Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2001/10/15

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Subject: RE: [Leica] Piezo printing
From: Henry Ambrose <henryambrose@home.com>
Date: Mon, 15 Oct 2001 09:43:12 -0500

Austin,

You may be right that I am too sensitive. As to the unfair part, well, 
maybe that too. 

When I read your post it came across to me as an interrogation and a 
rather aggressive one at that. On re-reading it I still see it that way. 
I suspect that you really don't mean it that way, but it slaps me square 
in the face - every time. In the future I'll keep in mind thats not what 
you mean. Sorry for being snappish.

Anyway, about your questions:
On every scanner I've owned the time to complete a scan is longer for 
larger files as opposed to smaller files and color scans take longer than 
grayscale.
So from the time I click "Scan" to the time the image appears on screen 
is what I'm concerned with. In addition to that, as you state, it is 
certainly faster to work on and handle smaller file sizes.

About scanning B&W film as RGB: The reason I say that it does not help as 
far as mixing the channels is that when you get the resulting file in 
Photoshop you do have 3 channels but they are NOT the 3 very different 
channels you'd have when working with a color scan. Essentially you have 
in the B&W neg RGB scan 3 channels very much the same so when you go to 
mix them to make a grayscale file of a given tonal effect its useless. 
Its like mixing 3 quarts of clear water - when you're done mixing you 
have clear water. Mixing 1 quart of blue water and 1 quart of green water 
and 1 quart of red water on the other hand can produce varying color or 
tonal results. (not exactly technically right but I hope you get the idea)

As to scanning B&W in RGB for the purpose of helping a lame scanner 
produce a better scan - sometimes it works. Try it. I can only guess that 
it works because when blended together some of the noise cancels out? Its 
a work-around for poor hardware that can sometime help.

Peace,
Henry
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