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Canon FS4000 Film Scanner Review/WorkflowWhen my Kodak RFS 3600 decided to die on me, I was forced to buy yet another film scanner. The FS4000 from Canon was the lucky winner. So how does it stack up against my dearly departed RFS 3600? Read on to find out. First, in terms of build quality, the FS4000 is leagues ahead of the Kodak. Although neither is made of anything more than plastic, the Kodak had a definite feeling of "cheapness" that the Canon does not. Setup was a breeze... I'm using USB. Just plug it in and point the hardware wizard to the software drivers. Then fire up Photoshop and import from the Twain32 source to launch the FilmGet software (which I'll talk more about a little later on). The Canon has two film feeders, both made of what seems to be very durable plastic, one for 35mm film strips, the other for mounted slides. After loading either with film (a very easy task, even for somewhat curled negatives), you insert the film holder into the mouth of the FS4000 past a slight resistance, and then the motor takes up the film holder and draws it into the body of the scanner. In terms of noise, there is no comparison with the Kodak... the Canon is just so much quieter it amazes me. During scanning I actually have a hard time hearing it, and when I first started using it was actually wondering if it was working. FilmGet, the software that comes with the Canon, was the one sticky point for me prior to buying this scanner... I had heard some dubious reports about its ease of use and functionality. Now, having scanned about 6 rolls of film prior to writing this, I can say that FilmGet is worlds easier to use than the TWAIN software that came with the Kodak RFS, and is a substantial bit more intuitive that SilverFast Ai, which I also used with the Kodak. If you have specific questions about the software, let me know, but to cut to the chase, I'll just say that it's very simple and does the job. Thumbnail scans are generated with amazing speed, and large size previews from any of the thumnails are also generated very quickly. I haven't timed the scanner to see how long 4000dpi scans are taking, but they're certainly not any longer than they were with the Kodak. One reason that I'm very happy with this scanner is sharpness. With the Kodak I had significant issues with both a lack of edge sharpness, and with depth of field in general. This scanner has solved that problem wonderfully... I've now got some great scans (and the resultant prints) from negs shot with my 21mm Skopar that exhibit wonderful depth of field. Perhaps my one complaint is that scans seem a little too sharp... my suspicion is that the FilmGet software is applying some sharpening algorithm after scanning, which I would prefer to do in Photoshop. But, all in all, this scanner was worth every penny. Here's a little proof: these are crops of the same B&W negative (Delta 400). The one on the left was scanned at 3600dpi on the RFS 3600, the one on the right at 4000dpi on the FS4000. I then cropped this section of image (which is of a tag on an umbrella), sharpened with my usual Photoshop action, and saved them for the web. The difference is quite apparent.
**** Update July 09, 2002 **** I continue to have good results using the FS4000 and the bundled TWAIN software. However, this only applies to negatives. I've found the Canon software to be absolutely awful when it comes to scanning slides. This led me to give VueScan another try (I gave it a whirl about 6 months ago, and a horrible memory leak, which appears to have been fixed in the latest release, led me to abandon it), and after a bit of fiddling (actually, it didn't take much), I've come to find the FS4000 very capable when it comes to slide scanning, even with poorly exposed slides. I've also begun to use VueScan when scanning B&W negatives. The results, while not as impressive as with slides, appear to lead to a better final image than when using the Canon software. For $40, I highly recommend it. VueScan is made by Hamrick Software. Want to read some of my other Equipment Reviews? |
