I bought a cheap film scanner from Lidl ( a discount supermarket chain in Europe ) in a clearance sale, it claimed 5mp resolution. Its based on a basic lens and sensor mounted in a tower pointing down at a back illuminated panel which has a simple negative / slide carrier manually pushed over the panel.
Their are many reviews of these type of devices online, some people seem happy, many complain about the quality.
The Lidl scanner produces scans of very poor quality, colours are erratic, dynamic range is small, illumination is very uneven. But as its allows real time viewing of the image on a PC ( as you push the negatives / slides through the scanner you see the image like its a video camera, you only capture a scan when you press the button or icon ). This means I can quickly check if the neg / slide is worth putting to one-side to scan on my Minolta film scanner.
This made me think, with the collapse of the P&S market Canon could use the sensors / lenses from these P&S to create a high quality simple manual film scanner. I would expected most of the R&D costs for the P&S sensors / lens would have been recovered by now. So developing a simple manual film scanner based around this ‘old’ technology should not be to expensive.
Canon could even do a deal with a software supplier ( say Vuescan ) to bundle a Vuescan Lite with the scanner. This version would be could be locked down to only scan to JPEG, half resolution ( 6mp scans from a 12 mp sensor or an 8mp scan from a 16mp sensor ). After purchase an option to buy a full Vuescan licence specific to the scanner would allow full resolution scans, option to save to TIFF with multiple pass to improve DR etc .
I know its not a new Canoscan dedicated film scanner many people would like to see, but I would of thought this idea could produce a good revenue stream for Canon with relativity little cost of development and put Canon back in the public eye again.
Comments?
Their are many reviews of these type of devices online, some people seem happy, many complain about the quality.
The Lidl scanner produces scans of very poor quality, colours are erratic, dynamic range is small, illumination is very uneven. But as its allows real time viewing of the image on a PC ( as you push the negatives / slides through the scanner you see the image like its a video camera, you only capture a scan when you press the button or icon ). This means I can quickly check if the neg / slide is worth putting to one-side to scan on my Minolta film scanner.
This made me think, with the collapse of the P&S market Canon could use the sensors / lenses from these P&S to create a high quality simple manual film scanner. I would expected most of the R&D costs for the P&S sensors / lens would have been recovered by now. So developing a simple manual film scanner based around this ‘old’ technology should not be to expensive.
Canon could even do a deal with a software supplier ( say Vuescan ) to bundle a Vuescan Lite with the scanner. This version would be could be locked down to only scan to JPEG, half resolution ( 6mp scans from a 12 mp sensor or an 8mp scan from a 16mp sensor ). After purchase an option to buy a full Vuescan licence specific to the scanner would allow full resolution scans, option to save to TIFF with multiple pass to improve DR etc .
I know its not a new Canoscan dedicated film scanner many people would like to see, but I would of thought this idea could produce a good revenue stream for Canon with relativity little cost of development and put Canon back in the public eye again.
Comments?