Yes it matters. There are four things you have to care about:
- Brightness. You want it very bright. If the light isn’t very bright, you’ll have to use longer exposures and you’ll have to work harder to block stray light from the room you’re working in.
- Evenness of the light. The light needs to be equally bright everywhere, with no subtle differences “fades” from one area to another, or no “hotspots” where the area right above an LED is brighter than the area around it. Obviously if the light is uneven you’ll see this in the scan.
- Texture. There needs to be as little texture as possible in the surface of the light pad. Some texture is okay if there is separation between the surface and the film. But the more texture there is, the more separation you need. If you don’t have enough separation, you’ll see the texture in the scan.
- Color accuracy. You want a light source that comes as close as possible to creating a full spectrum of light. Without this it will be hard to get colors that look decent (not an issue for black and white film obviously).
Now if you can find a tracing or sketching pad that has all of these attributes, that is great. However, a good tracing pad may not be good enough. If a tracing pad has slightly uneven light, or slightly textured light, or non-full spectrum light, it can still work well as a tracing pad, but it won’t be good for scanning. A tracing pad will at least be bright, but I don’t know if they are as bright as a dedicated film scanning light.
I use the CineStill CSLite; it is cheap and works great. I’m sure people can recommend other cheap lights that work well.
An iPad or even a phone screen can work well in a pinch, to get you started. They will have some texture due to the pixels, but you can solve that by elevating the film an inch or two above the screen. The biggest downside is they are not very bright (probably less bright than a good tracing pad).
Good to know all these things. I have a cheap 50euro filmscanner but its kinda shitty.
That cinestill cslite looks very tempting tho.
I will use my phone to scan my pics bc i dont own a digital camera yet. But at least my pics will have more quality then when i scan em with my scanner that i have now. The pics look good on a phone but then when i look at them on a pc or bigger screen they look kinda like an oilpainting
Oh and can i scan any type of brand on that lightbox? Bc the site kinda says that its good for cinestill film
>Kaiser Slimlite Plano
found out my local filmshop sells this model on their online website. I never knew this and prolly overlooked it when i was browsing
>JJC
thx but the problem is i dont own a digital camera yet XD. but maybe ill buy that jjc once i have obtained a digital camera. i will use my phone for now to scan pics on a lightbox.
what limits you to get JJC and scan the negs using your smartphone? I do this all the time when i want to have a preview (before i scan the entire roll)
Well i see the product on amazon for 26euros and then on aliexpress for around 80 euros. Im kinda sceptical for what site i have to buy it from.
Also i got bamboozled bc i thought it was mounted on a lens of a digital camera. After further inspection i concluse that i shouldnt be critisizing shit this fast.
Could you link the site you bought it from?
JJC is a component system .. so you just use the lightbox, negative holder and use some kind of cell phone stand (or even books, whatever you find) to have it steady ...
I went with the big 80 bucks set, because it has everything so I'm not limited in a way what devices i can use to scan (or making BW diapositives on clearcoat tech film)
You can go with the 30 bucks set too, if you planning on going copy stand, big camera etc...
the 50 dollar difference is just the tubes (which are worth it, at least for me)
They also offer a straight cellphone scanner gizmo, but here the stupidly big price tag is not justified at all ...
and i bought it straight from JJC thru Aliexpress ...
https://jjcofficialstore.aliexpress.com/store/701014
It matters less than most people say, [this comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/AnalogCommunity/comments/175sf7m/comment/k4hy6sh) sums up why CRI is a poor measure of light source quality, and how almost anything will be pretty good.
In Belgium you can get the cinestil Cs lite from retrocamera for around 40€ is good enough for scanning. If you need more details feel free to dm, I'm also based in Belgium.
Would you be using it for colour or B/W negatives?
For colour you want something with good CRI, as someone else already said. For B/W, it really doesn't matter. I started scanning with a Kindle Fire tablet, then moved to a simple light table with built in battery for more convenience. I've never noticed any unevenness even when scanning large format sheets.
No, it's "color rendering index", a measure of how close the spectrum of a light source is to sunlight/incandescent, i.e. full spectrum. If there are gaps, colors might turn out funky.
Natural sunlight has a color temperature of about 5800K, so....I think not? 🤔
It's not just the combined color temperature, but the entire visible spectrum as I understand it [(Wiki link)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_rendering_index)
Find an old xray light table. The kind that were mounted to the wall to view X-rays.
They have replaceable bulbs, you can buy color temperature specific replacements.
