Review on Plustek OpticFilm 8200i SE Film and Slide Scanner | 7200 DPI, 48-bit Output | Infrared Dust and Scratch Removal | Silverfast SE Plus 8.8 Bundle | Mac and PC Support by Lonnie Batch

It took me a long time to realize that this scanner is technically completely outdated. But I recently bought a Canon 9000F Mk2 as a flatbed scanner for reflective materials (I'm a designer) and I tried the transparency/film tray function. I've always wondered why the Plustek is so bad at rendering dark backgrounds (even if they're dense, of course, but quite detailed). Very high resolution (4800 ppi) and TIFF format for maximum image integrity do not help. But I found it just as good as scanning film. Well, it definitely isn't. I compared the results to a complex (high contrast, dark background) but beautiful slide. Plustek produced a 4800ppi 90MB TIFF, while Canon at 4800ppi in JPEG (maximum quality) produced an image of only 5.3MB... aberrations in JPEG at very, very large gain. But the background was completely different. In the Plustek TIFF the noise was very strong, the detail quality was dismal and the overall color balance was way off with an ugly red cast, while the small JPEG from a Canon flatbed scanner had much better detail and less noise. , and only slightly distorted colors. If we add to this rather sad image (no pun intended) the fact that the Silverfast software bundled with Plustek is overly complicated and in many ways counter-intuitive (although the Scangear bundle - the high-performance scanner option that comes with Canon's drivers - it's also not for beginners), the verdict is simple: save. No problem: scan films on a new generation flatbed(!) scanner, it's cheaper, with better results, faster and with a much smaller file size. And I'm not even a fan of Canon: all my professional photo gear is from Olympus...