A short post on Pakon F-135 Plus scanner

[raytoei]

Some of you may know, i bought a Pakon Plus F-135 scanner.
A short summary, this is a Kodak scanner originally meant for the
photo labs, the F-135 is the smallest of the scanner family.

My 2nd hand F-135 arrived yesterday, I am happy to report that it works!

I can scan whole rolls at 2000x3000, C-41 as well as normal B&W film.
I am running it on an old Lenovo Thinkpad T410 and connected via USB
port to this scanner (it requires XP and won't run on modern computers)

As a Photo Lab device, the software is easy to use, however,
a bit weird to see CD, Prints and Contact Sheet options.
The company selling this stopped selling after being overwhelmed by
orders, they have since resumed selling this scanner at a 50usd increase.
So if you are looking for a scanner that can scan strips as well as whole rolls at
an industrial speed, please go check out the Pakon F-135U from AAA Imaging.

The scanner and the accompanying sw scans B&W as it is the latest version.
(which scans B&W film, and the HW PLUS version runs at 3000x2000)

http://www.aaaimaging.com/other-equipment/scanners/kodak-pakon-f135-film-scanner.html
raytoei

 

[anerjee]

How big is it? Can you please post a pic next to your m5 for relative size? I'm also interested to know how it fares compared to other traditional scanners.

Some of you may know, i bought a Pakon Plus F-135 scanner.
A short summary, this is a Kodak scanner originally meant for the
photo labs, the F-135 is the smallest of the scanner family.

My 2nd hand F-135 arrived yesterday, I am happy to report that it works!

I can scan whole rolls at 2000x3000, C-41 as well as normal B&W film.
I am running it on an old Lenovo Thinkpad T410 and connected via USB
port to this scanner (it requires XP and won't run on modern computers)

As a Photo Lab device, the software is easy to use, however,
a bit weird to see CD, Prints and Contact Sheet options.
The company selling this stopped selling after being overwhelmed by
orders, they have since resumed selling this scanner at a 50usd increase.
So if you are looking for a scanner that can scan strips as well as whole rolls at
an industrial speed, please go check out the Pakon F-135U from AAA Imaging.

The scanner and the accompanying sw scans B&W as it is the latest version.
(which scans B&W film, and the HW PLUS version runs at 3000x2000)

http://www.aaaimaging.com/other-equipment/scanners/kodak-pakon-f135-film-scanner.html
raytoei

 

[raytoei]

at 2000 x 3000 for a 24x36 negative, ( since 24mm is around 1 inch, i rate it at around 2000 ppi ?)
i don't think this is going to replace the coolscan, the minolta scanners anytime soon. the biggest
advantage is the speed, the box specification is 19 rolls of 24 frames per hour with ICE turned off
and 15 rolls with ICE turned on, this translate to about 3 - 4 mins for a whole roll (!). I currently
take about 30-45mins for a 36 frame at 3200 ppi on my Minolta 3200.

Of course, this assumes a whole uncut roll is fed into the machine, which is slightly smaller than
the V700 at about 4kg, then it is a hands-off operation, ie. just set it to scan and walk away, upon
scanning, you can theoretically print, cut into photo cd, print contact sheets etc, in reality, saving
it would be the objective, printing and cd-cutting probably requires kodak hw (my educated guess,
not verified).

One reason why it is so much faster is that there is no need for preview scan, all it does is a straight
auto-focused scan, if you check out this picture of the scanner, i found on the web:

you feed the reel into the right side, and it will be threaded and scanned and come out from the left
side into the basin-like catchment area.

(Correction from previous post, i found that the version of PSI sw is 2.4, which only supports C-41
color film, i have since downloaded the newer version 3 which supports b&w. )

here is a scan from yesterday,

Leica Minilux, Fuji Acros 100

 

[oceanpriest]

thanks for sharing raytoei

any issue with newton ring since the uncut roll won't be that flat? :think:

and how about autocrop for halfframe or xpan/horizon?

 

[Vittra]

Does it need dx coding on the film to work?

