Nice product so far! thanks fence companies lakeland FL

None so far

The variety of formats that can be used with it (pretty much anything you can mount to a holder and shove into the hole in the front of the scanner). Software, though buggy, has many nice features. | Concrete Contractor

None so far

High quality scans
Easy to use software

if any, its an older model, so parts and service may be hard to come by.

Many reviewers slam this product for the film holder, the lines in the dark areas, and no detail in the highlights, but they do not understand the principles of scanning and perhaps of photography in general. I shoot 6 x 7 slide film, often with very contrasty images and every time I get a scan that I can use to get a perfect print. Yes, there is a lot of work in getting a print that matches a slide, but this is what you have to do, what photographers have always had to do.

The film holder works well, you dip a cotton bud in alchol, run it along the rubber on the grooves, then it will grip the film and you can pull it tight and flat. No problem. One of the clips broke off, so I used screws to pull the holder down onto the film. works fine.

I use the basic Nikon software that comes with it. If you get lines in the scan, go to fine mode - 3 times longer - big deal - you get a perfect scan. If you need detail in the dark areas, use 14 bit and 16x passover and you will get good detail. Dont use shaprening, curves (unless absolutely necessary, or any other settings except ICE) This gives you a high quality raw file that you then use in photoshop to get the best detail from.

If your film is so poorly exposed that you have a massive contrast between blacks and whites, you can always do 2 scans and layer them, one exposed for highlights, and one for shadows. Its no different to masking in a dark room.

I get sharp prints that look almost exactly the same as the slide films they are scanned off. Sometimes you have to work at it, just like getting a good neg in the first place, so dont slam something just because you dont know how to use it.

Samples of my scans are on www.coreyrankin.com

Customer Service

na

Similar Products Used:

Medium format flatbed scanners

-Top-quality scans
-dust and scratches less noticeable than flatbed
-excellent color and contrast with a minimum of post-processing
-professional build quality
-firewire for speedy transfer
-uses standard cables for power, firewire
-MUCH cheaper than anything like it (but not for long). The 9000's price is now skyrocketing out of sight.

-out of production, unlikely repair by Nikon
-expensive, though still a fraction of what a 9000 now goes for
-software unsupported by Nikon (other option exist, though)
-large, though footprint is no bigger than a flatbed

Even as I write this review in January, 2011, the Nikon Coolscan 8000 ED is still the best (probably the only) value for high-quality scans outside of expensive drum scans. Despite being years out of production, large, noisy, and slow, it still beats everything else for the money. But as the latest generation, the 9000, climbs past $4000 and even $6000, expect the 8000's value to rise as well. I wouldn't be surprised to see the 8000's price climb above $2000 fairly soon.

I can compare the 8000 to two other scanners: the Coolscan V, and the Epson V500.
The 8000 makes excellent 35mm scans, but not visibly better than the V. 35mm is noticeably better than the Epson flatbed, as expected. I primarily scan medium format film, and the Epson does a fairly good job, but it depends on the film: Tmax 400 II is a great scanning film and the Epson does a good job. However, the Nikon 8000 far surpasses the Epson when it comes to color. Straight out of the Nikon, both color negs and slides have excellent color and contrast, while the Epson produces very low-contrast files that only guess at the colors. Much tweaking of the Epson files is needed, and sometimes you just can't get the colors right. Also, the Nikon color scans produce very little noise, while the Epson color scans are full of noise. The 8000 scans, even without ICE, produce less in the way of dust and scratches. Because the Epson's files always need a contrast and sharpness boost, dust and scratches are emphasized.

The 8000 is certainly no speed demon, but let's face it: it's much faster than mailing out your valued negs to a service bureau (one of which sends them on to India...). And of course faster than darkroom work. It has a small amount of operating noise, but nothing too objectionable.

The film carriers are large and beefy, and put the Epson holders to shame (although the Epson holders do what they need to do). Many have said the glass MF holder is necessary--I'm still determining that. I have found that, contrary to the instructions and common wisdom, I get sharper scans with the emulsion side up in the supplied 120 holder.

The one weakness of using Nikon scanners in general (besides the possibility of no repair service) is the lack of reasonably-priced full-feature software. NIkon Scan, while it has the most control, especially for batch scanning, constantly crashes and is no longer supported. Silverfast is expensive. I have been using Vuescan, which is adequate, especially for the price, but the documentation is very thin, and many aspects about the program are cryptic.

The 8000 occupies a very narrow and specific niche. Who would want one?
Serious film photographers who want the best scans for the money, want to do it themselves, but for whom the 9000 is now out of range. Even at its current used price of $1500-2000, you only have to do a few hundred scans to pay for it. At this point, there is nothing left to replace the Nikon scanners. Get one before the price follows the 9000 into orbit.

