes. So if anyone is looking for a budged alternative - try looking for these (but also try finding one with plastic film holder to avoid frustration). Sure this alternative is worse than two scanners compared in this video, but for casuals looking for a device to convert their old family archives it is perfect (and definitely better than those Chinese Qpix "film scanners" that cost 80$ on Ali).
This video made me take the plunge to get a Plustec scanner.
Though those specs you see. Makes me curious if they are in the same place over several photos. That would suggest there is some dust particles inside the scanner.
Been using one for a few years. Love the plustek, highly under rated.
To all who are looking for Nikon Coolscan quality on a budget for 35mm, I'd recommend one of the Nikon Coolscan dedicated 35mm scanners. A Nikon Coolscan V can be had for around $500 USD and I think it can slightly outperform the Coolscan 9000 with 35mm. The lens in that scanner is optimized for 35mm frame sizes instead of medium format and I think it just barely outresolves the 9000. For even cheaper, you can get a Nikon Coolscan IV! Those can be had for around $350 USD, sometimes even cheaper. It's a bit lower resolution at 2900 DPI instead of 4000 DPI but it still has the amazing lens capable of resolving fine details. I've actually owned all three at different points. The Coolscan 9000 which I paid market price for 5 years ago and the Coolscan V and Coolscan IV which I found in thrift stores over the years (yeah I know how insanely lucky that is). I have no problems recommending both the V or IV over the 9000 if you just shoot 35mm. Definitely worth a look!
I think there's a doctor with a speciality in laser optics that has published data which confirms the 35mm coolscans resolve detail better than the 120 coolscans. He also has guides on how to clean and repair them on his website.
Found the website www.shtengel.com/gleb/Scanners.htm
@@jonnoMoto I actually used his guide to clean the mirror in the thrifted Coolscan IV I found! Worked great and now the scanner performs perfectly.
gonna be honest, i think the coolscan is scanning to show the film stock colours better and the plustek seems to be correcting with more true to life colours, the white wall on the night shot was more green on the coolscan and much more white with the plustek
morons... only morons would think that scanners are responsible for the color outputs.. havent you people heard of profiling? its the person using the scanner who decides how the colors come out.
It might also be how well Negative Lab Pro handles variations in scanned DNGs
I've scanned 1000's of negatives and slides with my Plustek 7200i and love it. Yes, it's slow but you can do something else like read or watch a movie while it's pottering away. The i version does an infrared pass to remove dust and scratches.
I have the Pustech Opticfilm 135i batch scanner, it scans strips of six negs in a single pass and does a pretty decent job, It's a bit more expensive at £450.00 than the single frame model but worth the money as I'm able to leave it and go do something else, it's also compact enough to fit on my desk.
Great comparison. Definitely shows me that the plustek is more than enough for what I need.
Sad to see there isn't much going on in the film scanner world. I do see Plustek is up to the 8300i AI and I wonder how it would stack up to the Nikon Coolscan 9000 today. I am in the market and willing to pay for a Nikcon Coolscan 9000 but need to research if I can even use it on a M1 Apple machine, etc. Might bite the bullet on a 8300i AI and see how it goes.
I am also trying to decide between the 8300i AI and the Coolscan 9000. Considering how much the 9000 is going for these days for a used one, the 8300i AI seems like a better choice. As for the M1 Mac support, if you go with the Coolscan 9000, my preliminary research is that you can buy the VueScan software that will run on M1 and use it with your 9000.
I think these Plustek Scanners really depend a lot on using the Multi Exposure mode to really get a more natural rendition that the Nikon Scanner seem to manage in just one pass. And yes, i too realized how much scratched the Plustek scanner reveals on all of my Negatives. Even on those that actually look pretty well otherwise. Maybe the Nikon one just scans it differently due to the actual effective DPI and Dmax value. Sure it means a lot more manual restoration work on the Plustek Scanners but personally.... i can live with that if these two caveats are really more or less the only things that save me ca. 2700 bucks when i just want to scan at a much higher standard than what other alternatives at cheaper costs have to offer. Especially if it doesn't involve a Light table, a digital camera that saves RAW images and a macro lens, if you use that DSLR "scanning" method.
I couldn't see a difference with multi exposure turned on in most cases
After all these years nikon is still the probably the best film scanner you can buy. I shot pro back in the 90's and used nikon scanners. The only way to get better quality was sending my negtives and slides out for drum scanning service.
This is a good and fair comparison but for those of you who still want to shoot film, I advise you to get the very best possible scans that you can. I don't see the utility in going through the expense of shooting film if one is just going to go for ok scans.
I do miss my RZ and have had most of my stuff scanned but now I am content with my sony 6000 for family pics and vacation pics.
