slide adaptor for scanner

Has anyone had any experience of using a slide adaptor to scan scan slides into the computer to digitise them?
Have inherited a lot of slides which would be more convenient to access and use if they were digital and so looking at the options of getting them onto the computer.
Any recommendations would be welcome as I don't know what to look for on this type of equipment. I have been looking at one - a Summit photofix film and slide scanner, but are they are good?

that isn't one I've heard of. The best reasonably affordable way to scan negs and slides at home is with a dedicated 35mm scanner. The one I always used to recommend was made by Konica Minolta, but I don't think they make them anymore. Nikon and Canon also make very good ones.

Other than those three brands, I would steer clear, just about all others on the market are rebrands of the same generic unit. They have cheap fixed focus optics where the Nikon, Canon and KM ones have decent auto-focus glass.

A close second to a proper slide scanner, and overall more useful in the long run if you don't shoot a lot of film, is a flatbed with a good slide attachment. Epson make some very nice units, I'm not sure of the current range but when my parents got their current unit it was the Perfection Photo range. These are also more suited to scanning other film sizes such as 110 and 120.

Dad's epson isn't quite as good as my KM Dimage Scan Dual IV, but it is cheaper and can also be used to scan paper documents so overall it's a better buy.

Trouble is I already have two scanners, one flatbed and the other a scanner/printer/copier which I am happy with and don't want to get rid of. I have been quoted £50 to transfer 300 slides onto disc. I can't seem to find just the adapter to go on an existing scanner, they all want you to buy the scanner with the adapter!

I suppose it depends on what sort of quality level you will get for the £50. If the scans were excellent ones, large file sizes with full detail, then £50 might be a very good deal. If they are low res rushed scans then they might not be worth the trouble.

Scanning 300 slides yourself would take a long time. Not a job I would fancy!

What I don't understand is why someone hasn't cleaned up in this business.

There must be thousands, maybe tens of thousands of people with lots of slides and negs to scan - and no economic way of doing it.

Unless whoever it is has a high degree of automation, £50 for 300 sounds very cheap.

There is an auto-change slide scanner that takes 50 slides per loading. It looks like a slide projector.

I have no idea how good the scans are...

I hope it focuses better than slide projectors used to

I briefly tried scanning peoples slides for them as a side earner while I was an undergrad. It is just about impossible to do it at a rate people will pay to a quality you can be proud of and make any money.

Unless your scanner is designed to take a slide adaptor, it is unlikely you will find one available, and if you do it is unlikely the quality will be any good. Flatbeds are designed for paper scans. They shine light up at the item and scan the reflections.

In order to scan a transparency like a slide you have to do 2 things:

1. shut off the main scanner light

2. install a second, defuse light behind the subject.

couple this with the fact that paper scans are generally done at 600dpi or less, while slides must be scanned at around 2000dpi as a bare minimum (my KM does 3200dpi, the Canon and Nikon models do 4000 or more, and that's native optical resolution, not interpolated) and you'll begin to see why slide adaptors arn't as simple as they first appear.

If the 300 are the only slides/negs you'll ever scan, take the offer of doing it for 50 quid (subject to the quality being ok). If you shoot enough film that you're likely to want more done in future, there are epson flatbeds on the market with very good features at just over 100 pounds.

one of the Nikon models has an optional slide magazine which takes 50 slides. You're looking at 500 pounds for the scanner and the same again for the magazine though.

I have a HP G4050 flat bed scanner and it can take 20 slides at a time. I usually set everything before bed time and I let it do it's thing during the night (as somebody stated, it takes a while for the scanner to scan slides).

Don't be tempted to buy a slide copier to fix to your camera. On a Pentax DSLR the slides will be cropped, and you'll only get the central portion.

But it is possible to copy slides with a DSLR and a good macro lens, if you can rig up a device to hold the slide, and some even illumination behind it. Results won't be as good as a proper slide scanner, but the output is much easier to deal with.

Dedicated scanners produce massive files that then need to be cleaned up and reduced in size. All of this takes time.

If you were able to find a second-hand scanner at a reasonable price, many people swear by the Hamrick software, which is considered better than that provided by most manufacturers.

However, 50 pounds for 300 slides is a steal, if the quality is acceptable. Try to get one done as a trial.

G

My Nikon Coolscan V ED photo negative scanner came with a slide option. It only takes one slide at a time though so it is pretty time consuming.

I've been thinking of getting one of these for a long time - I have several thousand negs to digitise from my film days.

Since I don't have the prints, I need to scan them even to see what I have - so ideally I'd want a reasonably simple workflow with as little intervention as possible for the first pass.

Please could you elaborate a bit on your experiences with it?