The Olympus ES-10 SCSI The Olympus ES-10 was first released in May ’98 and is still a popular option for those who want to spend less than $400 for a quality film scanner that creates up to 11MB files. The basic specs are: $395 list price. Models available for both Mac (SCSI interface) and PC (parallel). Accommodates both 35mm and APS film format (APS adapter is optional). One pass scanning time is 5 seconds for preview and 30 seconds for max. resolution. 24-bit color depth. Maximum image size from 35mm is 2,400 x 1,600 pixels @1,770 dpi producing 11 MB file. APS files max out at 6.2 MB. Can read and write IX data for APS film. Lots of good software included. Using the ES-10 Setting up the unit to use for the Mac was simple-- plug it in to the SCSI port and load the software. I was scanning my first slide within 15 minutes. The ES-10S comes with both a standalone application (driver included) and a Photoshop plug-in. I prefer the plug-in, but the application works fine too. If you have a newer iMac, G3 Tower, G4 Tower, PowerBook 2000, or iBook, you don't have a SCSI port for this scanner. there are SCSI to USB adapters on the market, but I have been unable to get one to work with this device. On the other hand, this scanner does work great with older PowerMacs, and if you have one sitting around unused, adding this scanner makes a nifty digital workstation. The ES-10S uses an electronic manual focusing system that I prefer to autofocusing only. Having both focusing methods would be ideal, but would probably increase the cost. Once you focus the preview image, other adjustments can be made such as color balance, exposure, etc. All controls work well and enable you to make consistently good scans on the first try. Slides load easily one at a time in their nifty carrier. Negative strips, however, are more difficult to position in the carrier—a process that slowed down the scanning process considerably. Resulting images had good sharpness, midlevel color saturation and a somewhat narrow D-range. The narrow D-range will limit shadow and highlight detail on images containing a wide latitude of exposure. In most cases I’ve been able to adjust these types of pictures in PhotoShop to achieve good results, but this is a notable difference between this scanner and the more expensive units listed latter in this article. On average, I spend about 10 minutes preparing, scanning and saving each image. This is a reasonable rate for home and light office use, but would be unacceptable for heavy-duty commercial situations. Scanning APS film is faster because you can load and preview an entire roll at once. Overall I believe the Olympus ES-10S is a highly competent tool for web publishing, newsletters and print output images up to 5" x 8". I’ve printed images as large as 8" x 10" on an offset press with excellent results. Of course pictures for the Internet or lower other resolution applications can run even larger. The ES-10S is a particularly good value for its sub-$400 price tag. The compromises chosen to keep the price low were primarily convenience items such as autofocusing and batch loading. The only real performance tradeoff is the narrow D-range due to 24-bit color depth instead of 30-or 36-bit, and that has not presented any notable problems for my publishing adventures. Olympus ES-10 Scanner Page   D. Story, April 1999 Revised June 2000