Your observations about the film holders on the SS120 are, or at least were, valid. I know Polaroid has acknowledge the need to redesign the holder for the SS120. I don't know how far along they are in this. There were some suggestions made about dulling the finish with mildly abrasive "sand paper" to overcome the reflection problem, and I believe some people did enlarge the holes somewhat in the meantime. Perhaps someone using one can comment further about those issues.
Moreno Polloni wrote: > You have a definite bias against Nikon, which is fine by me. At least you're > open about it. However, you should be more forthcoming about the fact that > Polaroid has been providing you with a scanner, and that this may bias your > opinion towards their products. My bias against Nikon is based on several criteria. My own personal experiences with some of their more recent (last 5 years or so) camera products (bodies and lenses) and dealings with their service people (I own thousands of dollars worth of Nikon camera bodies and lenses, BTW), and that, compounded on top of dozens of complaints both in public forums like this one and private email with Nikon scanner owners and users. If you wish, you can check the archives of this and other scanner lists as "proof" that at the time I began my "bias" regarding Nikon Scanners, I had absolutely no involvement with Polaroid. And to be clear, my only affiliation with Polaroid is that I was asked to beta test their scanner, and some related software. Until about 5 months ago, my only dealings with Polaroid was as a customer of some of their video products. Further, I think I was as clear as possible about the fact that I was beta testing for Polaroid, as soon as I was released from nondisclosure. And, I also want to make it clear that once the SS4000+ was officially released it was I who asked Polaroid if I could speak about it publicly. They gave me permission, with no strings attached. They never told me what to write. In fact, they never even asked me to review it, that was my own motivation. I suspect I wouldn't be their first choice to review it, since I'm known to be hard on scanner manufacturers. I did not, nor would I have, shown anyone at Polaroid what I wrote before I posted it. If they have seen it, they saw it the same time you did. It's the first film scanner I've been truly happy with, and that's what I wrote. My bias "toward" Polaroid scanners is based upon the same issues as my bias against Nikon. I read public comments and private ones, and I saw how Polaroid's representative replied, and the results. Since I still own a ton of Nikon goods, I probably have a better reason to hype Nikon, if that was my motivation. Is Polaroid perfect. No. Like I said, I do read these groups, and I get private mail. They had some problems some the earlier SS35 scanners, (the main ones I was aware of was with keeping the slides going in straight) although at the time those scanners were still reviewed highly for their price group otherwise. They had a problem with a cable harness pulling loose on the first SS4000 scanners, which I recall them correcting very rapidly, including previous owners. They had a problem with dust build up on a location sensor on some SS4000 scanners, which they provided a small brush that attached to the film carrier free of charge, and I believe they also covered all warranty issues related to that difficulty. They appear to have corrected these issues in future models, and no one was left with a defective earlier SS4000 that I'm aware of. I call that a pretty good record. My recent experience as a beta tester leaves me with more respect for the company. They communicate regularly with us, they listen to their beta testers, and keep us in touch with the right people within the organization, and they don't appear to be rushing product out until they are ready. Like I said, I had a SS4000+ in October, and it is just hitting the shelves now, while firmware was adjusted and software was debugged and improved (it was pretty much bug-free by the time I got it, to be honest). No, I have never beta tested for Nikon, so I have no comparison there. I have done some beta testing for other companies, including some pretty large ones, and I never felt the same type of direct feedback ability that I have with Polaroid. So, yes, I am currently biased toward Polaroid, because so far, they deserve it. Regarding the Minolta Pro, I don't know if Minolta is doing the same thing with their medium format scanner as they seem to have done with their 35mm version or not (I do own a Minolta Dual Dimage II). After working with the Polaroid, I realized something seemed a bit strange. The Minolta appears to be sharper at first look than the Polaroid... but its an illusion. The grain is more pronounced, and dirt and scratches are more evident. At first, I thought it was due to the lighting source (although it is a cold cathode system from the best I can figure) but something I read recently, and some tests I did leave me wondering. Why was I so limited in my ability to sharpen the Minolta Scan in unsharp masking before considerable artifacts started to appear, while the Polaroid scan could be sharpened so much further, going beyond the Minolta's with minimal artifacting? Well, as everyone knows by now, I am not an engineer, so I'm working on gut intuition here. It seems to me something is going on within the firmware or electronic filtering of the signal that's different. I'm guessing that the Minolta might be using electronic sharpening before it spits out the image. If that is true, well, its probably not all that different from unsharp masking, and therefore it may not be the optical scan that's coming out of the scanner with the Minolta. I suspect the image coming out of the Polaroid is an optical scan, without any sharpening processing, which might explain why I have so much more ability to sharpen it up with unsharp masking without adding unpleasant artifacting. (Polaroid does have a sharpening feature built into their Insight software, but I always leave it off). Now, due to a possible "slip of the keyboard" by someone on this list, there was an implication made that at least older Nikon scanners (prior to the last generation) might have used an electronic sharpening method in certain modes. I don't know if their current crop does or not, but perhaps that, in part, explains the perceived increased sharpness with their scanners, as well as the known lighting issue which would be expected to increase grain, dirt, dust, etc. Perhaps someone who has owned both the Polaroid SS120 and the Nikon 8000 who might have the same file scanned on both, might wish to try an experiment of using unsharp masking with both, and see, after doing so, which looks the best, after using the "best setting" of unsharp masking for each image. I am now convinced that simply looking at the scan coming out of the scanner prior to unsharp masking doesn't tell the whole story. However, this is an empirical observation with the Minolta Dual II and the Polaroid SS4000+, and I'd be very interested in other's experiences. Anyone up for the challenge? Art ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