Nice and useful comparison. I have both the 8100 and the 8200i models, the latter adds infrared dust and debris removal which should get rid most of the defects. However, this adds a bit of extra time to the whole process and it does not do as good a job as the ICE of my Epson V550 which I use for 120 film. Like you said, a no-brainer for people on a budget who don't want to get into the trouble of DSLR scanning.
I wonder if you have tried something like the Nikon ES-2. If so what are your thoughts on digitizing using a camera with a macro lens rather that scanning?
I was disappointed with scans from 35mm off my Epsom V750 Pro. So I bought a Plustek 8200i earlier this year from Amazon and I’m very pleased with the results.
My Epson 600 is pretty trash for 35mm scans but gives nice results with 120 scans. I got improved results when I switched to the Lomo Digitaliza trays, but I'm seriously considering a Plustek 8200i SE for my 35mm negs.
@@justinkingery2489 get scan dual iv, cheaper and way better than plustek.. plusteks have poor quality lenses, the same reason your epsons suck.. plastic fantastic lenses.
I dont think you can buy Nikon scanners anymore. But after seeing your results I think I will get the Plustek 8200 Ai model with the IR channel to filter out all those scratches and dust particles. I have a V700 now and i'm not satisfied.
The colors on the Plustek seem more neutral. The Nikon seems to have a slight yellow cast. Adding yellow warms the image but also makes colors "richer". A very interesting comparison, Kyle. The Plustek is a very impressive scanner especially for the price.
I use the Pacific Image Primefilm XA (it's Reflecta rpm 10m). It gets 4300 dpi with a 5000 dpi scan. The scan is so high resolution that I see visible grain in Provia. And it's only like $100-150 more than the Plustek.
Seeing grain in any slide film is hard, If I set my epson at the max scan res that it can resolve and flatbed scan a 6x9 slide the scanner literally tells me that it cant handle it because the file size and res is to big and wont let me scan it. TIFF files are like 3gb for ektachrome.
@@pilsplease7561 Yeah, flatbeds don't really resolve grain that well, no matter the format. You'd have to sharpen the image a bit to get some grain texture on a 2400 dpi scan from a V700/V800. In which case, Provia and other slide films won't show much or any grain. The scanner I was talking is a 35mm-dedicated scanner. Probably the best one out there that's for sale currently.
@@eccentricbeing kind of yeah, I typically have my slides scanned by my friend at her lab on a noritsu which is better than any home scans. But I do plan on buying myself a better scanner for scans in a pinch
Any views on how these scanners compare with “scanning” using a high resolution digital camera like the Sony A7Riii, macro lens and copy stand?
Thanks Kyle. Very good comparison. I have a Plustek 8200i so I know what this is capable of. Makes me want to load up a roll of Tri-X and head outside.
Cheers, Alan.
Regarding the scratches being revealed, I often found my Nikon LS5000 to be quite unforgiving, showing every little scratch while actually printing the BW photo in darkroom with mixing head (diffused light) the resulting print looked immaculate.
I would kinda expect your Nikon to have the same light source as the 5000 but then there might be some diffusion element because it needs to evenly illuminate wide strip of film compare the 35mm only LS5000.
And the dust... if you scanned with the Nikon first and Plustek second - it might be just (at least in part) a new that got on the film during handling. Usually when I am going back to some film that I already scanned when it was freshly developped it is much dustier even after dusting it off with air.
I can't remember what the cause is exactly but the 'scanhancer' insert for Minolta's was to reduce the grain/dust/scratches optically.
Thanks, very solid info and comparison. The Plustek looks compelling from your results.
The Amazon reviews seem to confirm your findings of lines/scratches with the first few saying it's a consistent trait.
Glad you enjoyed it.
Plustek 8100 VS DSLR/Mirrorless camera scanning, now that would be a killer video, you would see the next day the Ebay getting full of Dslr´s and Mirrorless cameras :)
Great video Kyle! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼
I got a Plustek 8200 bargain for half the price (usd200) about 5 years ago at B&H. What you are saying is true, the same thing happens to me. First, the tiny scratches in the scan and also the magenta in the shadows. Despite these things I am really happy with the results and it is my everyday tool for my 35mm negatives.
Cheers, Sebastian. Interesting to hear you experienced some of the same results.
Thanks Kyle, Im 400dollars poorer now haha. Ended up buying the Plustek 8200i SE, because it seems the dust and scratch removal is needed. So now my epson v600 is only going to scan 120 film. You did a really great review!
Glad you found this helpful, Martin. Enjoy!
Nice comparison Kyle. Yes, the Plustek has manual film advance, a bit less smoothness in color rendition, and scans that show a bit more dust. But for 35mm film, is the Nikon 10-12x better to justify the price gap? I really don't think so.