Customer Service

not used

Similar Products Used:

Coolscan V
Epson V500

Plenty sharp enough for gallery prints! Scans are normally very accurate, colorwise. ICE works to remove scratches from film. Warranty work done well. 35mm and slide holders work well. Add-on glass holder is fabulous.

Lousy lousy 120mm tray holder. Very occasional banding (due to hot room?) Don't expect fast scans. Might need calibration after purchase. There is a bit of a learning curve. Masks are a teeny bit large, allowing light leaks to fog the scan at the edges.

The scanner is now the core of my fine art print business - I am a panoramic photographer who sells in galleries, and I have used this 6 months. Having had years of experience in the wet darkroom, I find that this scanner's output is quite close to reality, possibly even bringing out colors I had not seen before! I scan almost exclusively Widelux and 6x7 negs. The 35 mm and slide holders work great, however I just couldn't live with the lousy 120mm film holder they supplied. You just can't get the larger films flat for accurate focus, it's a very stupid disappointing device. Now, there was no holder for a 24x65mm Widelux neg either, so eventually I bought the $500 glass holder. What a difference! Now all my scans are sharp!!! And when using the glass holder, the software remembers my previous settings! It doesn't otherwise. And the glass holder comes with lots of masks. Before I bought this scanner, I had some of my multi-frame panoramas done on a drum. But my own scans on the 8000 are far far superior in capturing the tonal range, I suppose because I can adjust the software, and now I much prefer doing it myself and I laugh at drum scans. Digital ICE does not seem to take much longer, I don't know what people are talking about. Maybe it is due to my negative size and settings? I just go get a coffee and come back. Incidentally I scan 24x65 at 4000 dpi and the 6x7's at 2000 dpi because the Epson printer doesn't go higher than that realistically. If I ever scan at higher res, it is to get some extra color or shade detail in a difficult negative. Having tried the Hamrick Vuescan software, I have returned to the Nikon 3.1 scanning program. I like the digital ICE, it saves me hours in editing, trust me on that and don't believe the other reviews. The ICE output is smooth and clear. Haven't tried the GEM yet, I should - some of my Widelux negs are grainy (possibly because I took them to poor out-of-town film labs on my photo trips). I get very occasional banding, which seems to only occur during very hot days. I will keep checking that, and will try to keep my room cool. The tray eject motor quit after a month of use. I sent it back, they fixed it, recalibrated the lamp, and now it scans sharper than it did when I bought it. Perhaps if people are not getting totally sharp scans, get it calibrated under warranty if you can. My fine art prints are easily good enough for galleries, and I don't have to run an awkward wet darkroom anymore. If somebody orders a print, I can print from the scan without test printing first! I do caution people to download the lastest scanner driver if they run Windows XP. As far as desk space is concerned, yes it is bulky, but I simply spent $30 to put in a sliding tray under the countertop, and it is now completely out of the way!

Customer Service

Didn't try calling. Warranty repair went well. Took awhile, but I would rather have it right than rushed.

Similar Products Used:

Epson Perfection 2450 (useless fuzzy junk)

What's not to love about it?

Documentation. There are too many features you simply have to play with for yourself. I run a photography business, I don't have time to play with features. I really need straight forward information from the start.

I don't want to rehash what everybody else says about the scanner. I have had it from around the first few months of it's introduction. Overall, I am beyond impressed with it. On the otherhand, the documentation on the scanner is very poor. One thing that helps is Nikon's website www.nikoncoolscan.com. If you are scanning low contrast items, do yourself a favor and test a scan a one pass, and another at 8 or 16 passes. One thing you will notice is that there is lot less noise in the blue channel. Overall, it's a great scanner, and a great investment.

Wide range of tones

The Nikon is not sharper than the canon FS4000.

I have compared my images scanned from the Canon FS4000 and the Nikon 8000 scanners; I find that while the canon was just a tad sharper ( with less shimmering around edges) it was also very contrasty at the highlights compared to the Nikon. The nikon was able to hold highlight details and had quite a wide tonal range on my white petals daisy, while the canon totally lost the highlight (white). On the Canon, Anything that was white was just pure white with no details. The nikon in the end was able to produce a very nice extended range of tones when the canon simply could not capture the extreme ends, especially the brighter end of the spectrum. Pity about the Nikon''s ED lens which was less sharp than the Canon. I had expected it to be quite good being that its an ED lens. I also think I detected some softness at the edges - There could also be some truth in that the edges are also a touch soft. In conclusion, while the canon was sharper, I don''t think I could have lived with it losing details in the highlights, so I would have chosen the nikon for its greater tonal ranges. PS: I would like to have seen what the Minolta 4800 dpi new scanner could do. Heard it was very good.

