Nikon Super CoolScan 5000 ED Film Scanner

Manufacturer:	Nikon
List price:	~~$1,099.99~~
Our price:	Too Low To Display that is 100% off!

Nikon Super CoolScan 5000 ED Film Scanner

Average rating: Stars

Beware of Nikon Super CoolScan Slide Feeder

We purchased a Super Coolscan 5000 ED with SF-210 slide feeders, hoping to scan my parents' thousands of Kodak slides. The Super Coolscan worked flawlessly on single slides, but the SF-210 slide feeder simply could not scan more than 2 slides without jamming.

The instruction manual does say that the feeder basically works only with Fuji compatible slide mounts, and warns of problems with Kodak and other mounts - but it's buried in the middle of the manual and you don't find out until you've purchased the producdt. I have been unable to find those restrictions mentioned anywhere inthe literature. At nearly $400 per feeder, I would expect it to work - or at least have the sales literature mention its limitations.

I complained to Nikon, but never even received an email response. I will never buy a Nikon product again.

Nikon Super CoolScan 5000 ED Film Scanner - Nikon

Good scanner but be aware

I've been doing this for some time and have Nikon gear top to bottom. I have the slide feeder and the negative adapter that lets you feed full strips into it. Both work well 90% of the time. I get mis-feeds on the slides from time to time.

You will get a bluish hue on your negatives. I have tried several films and they all yield the same problem. Expect to take some time in Photoshop to correct this problem. I am taking the advice of a poster to alter my color settings to compensate.

Here is the biggest issue with this scanner. PROPERLY exposed slides scan dark. This is with Fuji 50/100/400 and Kodak. This is a known issue and you will see dozens of posts all over about this problem. Flat and dark scans that need to have the analog gain pumped up to compensate. This throws off GEM and ROC and makes the software unusable. It also washes out detail and increases grain. I contacted Nikon and they stated that Fuji has a 4th layer of emulsion that impedes scans. This is not true for slides, there is no 4th layer. End conclusion, there is a problem with the scanner design. Nikon has failed to give a reason why this is occurring other then to point the finger at someone else. If it was just my problem, I would say it was something on my end, but there are dozens of people stating the same thing on many different photo boards.

ROC and GEM are "OK". I would scan clean unless there is an obvious problem with the neg/pos that needs to be addressed. Any time you alter grain or the physical layer of the film you are altering original quality. See what you have first before changing setting across the board.

If you have any questions about this, my AOL-AIM is above as my Amazon username. This would include Nikon if the finally have a reason WHY there are issues. Overall, it's a good scanner. I would buy it again, but at least I would know what to expect and not expect it all as advertised.

Nikon - Nikon Super CoolScan 5000 ED Film Scanner

Works beautifully, although slower than you might expect

I am using this product almost exclusively for slide scanning, so my comments only apply to that aspect of this product.

If you are like me and wondering whether you should suffer through using a consumer level slide scanner or fork out the dough for this one, then the quality this produces when scanning dark slides should be enough to convince you alone. And that's just the beginning. I've used consumer level scanners before and no amount of tweaking or photoshop'ing can match the quality the Coolscan 5000 produces. For professionals, this is of course a no brainer, but for semi-professional folks like me, this is a major investment, and I needed some convincing that it would be worth it. I am now convinced.

Don't put too much stock into the scan times (and feed times for the sf-210 auto feeder). These times are without any Digital ICE, auto exposure, auto focus, etc. However, I have found if you do not use these features, you are wasting your time. After much tweaking to get all the settings such that the final result looked just like the original slide, I am looking at about 1 minute and 30 seconds per slide using the sf-210 (AMD 2.2 Ghz 1GB Ram, scanning at 2000 dpi)

I have found that without tweaking, you get a bluish hue (although a little less so for Kodachrome slides). I have turned red up +20 and blue down +20 (green at 0) and to me, this seems to give the best results (ymmv).

Use the digital ice features!!! They are simply amazing. The dust and scratch removal is phenomenal. The grain removal is also wonderful - and it keeps the picture sharp much more so than using a software filter like those found in Photoshop. Personally, I set the Digital ROC (color restoration and correction) to 0 because it is too unpredictable.

Lastly, use a bright, high quality LCD monitor! You would be amazed at the difference this can make when doing color matching, especially on dark pictures. I was astonished to see the difference.

When you take the above into consideration, this scanner is superb. Plan on spending a few hours getting your settings just right, but after that, sit back and enjoy. I've done 8x10 prints of my slides (scanned at 2000 dpi) that are just beautiful. It is near impossible to match the luminance and beauty of a projected slide, but the Coolscan 5000 does a darn good job.

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