Software for Nikon Super Coolscan 5000 ED slide/film scanner

Thanks for this.  From other things I have seen, I had suspected that it was indeed possible to use Nikon Scan in Windows 10, a matter of convincing it to accept a modified driver.  I'd be very interested in learning more about that.

I have been a "Nikon photographer" since 1970, when I arrived in Saudi Arabia as the first environmental scientist there.  I still have 2 of the 4 Nikon F2AS cameras I used back then.  It was all Kodachrome, mostly K25 but sometimes (especially for underwater work, I had a Swiss made underwater housing for my Nikon F2s, and also 4 Nikonos underwater cameras) I used K64.  I went through a big freezer full of Kodachrome each year.

Now it is all digital (still Nikon, too much invested in lenses to change brands even if I wanted to) but digital and film are really two different media and b/w is different again.  Most of my best work (my opinion <G>) has been in black and white (and doing all my own darkroom work).  Long ago now -  I started photography at age 15 with a 1925 vintage Leica my father brought back from Germany.

The Nikon 5000 ED scanner I have was purchased new from B&H in New York.  I think it was the last one they had in stock.  I used it for a while, then complicated life events intervened, and now several years later I am trying to resuscitate it.  As noted in an earlier post, I think there is a mechanical problem, probably a dirty mirror.  I am now recovering from a recent, not very pleasant brush with heart disease and don't yet trust my ability to take the scanner apart and clean the mirror.  Soon, I hope.

Recently several vendors have appeared on eBay offering to service/repair the Nikon scanners at prices varying from reasonable to high.  Replacement units still sell for up to more than double the original list price.  I am tempted to give one of the repair vendors a try.  Any comments?

I've installed the free version of vuescan that installe dthe drivers to recognize the scanner and then installed the Nikon's original software v. 403 WITHOUT installing the nikon's drivers

It worked to me and I can use the original nikon software in windows 10

I know it's been a few months since the original post.

 

I just picked up the same scanner.  Aside from your thread, I've been researching best practices for using the Nikon Scan software.

 

I'm posting to let you know that Nikon Scan can be operated in Windows 10.  There are a few places online that guide one through the process, and it is essentially the same process that made the scanner work in Windows 7.  

 

In terms of your original question, I think the software choice depends.  I am using the scanner to archive all my parents' slides (and then I'll do this for my own negatives).  My primary goal is to get archive copies of negatives, and from what I can see the Nikon Scan software will be good enough.  Vuescan doesn't seem to use the DigitalIce features to the full extant but rather developed their own feature that serves a similar purpose, and Silverfast is quite expensive. 

 

Of course the Nikon Scan software is outdated, but so is the 5000 ED.  I'm ok with it.  I primarily work with digital cameras now, and I figure I can use Lightroom faster to correct images once they are scanned than spend too much time with the scanner software.  I am hopeful I'll get a preferred settings worked out that I can generally use moving forward.

 

But I digressed.  I have Windows 10, and I am using Nikon Scan successfully with a tweaked version of the original driver's inf file.

Hello , I'm using the same scanner too with nikon software on windows 10 but the scanning seems to suffer from some "noise" . Is it the same to you or did you find a way to limit that issue ?

thanks

QUESTION FOR ORIGINAL POSTER... I have just begum using this unit (bought new many many years ago) for color slides and find that the scanned images are quite poor compared to the slides. They are darker, less colorful, and less contrasty. I can correct some of this in the software provided, but I don't think I should have to. I expected to put the slide in, hit scan, and have the image be true-to-slide. I would GREATLY appreciate any insights you would be willing to offer. Have you sound the resulting scans to be good without massive correction? Thank you very much!

Marc

glaucus@earthlink.net

Apologies for having left this so long unanswered.  I bought my scanner new when it was still current (walked out of the B&H store in NYC with the last one they had in stock).  Used it to scan 400-odd slides, then life intervened in various ways and the scanner sat unused for years.  Now it needs at least cleaning, and perhaps an overhaul.  I will have more to relate when I get it back from the overhaul.

All the slides I did scan back then were Kodachrome (mostly K25, some K64).  Some of them shot under harsh sunlight conditions in the Saudi Arabian desert.  I was able to get very satisfactory scans but in a few cases had to do a bit of tinkering in the Nikon software.  At one point we were camped in a red sand district and the color of the sand (in the slides) changed dramatically as the light changed at different times of day.  I was photographing falconry action, bucketing across rough ground at 80 mph in a Range Rover with 4 cameras strapped on, a different lens on each (falconry action is far, fast and furious and there's no time to change lenses).  I was also doing the driving, the action is so fast and furious there's no time to explain to a second person where you need to be at each moment.  After three months of that the cameras looked quite battered - but Nikon AG in Switzerland restored them to as-new condition, I don't know how.

In a few cases I recorded the scanning tweaks in the name of the resulting scanned image.  Here are a couple of samples:

"My tent 34B04 with DEE, shadow 75, gamma +2.20 full auto adjust crop" (the best of 6 scans with different tweaks)

"My tent 34B09 with DEE, shadow 75, ICE crop" (best of 3 scans)

These are two shots of my tent, with me in front of it in full Arab dress, taken at different times on the same day, requiring somewhat different tweaks to make the sand color even approximately match.  Actually to make the rest of the picture (tent, falcons, myself, etc.) approximately match - the sand color still looks different in the two shots -- taken maybe half an hour apart in the late afternoon, when light conditions change very rapidly.

These are 35mm Kodachrome slides, scanned at 4000 dpi, giving images only slightly smaller in pixel count (5782 x 3946) than the digital images I now shoot (6016 x 4016) with a Nikon D600 digital SLR.  Not much difference in image quality either.  Fine for at least 16" x 20" salon-quality enlargements.

Actually those two were the most troublesome of the 421 scans (only a few sets of multiples) of my Saudi Arabian material (only about 35,000 still left to do).  Nearly all of them came out well on the first pass.

So the short answer is no, I did not experience that kind of problem - but I also did not expect everything to come out "correct" (whatever that is) without a bit of tinkering.  It may also be relevant that all my originals were Kodachrome.  Kodachrome has its own distinctive characteristics, and other slide films may behave somewhat differently when it comes to being scanned.

When I get my scanner back, and tackle a wider range of subject matter, I may well have more to say on this topic.  I do not consider myself any kind of expert on slide scanning.