photographic @ge - Review Nikon Coolscan IV

Digital Ice makes this scanner real cool

The very first roll of film that I exposed was a roll of 35mm Anscochrome 64 slide film. I still have 2 slides from that roll I shot in 1972 in my archives.

For several years I have been shooting everything on print film and having it processed onto Photo CD so that I could use the images in my digital darkroom. For those of us who just don't have the money for an expensive digital SLR, this is a great way to use your film camera and have digital images without having to scan negatives or prints.

While I will admit that converting to using the Coolscan and shooting on reversal film means that I will have to scan the images. But, in the comparison of the first slide I scanned to the same one scanned by a pro lab in PCD format, even the greenest novice photographer could see the difference.

I also often have my film processed at a one hour lab and burned onto a Picture CD which is not to be confused with Photo CD. Picture CD is JPEG scans of the negatives and Photo CD is Kodaks PCD format that yields a 18kb to 18Mb file size. I also found the Picture CD to be a little bit flatter in contrast but just the fact that I could have my images on CD was worth having to fix them up in Photoshop.

In the image comparison shown in this popup window, the top image is scanned with the Nikon Coolscan and the bottom image is from the Photo CD.

You will notice a distinct red cast in the Photo CD image that is not in the slide. The Photo CD image is a bit flat but overall the contrast, sharpness, shadow detail and highlights are relatively identical in both images. By taking out some of the red cast in Photoshop I could achieve the same results... Not so true.

I soon discovered that a little adjustment on the red slider in Photoshop did not fix the image. It actually took a lot of tweaking and adjusting to try and duplicate the image from the Coolscan. By that time I could have made another scan and as I would go through the process of making about ten scans I would have equalled the time it would take to open and fix only four or five PCD images.

Quick Spec List

The Nikon Coolscan sells for about 600 to 800 dollars from most online camera stores. It comes complete with 35mm slide film holder and film strip holder for negatives. Also in the box was a USB cable and Nikon scan software, but I went to the Nikon web site and downloaded the newest version of the software that was just recently released since it was OS X native and I could keep my cool aqua interface while making scans.

The dynamic range is a key factor in scanners and the Coolscan IV ED has a dynamic range of 3.6, but even the next model up only has a 3.6 range. Not until you spend almost double can you get the Coolscan 4000 that has a dynamic range of 4.2. And of course it also sports many other options that help justify the twelve hundred dollar and up price.

Keep in mind this is my choice for getting as close to professional grade scanner as possible for a price that many photographers may be able to afford. Saving that extra six hundred bucks towards a digital SLR would be a better move than to swing for the pro line film scanner that may be obsolete in six or seven years.

The Coolscan IV ED features resolutions up to 2900 dpi and will produce a 69Mb 48bit image. But even more noteworthy is the Applied Science Fiction's Digital ICE3™ Image Enhancement Technology incorporating Digital ICE™, Digital ROC™ and Digital GEM™ that will clean up and restore your images in an unbelievable manner.

As you can see in this series of examples there are many scratches and specks of dirt on this twenty year old slide. The top image is a straight scan without Digital Ice or any other effects. While the middle image is with Digital Ice on and the third image is with Digital Ice and Digital ROC.

According to the Nikon spec sheet, the Coolscan IV ED would produce a scan in 45 seconds. I found that without Digital Ice, it would scan in 35 seconds, with Digital Ice it was 45 seconds and with Digital Ice and Digital ROC the time increased to 4 1/2 minutes.

The Coolscan IV ED connects to Mac or Windows computers with a USB cable. I even tried hooking the cable directly in the USB port in the back of the computer and also to a USB hub where many of my other devices are plugged in. But neither connection method shows any change in scan times.

The scans in this article were all made at the default settings, but the Nikon Scan software has a jam packed tool box of adjustments and enhancements that can be made to achieve excellent scans from any type of slide or negative.

Each setting also has a button to revert it back to the default settings or save the current settings if you use them a lot for repeated results from images that may require certain alterations to achieve the results you are needing. You can also preview the results live in the preview pane of the softwares main window.

With over ten different types of image adjustment tools, you will find this to be one of the most comprehensive scanning softwares available.

Putting On The ICE

The Digital Ice is not just software but also works with the hardware to reduce the artifacts in an image. All I can say is that it is simply amazing with what it can do to remove unwanted dust and scratches and still not affect the sharpness of the image. Most software patches that do similar tasks accomplish it by slight blurring and re-sharpening of the image. There is no way to equal the power of Digital Ice in a software only package.

When you add in the ability to restore color and remove film grain from high speed film images, then you most definitely can't match what Digital Ice can do with any other methods. Digital Ice is not just built into Nikon scanners, but Nikon was the first to use the technology and I think would have the best equipment to use since they have more experience with it.

What about the Digital GEM? This ability to remove apparent film grain is a great blessing as well. Now you can shoot a lot more of the ASA 800 film and remove the grain when you scan the negatives. The sample shown in this popup window is from a roll of Fuji X-Tra ASA 800 print film. While the results were fantastic, it did have a bit of extra grain to go along with the X-Tra name.

This top image shows the grain you would get at a 10x12 enlargement then with the Digital GEM process during scanning you can see in the bottom image just how amazing it is.

Any Complaints?

After seeing the superb job the Nikon Coolscan IV ED does with my slides and negatives, it very much overshadows any features that were not so welcomed. One being that the scan time is 45 seconds... but when you actually want to use the Digital Ice and the Digital ROC in just about every scan then the 4 1/2 minute scan time gets a little bit of a thumbs down.

In my work pattern, I will start the scan process and since my G4 has tons of RAM I then switch over to Photoshop and work on images or some other software to do work while the scanner is working in the background. This way I don't lose any production time due to the long processing times of the Digital Ice at work.

If you are wanting to digitize your old, new and yet to be photographed slides and negatives... and you don't want to not spend a thousand dollars or more, this is the choice to make. You will be convinced right from the very first scan.

Even better is if your budget does allow you to swing for the Coolscan 4000 ED or the 8000 ED. You will get the added dynamic range and 4000 dpi. The 8000 ED also accepts medium format films and transparencies making file sizes up to 790 Mb.