RetroScan Universal Operating Question

[Mack]

This is my first time posting here, but I wanted to ask those of you who might have experience with the RetroScan Universal. I have had mine for a couple of weeks now and love it. It is much nicer to me than my WorkPrinterHD, but both machines are still fantastic. However, there are a few things that I am still struggling with and frankly, it is due to a lack of experience. I wanted to see if someone here could offer advice.

1. Most of my scans come out fine. However, I do have a series of films that have (for lack of a better term), junk in the frame lines that I can't get out. If I adjust the length of the tube to crop in around it, I lose a good portion of the detail. How do you deal with this?

Airplane Shot.png

2. I also have moments where it is obvious that the sensor isn't adjusted just right and I get a frame line in the middle of the shot. If it is just one frame, I can delete it in my NLE and it is usually not noticeable. If it happens for more than a few frames, then how do you deal with it? "If" I can get the sensor set for these particular frames, I "may" get it better, then it jumps to the next scene and I get frame line junk from the top. Do you capture this scene by scene and edit it together, or am I not being aggressive enough with the sensor knob?

Baby Shot.png

Stoller Shot.png

Thanks for your time.

[Andreas Wideroe]

Hi Mack and welcome to the Filmshooting forums!

What you are seeing (I'm pretty sure) is hair or dust in the cameragate that has blocked the light when passing through the lens and onto the film. This causes an exposed hair/dustparticle on the film like you see. You can't get it away unless you want to do some magic with some software.

If you look very closely on the originals, you will see this hair/dust as tiny line on the bottom of the filmframe.

This is the reason cleaning the cameragate before putting in a new film is so important.

Btw, I have seen much worse than this.

/Andreas

[milesandjules]

I usually frame it a bit wider so i can see the edges of the film and adjust the height and sides if needed then just crop in post- if client wants it in widescreen i just put a black mask over the sides to hide any edges

[Nate Williams]

Are you using the stabilization feature of the RetroScan software? Try turning that off if you are having trouble with random jumpy frames.

[Mack]

Thank you so much for the replies....I really appreciate them.

I have cleaned everything really well and still have those issues. The film has been pretty thoroughly too.

I may start capturing mine with a wider frame and just applying a mask as well.

I don't see a stabilization feature in the settings. I don't have any grain reduction set and I am capturing compressed. I don't see any other place to select a stabilization setting. Am I missing something?

Thanks

[MovieStuff]

The Universal software has no image stabilization. If you're having any problems or just have questions, please feel free to contact me. moviestuff@swtexas.net or call me at 830-966-4664

Roger

[Nate Williams]

My apologies. I recall there used to be a stabilization feature in an older version but I'm not familiar with the latest version of the retroscan software. I use a modified version of the FlyCapture2 software with my Retro these days.

[Tscan]

If I ever get intermittent flicker, it's only on certain films that are always older. I attribute it to artifacts or heavy wear around the perfs. Dialing down the sensor can help.

[Mack]

I am curious why you use FlyCapture instead of the native Retroscan software?

[Nate Williams]

I use Flycapture2 for various reasons. The Retroscan software (at the time) didn't provide functionality that I wanted so I wrote some of my own software to process the individual frames. However, it sounds like Retroscan is evolving and I may have to re-visit it eventually.

[TimelessMomentsLtd]

I have cleaned everything really well and still have those issues. The film has been pretty thoroughly too.

Cleaning your system will not remove the dirt shown if it was in the original camera gate, it's as much a part of the image as the people and objects in the film.