Thanks. Yeah, it'll all come down to personal preference/budget, but there's a huge price gap between the two machines, that's for sure.
It would be interesting to see camera scanning in comparison to the Nikon coolscan and the plustek. Have you tried camera scanning before?
I haven't, but I agree, would be an interesting comparison.
Camera scanning works, but is not easy, and not even close in quality to a good scanner like the Plustek.
The Nikon handles whites better, I think it has more dynamic range. But for the money, the Plustek holds up pretty well. Thanks for the review!
Can you do that comparison video of the Nikon scanner verse the Epson scan for medium format? Would love to see the differences
Unfortunately I don’t own an Epson flatbed anymore. Would have to buy one.
Such a good video. I have been so curious about the Plustek series. Now I just need to see a Plustek vs a Nikon Coolscan IV ED. I see them everywhere.
11:41 Did you used multi-sampling with Plustek? If not, you should try it. That magenta was originally 'low' level scanner white noise before negative conversion. Multisampling will probably eliminate it and make it closer to black.
Wow this video is super helpful - thank you and very much appreciated. I have just dusted off an old Nikon F3 I bought 20 years ago (and last used 10 years ago) and put a roll of HP5 through it to test it and all seems well so I want a scanner for 35mm B+W and this review plus the samples is just what I need to make the judgement properly. Its great to see a film scanning expert like yourself test out the scanner. Re the dust etc, I read somewhere that the plustek has fixed focus so maybe has a smaller aperture (with greater DOF) than the Nikon so the plustek may be getting the film base side in focus where the dust likes to sit - just a guess. Anyway thanks again for the thoroughness and the samples - very helpful indeed.
I came to the comments thinking the same and that it must be the focus that's different. Depth of field would seem to explain it.
1. Higher DPI usually means higher Dmax, so realistically the Plustek probably should have a true DPI of ~3000 which is consistent w/ ur results
2. Difference in color could be related to different lightsources & lenses in each unit. AFAIK CoolScans use RGB LEDs, and I personally scan with a Minolta MultiPro which uses a CCFL lightsource, both will produce light with RGB peaks, great for print film scanning because they reproduce color like an enlarger does, whereas the plustek probably uses a simple flat-spectrum LED and potentially low CRI
3. You should try inverting your negatives by hand sometimes. I treat all my neg scans this way because I find color reproduction better compared to NLP. It's simple and saves spending money on a semi-professional plugin
Love your style of content man, this is just my 3 cents
Cheers. Thanks for the comment and the input!
I was so impressed by your video that I bought one yesterday :D
Hope you enjoy it!
@@KyleMcDougall Amazing resolution but I have the same problem with dust and scratches. But anyway a great scanner!
According to Plustek web page the 8100 model does not have the IR channel, what explains the number of scratches visible on the scan. The model 8200 and up have the IR channel.
As noted a few times, no dust removal was used on the Coolscan 9000.
@@KyleMcDougall Oh, ok, thanks for the reply. This skipped my attention!
Interesting comparison! I've always wondered how a Plustek would do compared to a Nikon. I use the LS-5000 myself, but it's getting really old and I'm not sure how long it will last. The 8200 seem like a good option. I believe it's more or less the same as the 8100, but with the addition of the IR channel for dust and scratch removal. I find that ICE give excellent results with color negative film and slide film, at least on the scanners I've used.
I'm curious about the dust and scratches on the Plustek images. Could you take a picture of one of the negatives with a macro lens (or check with a loupe) to see the amount of dust actually there? I've had a similar experience when scanning old B&W film where ICE doesn't work. Scanning on a flatbed actually gave less dust and scratches than scanning with the Coolscan 5000. Assume it was caused by a combination of less real resolution, but also a much more diffuse light source in the flatbed which gave images closer to what I got from old darkroom prints.
With your Coolscan 9000 giving more details than the Plustek resolution cant be a factor with your dust and scratches, but type of light source might be. Anyway, the important part is IMO to be verify that the Plustek don't introduce "dust" that's not there.
Hey there, some people mentioned that it could be because the Plustek has a larger depth of field or a harsher light source.
How does the Plustek compare when scanning black and white film?
Also really great, the dust problem like he mentioned is still very prominent though
@@nakedexposure964 i have the 8200i SE model and i don't have the dust/scratches problem.
@@brankokosteski damn that's annoying, wish I'd picked one up now. Still love my 8100, but yeah the dust problem makes me spend hours cleaning it up
@@nakedexposure964 i don't know, maybe the reason I don't get dust is that I develop my own color and bw film and I am really careful with the whole process. might not be the scanner after all :))
Thanks Kyle, extremely helpful. The extra dust and marks on the Plustek might be because it has a deeper “depth of field” than the Nikon and is finding dust that is somewhere else in the optical system? Great review,.