Similar Products Used:

Canon FS4000

Clear, vivid scans. Digital ICE, ROC, and GEM really do what they''re supposed to (on color, at least). The variety of formats that can be used with it (pretty much anything you can mount to a holder and shove into the hole in the front of the scanner). Software, though buggy, has many nice features.

SLOW. ICE, ROC, and GEM don''t work with black and white. It''s big and heavy...have plenty of room set aside for it. :)

I''ve had my hand on a fair few models and brands of desktop film scanners, and, I have to say, this is by far the best one I''ve used yet. (I''m sure the 4000 ED would offer the same results if all you do is 35mm or smaller) It IS rather slow to scan, especially on medium format with all options turned on. I''m using it on a PowerMac G4 850MHz dual CPU with 1.5gigs of RAM, so it''s not the computer that gets bogged down when trying to run the scanner...the scanner and software themselves are just slow when handling such complex algorithms (it''s always about all the algorithms used to process information). It took, from sticking the film in the scanner to saving it, roughly an hour-and-a-half to scan a 6x7 at 4000dpi, single pass, 8-bit color depth, with Digital ICE, ROC, and GEM turned on (just wish these things worked with black and white...they''re supposed to, but trust me, they don''t). Of course, I can''t knock the filesize...this is unavoidable with images as large as this scanner is capable of producing. However, since I don''t have the possible tens of thousands of dollars it would cost to buy a drum scanner, I can''t really knock the speed either. The color reproduction of this little workhorse (and it does work hard, make no mistake) is really very impressive, as well as its clarity, especially when you consider it costs less than $3,000.00. The software could use some revamping, but I''ve seen worse. It at least offers Curves...something most other companies don''t provide with the software for their scanners. This is a very handy tool (just wish they''d implement a multi-channel curves tool for adjustment of each individual color channel, but Photoshop''s works fine too, so this isn''t a big deal). Overall, I''d say that if you''re tired of spending $25.00 or more per medium format scan and having to wait upwards of a week to have them done, then you''ll be happy with this scanner. It works PLENTY fast for 35mm film and smaller, and if that''s all you do, then, again, get to 4000 ED and save yourself another grand or more. So, given its abilities, I''d have to say I do recommend this scanner to anyone who''s serious about being able to control every aspect of reproduction of their valuable slides and negs. It just requires a little patience, which is far more affordable to most than the more costly drum scanners would be. :)

Customer Service

Haven''t had to use it yet.

Similar Products Used:

Nikon LS2000, Coolscan IV, Canoscan FS2710, Polaroid SprintScan

good quality, quieter than the polaroid, ice is great but takes too long.

not that quick, fiddly med.format holder,Black and white film seems to be grainier .

I have had the 8000 for 4 months or so and so far am pretty impressed with the general quality, it can be a bit soft if you dont load the med.film in accurately, but when its sharp its good.definately not up to drum scan quality but what do you expect for the price. I recently ''risked''supplying a ''hi res'' (70mg) file for a front cover of a magazine and the (talent shot) image came up really well. Colour management is the only issue, as with any in house scanner....but works great with my A3 epson -

Customer Service

My store in melbourne were great at first, no contact with Nikon.

Similar Products Used:

polaroid med format scanner

Easy to install and use; the Nikon software is easy to learn. I''m happy with the quality of scans (exclusively 4000dpi, 14bit) thus far.

Not super fast, esp. with 6x7 and ICE. I''ve yet to do a 6x7 with ICE and multi-sampling -- I think it will take an evening.

This is my first scanner; I''ve wanted it ever since it was announced earlier this year, because it was the first scanner on the market which offered 35mm and 6x7 at high res. However, the high cost, and the reported problems with the 3.0/3.1 software, caused me to wait a while. Eventually I took the plunge, and I''m very glad I did. It cost 2,400 UK pounds from Digital First in the UK. I''m using a 500MHz Pentium III, 768Mb RAM, 40Gb drive, Windows 2000. Installing the Firewire card was straightforward, ditto for the software. The scanner worked first time, and issues have been few. The 3.1 software reported a fault once; cause unknown. With a Velvia slide, autodetect of media erroneously evaluated it as Color neg. One slide scanned with poor focus; a rescan solved it. In short, I''m pleased with this purchase, and am looking forward to delving into my archives for the good images I never did anything with.

Customer Service

Not used.

Similar Products Used:

None.