Tag Archives: #Nikon Coolscan5000

Tips and Technique

Norfolk Southern Train 145 on the Street

Working with ripe professional Kodachrome 25 (PKM), I made a series of photos of Norfolk Southern trains traversing the former Nickel Plate Road street trackage on 19th Street in Erie, Pennsylvania.

This was part of a great adventure with my pal TSH in the summer of 1988 that brought us to many fascinating places on the railroad.

Kodachrome was wonderful film, and PKM was among my favorite emulsions, but when used a little on the ripe side (too fresh) it shifted cyan (blue/green).

I scanned this slide the other day using a Nikon Coolscan5000 digital scanner then imported the high-res TIF scan into Adobe Lightroom for adjustment.

Working with the sliders in the program, I made a host of small corrections to color, contrast, and exposure that improve the overall appearance of the photo while minimizing the effects of the cyan color cast.

I’ve included a scaled version of the unaltered scan; my adjusted scan, and one of the Lightroom work windows that shows some of the adjustments that I made during post processing.

Lightroom work window showing control sliders.
Unaltered scan of the original Kodachrome slide.
Corrected scan.

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photography

Rio Vista, California, May 2008.

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This morning bright sunny skies and a cool breeze reminded me of California.

So I scanned this Fujichrome color slide using a Nikon Coolscann5000 slide scanner.

Working with VueScan software, I set the color brand to ‘Ektachrome’ and the slide type to ‘E6’ and the color balance to ‘Landscape’, while under the ‘Input’ menu I selected ‘fine mode’ and ‘multiple exposure’ to obtain the highest quality scan.

After scanning as a hi-res TIF file, I then imported the file to Adobe Lightroom to scale the image for internet presentation. This is necessary because the original scan is 116.8 MB, which is far too large to up load for Tracking the Light. Why make such a large scan in the first place? When I take the time to scan a slide, I aim to capture as much data stored in the original in order to archive the photo long term.

The primary subject is a former Sacramento Northern four-wheel Birney Safety car that was operating at the Western Railway Museum on the day of my May 2008 visit.

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photography, Tips and Technique

Rochester & Southern—Example of a Multiple Pass Scan.

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This morning working with a Nikon Super Coolscan5000, I scanned this vintage Kodachrome 25 color slide.

This is a scaled version of the original scan without post processing color or contrast adjustment.

I used Hamrick’s VueScan software which allows me considerable control over the scanning process.

This has the ability to make a multiple pass scan that can obtain greater detail from highlight and shadow areas by scanning the same image several times and combining the scans.

It has a color setting specifically tailored to Kodachrome film and allows white balance fine-tuning.

VueScan work window for controlling color and exposure during scanning. Notice that I’ve used the Kodachrome profile.

VueScan Input control window where I have selected ‘Fine mode’, 3 samples, and multiple exposure features. I outputted the scan as Tif file at 4050dpi, then scaled in post processing for internet presentation.

This is a much enlarged section of the unadjusted raw scan (scaled for internet).

In post-processing, I used Lightroom to make fine adjustments to improve color balance and contrast before scaling for internet presentation.

I made the original photograph on April 19, 1989, showing a northward Rochester & Southern freight with former New York Central GP40s crossing a road at Scottsville, New York.

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