The very best and very worst from Canon

Author's Rating:

Pros: Amazing scan quality even on film. Price = $200 wow! Canon flawless with the optics.

Cons: Short USB cable and won't work with longer. Cheep film holders. Buggy software

The Bottom Line: 
Buy it, set it on top of the CPU, and handle the film frames with great care. Medium format users take note.

Author's Review
I bought one of these scanners to primarily digitize film. Both 35mm and 120 roll from my Hasselblad. As you may be aware, anyone who shoots 120 rollfilm with a Hasselblad these days is very picky about image quality (and can't afford $9000 for a digital back). Let me tell you up front that this scanner exceeded my expectations for scan quality. It does have some other issues.

I read a whole bunch of reviews and did a lot of research. Hassie has a dedicated film scanner of their own.... starts at $12000..... not for me. Nikon has the CoolScan 9000ED which I am sure does a really great job. I seriously thought about plunking down the $2000 for it, but found that these are perennially out of stock with all the major online outlets.

There are few other flatbeds that will do 35mm, but only a couple that will do 120. Among the choices, I selected Canon because I am a Canon fan. I have owned seven of their cameras.... still own and use five of them (two were stolen).

The results from scanning my 120 negatives are truly astounding for a $200 scanner. I am sure the Nikon is better, but ten times better? And I am certain that the Hassie scanners are the best that are possible given our current level of technology, but 60 times better? Besides, scanning a 120 6x6 negative at 4800 dpi on produces a file of just over 300 megabytes. Yes, that is not a typo 300 megabytes. Adobe Bridge, Photoshop, and Lightroom all explode if you try to load a file that big. I had to scale back to 1200 dpi (19-20 megabytes). Even at this resolution, I beleive that the results would be acceptable for most professional use. I had to zoom four times before I could see deterioration.

Now for the bad news. I do not know what Canon was thinking. Either they outsourced some of the design work to two Chinese guys and gave them an etch-a-sketch as their CAD system, or their engineers allowed their kids to do some of the design during bring your kids to work day. Two major flaws and one minor annoyance. First major flaw, the documentation warns that the scanner will not work properly with a USB cable other than the one Canon supplies. It is four feet long! You are kidding me right. I wanted to place the printer in a location which would have required an eight foot cable. The only one I had was a max USB distance cable (like 15 feet). Tried it... no good. I got a message from VISTA saying "Your device has had a malfunction and can not be recognized". I was skeptical that Canon would expect every buyer in the world to get the scanner within a couple feet of their CPU so I called them.... "can I get a longer cable from Canon that will work"...... "no, it has to be that short to work".

Second major flaw, the film holders (especially the one for 120 film. These are sourced to the same guys who do the CrackerJack prizes.... but on a lower budget. They wont last a year. The one for 120 film is so hockey, it even has a little credit card piece of laminated plastic which the user is supposed to slide into one end of the film holder to keep the free floating end of the film from curling. I can just see it. They are getting ready to start shipping and someone says... "you know we really haven't even tested these yet". So they grab some film and put it in the holder... uh, oh !?!?! Hey, I've got an idea.... I bet if I take my credit card and slide it in like this..... hey it works. Lets ship it! Spoke to Canon support about getting a spare set. Nothing doing, they only sell spare parts for cameras I was told. Well are you in the scanner business or not?

The minor annoyance is that the software Canon provides, while it works, is full of little bugs and short comings. For instance, if you are scanning film, you select document type - film. You then get to choose document size. You can pick 35mm...... ahhh wait a minute, where is 120? It is not a choice. Panic. well, it turns out if you select film (auto) and let the 35mm setting stand (you can't do anything else) it scans just fine.

If Canon fixed these flaws, which it amazes me ever got past the first design review, they would have one awesome product here.