The Flickr 决议 Image Generatr

Here you see a crop from the previous image. ScanMate ScanView 3000 (3000ppi, Dmax 3.6) vs Epson Perfection V700 (6400ppi, Dmax 4.0). On the last you can only say in a simple languge: if this is really a 6400ppi/Dmax4.0 then my grandma was definitely an astronaut! :-P Now I'm really beginning to believe in the world of drums combined with photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) :)

Note that this is a fisheye lens shot and ultrawide fisheyes are never very sharp due to their extreme angle-of-view used. But as you can see this 3000ppi drum scanner really takes out all the juice from a fisheye shot, it's acceptably sharp down to the last level at 3000ppi so for me the fisheye is surprisingly capable of taking around 50 megapixel equivalent frames. I.e. the very sharp SMC 200mm f4 lens goes beyond the ScanMate 3000 drum scanner since you could see even at 100% zoom there can be more details extracted (see the other shot crop) - I guess ScanMate 5000 or 11000 would do that resolution job better). Sharp 50MP out of 6x7 frame is more than enough for me since I rarely print very large format.

The thing is with the (I guess most of-) drum scanners that it's REAL 3000ppi, REAL Dmax 3.6, not hocus-phocus claimed-to-be 6400/7200+ppi Dmax 4+ etc as the consumer and prosumer CCD scanner manufacturers intentionally clock up and balloon their cheated specification numbers to steal their fooled clients money these days... :-/

On previous comparisons I showed that my Epson 4490 (4800ppi flatbed scanner) is absolutely no match for ScanMate 3000 (just 3000ppi). But let's see how it compares to the more-professional Epson V700 scanning a 6x7 slide.

Note the "ppi" (Points Per Inch) is the same meaning as "dpi" (Dots Per Inch), but the last one is more for the printing field with printers creating "dots" on the same spot with different inks. For scanning and digital images it's better to use "ppi" term.

I leveled the haze out to see the how much tonal-separation juice the scanner can "suck out" from this narrow DRed slide (pictured with lot of haze conditions as seen on the original).

Ignore the overall colour difference - most of this can be corrected on Epson, although it's a lot of colour balance work. Just compare the details, dynamic range and other small nuances that the two scanners can offer.

As you can see, detail wise the professional Epson V700 flatbed CCD comes closer than the Epson 4490 I had in previous comparisons, although the professional-oriented V700 is not really in the same league even if it has 6400ppi (over the double of the 3000ppi ScanMate scanner), but dynamic range and optical glowing reduction wise around fine details - not even close. From those details I'd roughly estimate the Epson Perfection V700's real-world usable resolution is around 2200-2400ppi range at the best possible conditions (flat film mounting etc), just forget the quoted 6400ppi, it's a mathematical number made by the Epson's marketing department to really mislead and confuse you.

Epson Perfection V700 is also quoted to be Dmax 4.0 capable, which supposed to be noticably higher than ScanMate's quoted Dmax 3.6, but as you can see the lower Dmax 3.6 PMT scanner literally blows the socks off from the "claimed-to-be" Dmax 4.0 CCD scanner, there's massive dynamic range and tonal separation difference there as you can see. You may ask: how can this be!?

From this simple seeing-is-believing example you can obviously conclude that the nowadays manufacturers cheat their customers big time not with just real resolution but also with their real Dmax specs. I wonder if it's the same story with the Imacon/Hasselblad/Nikon's quoted "astronomical" Dmax 4.8 etc?

Maybe they use software to to cheat the density specs measured with the standard b&w "step" densiometers but the scanner itself doesn't deliver what's promised in real-life images with real continous tones (without "steps") like with the Epson V700 example here?

But in any good there's always a downside as well - here you also see that drum scanning needs a lot of care and time. I have some banding issues with my SM3000 scans, my table is not so stable and I guess my wet mounting technique also needs more practice to fix things very tight on the drum - those are my very first wet-mounted drumscans. I also found out that I need to mount the full drum, otherwise it will run out of balance. This is the scan where I mounted only one half of the drum and the scanner shaked quite noticably, especially on my shaky table, so no wonder I got some banding issues - live and learn :)