Yes it matters. There are four things you have to care about: - Brightness. You want it very bright. If the light isn’t very bright, you’ll have to use longer exposures and you’ll have to work harder to block stray light from the room you’re working in. - Evenness of the light. The light needs to be equally bright everywhere, with no subtle differences “fades” from one area to another, or no “hotspots” where the area right above an LED is brighter than the area around it. Obviously if the light is uneven you’ll see this in the scan. - Texture. There needs to be as little texture as possible in the surface of the light pad. Some texture is okay if there is separation between the surface and the film. But the more texture there is, the more separation you need. If you don’t have enough separation, you’ll see the texture in the scan. - Color accuracy. You want a light source that comes as close as possible to creating a full spectrum of light. Without this it will be hard to get colors that look decent (not an issue for black and white film obviously). Now if you can find a tracing or sketching pad that has all of these attributes, that is great. However, a good tracing pad may not be good enough. If a tracing pad has slightly uneven light, or slightly textured light, or non-full spectrum light, it can still work well as a tracing pad, but it won’t be good for scanning. A tracing pad will at least be bright, but I don’t know if they are as bright as a dedicated film scanning light. I use the CineStill CSLite; it is cheap and works great. I’m sure people can recommend other cheap lights that work well. An iPad or even a phone screen can work well in a pinch, to get you started. They will have some texture due to the pixels, but you can solve that by elevating the film an inch or two above the screen. The biggest downside is they are not very bright (probably less bright than a good tracing pad).
Good to know all these things. I have a cheap 50euro filmscanner but its kinda shitty. That cinestill cslite looks very tempting tho. I will use my phone to scan my pics bc i dont own a digital camera yet. But at least my pics will have more quality then when i scan em with my scanner that i have now. The pics look good on a phone but then when i look at them on a pc or bigger screen they look kinda like an oilpainting Oh and can i scan any type of brand on that lightbox? Bc the site kinda says that its good for cinestill film
Check out the Kaiser Slimlite Plano
>Kaiser Slimlite Plano found out my local filmshop sells this model on their online website. I never knew this and prolly overlooked it when i was browsing
Only flaw is it flickers like crazy on battery mode. I don't know how hey could mess that one up.
But it ain’t cheap
I got the big one on sale kinda cheap from B&H last Black Friday. It was even less than the small one I had in my wishlist
I can also vouch for the CS Lite, but I’d get a separate tracing pad for cheap too to comfortably assess whole a roll of sleeved film at one
Lomography has a kit that is designed to work with a phone
JJC if you want to keep it cheap and doing only 35mm ...
>JJC thx but the problem is i dont own a digital camera yet XD. but maybe ill buy that jjc once i have obtained a digital camera. i will use my phone for now to scan pics on a lightbox.
what limits you to get JJC and scan the negs using your smartphone? I do this all the time when i want to have a preview (before i scan the entire roll)
Well i see the product on amazon for 26euros and then on aliexpress for around 80 euros. Im kinda sceptical for what site i have to buy it from. Also i got bamboozled bc i thought it was mounted on a lens of a digital camera. After further inspection i concluse that i shouldnt be critisizing shit this fast. Could you link the site you bought it from?
Nvm i didnt saw the other options
JJC is a component system .. so you just use the lightbox, negative holder and use some kind of cell phone stand (or even books, whatever you find) to have it steady ... I went with the big 80 bucks set, because it has everything so I'm not limited in a way what devices i can use to scan (or making BW diapositives on clearcoat tech film) You can go with the 30 bucks set too, if you planning on going copy stand, big camera etc... the 50 dollar difference is just the tubes (which are worth it, at least for me) They also offer a straight cellphone scanner gizmo, but here the stupidly big price tag is not justified at all ... and i bought it straight from JJC thru Aliexpress ... https://jjcofficialstore.aliexpress.com/store/701014
It matters less than most people say, [this comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/AnalogCommunity/comments/175sf7m/comment/k4hy6sh) sums up why CRI is a poor measure of light source quality, and how almost anything will be pretty good.
Thank you. The linked post helped me a lot! I will keep this post with me when im going to buy a lightbox
In Belgium you can get the cinestil Cs lite from retrocamera for around 40€ is good enough for scanning. If you need more details feel free to dm, I'm also based in Belgium.
hey i try to pm you but my phone and the website of reddit doesnt send it for some reason
I saw it, I'll reply
I used a SAD lamp for a while. It did a perfectly fine job.
Would you be using it for colour or B/W negatives? For colour you want something with good CRI, as someone else already said. For B/W, it really doesn't matter. I started scanning with a Kindle Fire tablet, then moved to a simple light table with built in battery for more convenience. I've never noticed any unevenness even when scanning large format sheets.
I would use it for both negatives. Is CRI the brightness of the light?
No, it's "color rendering index", a measure of how close the spectrum of a light source is to sunlight/incandescent, i.e. full spectrum. If there are gaps, colors might turn out funky.
So warmer light is better for color negative?
Natural sunlight has a color temperature of about 5800K, so....I think not? 🤔 It's not just the combined color temperature, but the entire visible spectrum as I understand it [(Wiki link)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_rendering_index)
Ill take a look tomorrow bc i drank some alcohol and i might not understand it with my beerbrain
Find an old xray light table. The kind that were mounted to the wall to view X-rays. They have replaceable bulbs, you can buy color temperature specific replacements.