Thanks, Howard. Yes, someone mentioned that and it seems like it could be the issue.
I wonder if the scratches and such are on the non-emulsion side and perhaps the depth of field on the Plustek is large such that it's making the backside of the negative sharp? I recall I was making a darkroom print on my Omega and stopped the lens down so much that I brought the filament of my enlarging bulb into focus! At first I thought it was a scratch on the negative - took me a while to figure that one out!
More related, I've noticed I get some weird scratches on the non-emulsion side of HP5 sheets, but seemingly only if I prewash. In any case, it's not normally an issue unless I also stop the lens down and notice that I can sometimes see those imperfections via my grain focuser (though it doesn't normally carry over to the print itself).
That's darkroom work of course, but just bring that up since I wonder if it's a related issue with the Plustek (where it has a greater than perhaps ideal depth of field).
For sure. It's a good point and has been mentioned by a few people already.
Hi Kyle. It will be interesting to see a comparison between the Nikon Coolscan 9000 vs Plustek OpticFilm 120 Pro. Thanks
If I could get my hands on one I would.
Yes the Plustek is such an amazing value. For a new film shooter who wants to save some money on scans this should be almost mandatory.
Add in a anti static brush and you should be in business. Some of that gunk you noticed looks a lot like gunk from the final c41 rinse though.
Thanks for this review! Now I really consider to buy a Plustek film scanner, because I am not a big fan of the results when it comes to scanning 35mm with my Epson v600.
This video was truly interesting. I love your photographs in general and I enjoyed the photo comparisons between the two scans. Your videos are relaxing and pleasant to watch. Take care, Manu
Cheers. Glad you enjoyed!
I have the plustek and also notice that it shows up any dust or damage, I wish I'd spent the extra for the ICE version. But I rarely shoot film, it's mostly for digitising my back catalog of slides. BTW Plustek also do a medium format scanner that would be more comparable to your Nikon and costs about the same too...
Me: Started to think about getting a budget scanner literally two days ago but feeling scared of the potential gap between this and professional lab scans.
Kyle: Uploads a video completely resolving my problem.
Thanks man, you're awesome. So if I understand this correctly the difference regarding b/w scans should be pretty minor?
Also the dust and damage on the Plustek's scans may be due to the fact that it doesn't have any dust-removal software. I've found info that for that you'd have to go for 8200i version.
Hey Michal, glad it helped. As for the dust removal, just to note, I didn’t use it on the Nikon for these scans. But yes, the 8200 does add it. I’d be curious to see how well it works.
@@KyleMcDougall Oh, sorry, I must've misunderstood. In that case I also have no idea where it comes from. Currently this 8200 seems the most tempting to me
For most people, the Plustek would be their best option. Most people can't afford or justify spending several $1000 on a scanner, so for $250, the Plustek has amazing quality.
It’s a great deal for the price.
Great video Kyle! I was considering a Plustek scanner for a long time, until I found a Minolta 5400 for the same price and got that one. Considering that 35mm film is not that high resolution anyway, you get almost all the detail that is there with the Plustek. I would assume that the difference between your Nikon and a Plustek 120 would be more noticeable, but for 35mm the Plustek is a great option. Also, it has a great advantage that no Nikon or Minolta scanners have : warranty and the peace of mind that comes with it!
For sure. Nice to be able to buy something like this new and have some sort of warranty.
I'd imagine the 5400 is better all round? I read many reviews and nearly replaced the Plustek with one before I decided to stop being lazy and use the camera. The Minotla was supposed to be so sharp some have taken the lens out and made a camera lens with it!
@@kronkite1530 It is very sharp indeed, to the point where I don't apply any sharpening at all to my images afterwards.But if you already own a Plustek I don't believe that you would see that much of a difference, the Plusteks are decent for 35mm film. The 5400 is a 20 year old scanner and with that you get all the risks that come with it. I got mine from someone who I knew that he barely used it, in fact he had only scanned a roll of slide film in 15 years! I would be very hesitant to buy it from an unknown seller.
slide film is pretty high res about equal to a 20-30mp camera. 6x9 slide film is around 150mp equiv and insanely detailed.
This is a fascinating video. I used a 1,800dpi Plustek film scanner about 16 years or so ago, and loved being able to get the scan exposure just right. For me this had as much value as anything else, and I am now trying to work out whether I would be more pleased with a £250 Epson scanner over the Noritsu scans my favoured lab is providing. For now at least, the Plustek 120 is out of my budget.
Great comparison.
Kyle, it you’re interested in having some drum scans for comparison or as a reference/baseline, let me know. I have a Screen 1045ai in my office and would be happy to scan several samples for you from your reference negs or reversal film.
Ohh, could be very cool. I may take you up on that at some point, Terry. Thanks!