Transferring film negatives to PC

[Andyvon]

I'm not very happy and I wonder if I'm doing something wrong.

I've just bought an Ion 'Film 2 SD Pro' machine which transfers 35mm film negatives and slides to PC. They can then be digitised and saved on DVD of course. Well, this thing cost almost £100 and the results are really quite poor. I've now transferred three rolls of negatives of different age and processed them with Picasa but the pictures are quite blurred and the colours aren't good.

Has anyone else used one of these machines? I don't think I'm doing anything wrong and I think the machine is working as designed. I'm now starting to think that the problem is in the physical limitations of the film. Am I right in thinking that transferring a small 35mm negative up to a large scale PC screen will result in a blurry picture? A just assumed the pictures would be pin-sharp as digital ones are but I think the film medium has it's limitations too. Also, many of the negatives are more than 20 years old.

If someone recognises this then I would be grateful for some advice. However, I'm starting to think I'm wasting my time with these negatives and that I've wasted my money on this machine.

Thanks in advance.

[Old_Geezer]

I apologise for not really having an answer to your question, but you are doing what I have considered for some time. What puts me off though is both the price of the kit and the fact that they never seem to suit all formats. Over the years my late parents had all sorts of negative sizes; what point, I think, getting kit that can only handle one or two at most ?

IMO. If you made a positive from the negative you'd not see blur and problems, so unless you are trying to blow up the PC picture more than your would a normal photo, then I don't see why problems should arise. The chemicals in the film will be fairly small and detail should be ok for any reasonable enlargement, as long as the scan had a high enough density of pixels. I appreciate film can deteriorate but I'd have thought you'd see that before scanning were it a cause.

Check the machine spec and see what it claims. Apart from that I hope someone with actual experience can give you an answer since the other thought is that you may have something set incorrectly.

[Mosaic]

In transferring 35mm slides to pc, I have found the best solution is to use the old projector and project the slides and use a tripod-mounted digital camera to photograph them from the screen.
So could you adapt that approach with your negative strips?
Then using an image software like photoshop and gimp you can invert the colours, hopefully resulting in a decent positive image.

[whiskeryron]

I successfully transferred hundreds of 35mm slides to pc & then to dvd using an Epson scanner without probs, I would suggest that you return the article & get your money back, it would appear to me to be not fit for purpose.

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Ron.

[Andyvon]

Thanks everyone. I think I will take it back Whiskeryron. The paper prints from the negs. are very good but the results when transferred to PC are so bad I really can't continue. I'm now wondering whether the problem is the scanner. The scanner does provide a positive picture on the screen but it isn't sharp and the colours and contrast are poor. I'll see what the shop staff say.

Thanks again.