 

[raytoei]

ocean priest, dunno leh, haven't tested a uncut roll, but my tri-x (which curls) seem to scan okay.
i don't think it supports other formats (eg. half or xpan type)

vittra: version 2.4 of the psi sw works only with dx coding. i download the 3.0 version and it supports all types of negatives.

 

[raytoei]

Just a quick post, did 3 rolls today,
Uncut and it scanned all 36 frames in 4 mins
With about an additional minute to save the images
For each roll.

 

[co1d7usion]

Sounds tempting, thanks for sharing ray, mind to share the pictures?

 

[raytoei]

hi,

i shot the images with the leica minilux, so i presume it would be at f11 or f16.
they are unprocessed and out of the scanner, i am incuding 2 formats, TIF and JPG.
thanks

http://retro4.ms11.net/roll-b-hawkeye-minilux-AA004.jpg
http://retro4.ms11.net/roll-b-hawkeye-minilux-AA004.tif

raytoei

 

[li_gangyi]

I just went and looked at getting it shipped here. Ouch. It's almost the same price as the scanner itself.

 

[watzzup]

How is this comparable to Plustek scanner, is it the speed?

Or am i comparing apple and orange?

New to film and thinking of getting a scanner.

 

[raytoei]

this scanner scans whole uncut rolls in 4mins.
the ppi is only 2000, so a 36x24mm negative frame is only 6mp.
the plustek can scan much higher resolution.
google is your best friend.

 

[sweat100]

Heard that the new software allows the scanning of BW film. Can this scanner scan positive slide film?

 

[anerjee]

Bumping this one. Any updates from the people using it?

I'm thinking of getting one, but not sure how to go about getting windows xp ...

Any potential pitfalls ? I usually shoot c41 and traditional b&w most of the time.

 

[Anxin]

Read enough stories (sweet or horror) about this baby and decided to get one and try. So got one thru eBay. It took exactly 2 weeks to reach here.

I installed Windows XP Pro via bootcamp on my old MacBook. Follow the instructions to install the PSI F-X35 system software with no issue. Power up the scanner and plug in the USB cable, scanner detected and driver installed successfully. Start scanning a strip of 6 frames, it just works! and the result is beautiful.

Attached is one scan right out of the scanner(shot with a Rollei 35S, expired Kodak Gold 200 film).



The full size image can be viewed here: https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2949/15355408245_7a6f254cc0_o.jpg

All in all, I am very pleased with the performance and the speed of this scanner. Given its age however, I might just get another one as spare in case it dies on me.

Next thing: how to use the TLXClientDemo to do Xpan scan. Anyone knows how and willing to share?

 

[newghost]

:thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

I'm impressed with the scan!

 

[anerjee]

Yeah, I also pulled the trigger on this one. I've realised 2 things after a few weeks with the scanner. First, it is really awesome for colour negatives. I've rescanned about 50 rolls of colour negatives which I had scanned previously with my epson, and I'm surprised how much better colour I get from this scanner.

Secondly, the scans from this scanner upsize very nicely. I've tested upsized results from this scanner against my KM 5400. The KM is no doubt sharper, but not visibly or obviously so.

 

[SeAnCoLd]

Hello, I noticed a strong magenta cast on this picture and also in all my scans using this scanner. Are you also getting this magenta cast?

 

[Anxin]

Hello, I noticed a strong magenta cast on this picture and also in all my scans using this scanner. Are you also getting this magenta cast?

Don't know lehz... think it's film dependent (the film of the above pix is an expired Gold 200.)

This pix was shot on kodak Ektar film with an old CZ Biogon 21 lens. Warm late morning sunlight. (I remember there seems to have a color cast, but I saved the pix in tiff and converted it to JPEG in LS, so I might have used the grey tone picker, not sure.) Anyway, the Ektar (or is it the zeiss biogon lens?) depicts much saturated colors than what I saw.

(and I just notice that when downsized in flickr, the brightness & contrast of the image somehow got much reduced!?) nothing is real so to speak.

 

[anerjee]

Ektar is well known to have color casts if you over expose.