Review: Plustek Large Format Scanners 

Thanks! Glad you found it helpful!

Thanks.

I have certainly enjoyed my OpticPro-I hope you do too!

I'm glad you found it helpful. Best wishes on your scanning project!

@Michelle Reader-I'm so happy I was able to help you out with your research! I wish you all the best digitizing your photo books!

Thanks, Jen-I hope you enjoy the Plustek as much as I have!

Glad you found it helpful Maureen. It's probably the OpticPro A320E you're seeing at $549. It's mostly the same scanner, but with a top resolution of 800 dpi instead of 1600 dpi on the A320L. But for your albums it should be just fine.

Yes, it does sound like a good fit-all the best on your projects!

You're welcome!

Glad it was helpful!

That's what I would choose for artwork and paintings!

That's a very helpful observation Tysto. CCDs also deliver better color and do a much better job of picking up detail in dark areas of photos.

Thank you, holohulolo-you bring up some good points. And you're right, I've only tested it for flat photos and album pages. There are levels of perfection from "that's good enough" to the need for ultra precise perfection and duplication of art work, or, as you mentioned, photography. I'm personally about 3/4 of the way to the right on the spectrum from barely acceptable to perfection which has been satisfactory for me for the family photos and books I've scanned and created. Between a good scan and some Photoshop magic, most photos come to life, which is all I can ask of them!

Hi Timothy-the Plustek will either scan multiple images into one PDF-OR-it'll scan individual JPG images, so if you want both you're better off starting with the JPGs for creating books and then combining those JPGs into a single PDF using some other software or online solution. That's what Linda and I have done. She scans the pages into JPGs and then gives the JPGs to me. I have the Adobe Suite so I use Adobe Acrobat Pro to create two PDF versions, one with full resolution pages that could be printed in the future and one with reduced file size for sharing online. Both look great on a computer or online but one is higher quality in case you want to print it in the future. Which reminds me-there are printing companies online who can turn PDFs into a book, but I'm not an expert in that area! It's usually more for high end printing I believe.

@Susan Schall - For scanning the scrapbook pages I used 300 ppi because the pages are quite large anyway (12 x 12 inches) and 300 is the resolution they needed to be when I uploaded them to a Photo Book printing site. I couldn't be happier with the resulting book! For routine images I generally use 600 ppi unless I want to enlarge one a lot for some reason. But 300 ppi worked great for my pages and saved me time reducing the size after scanning.

@@FamilyHistoryHero Thank you! Very helpful information.

@@susan8schall You're welcome! Just wanted to also mention that if you have a different intention for scanning a photo book page, such as wanting to quickly scan all the photos on a page without having to remove them, you may want to choose a different resolution, such as 600 ppi, especially if any of the photos are small. I wouldn't, however, go below 300 ppi even if I planned to reduce the page size later.

Hi Martha-I haven't found the Plustek to be as good as my Epson flatbed scanner for black and white so it's a dilemma because using an Epson flatbed scanner for large 12x12 pages is beyond awful! You'll have to scan the pages in 4 sections and then stitch the sections together using software like Photoshop or Photoshop Elements. I've done it but I wouldn't want to do it with lots of pages. Makes me cringe just to think about it! BUT Epson is wonderful for photos. The Plustek doesn't have the ability to separate one scan with multiple photos while the Epson does...within limits. If you use the Thumbnail view it separates the photos into individual images that it will scan one after the other-but it works best on standard size photos like 3x5 and 4x6. And yes, it does have photo enhancement capability. So you will have to choose which capability is more important to you for at least the first go-around and then maybe later you can spring for the other computer.

@markreimer6538 I don't normally upgrade scanners unless there's something really new and different. I also know that Plustek changes the number on the name no matter what the change, large or small. It could just be a different screw! So I went to Plustek's website and started a chat: Me: Has anything significant changed since the Plustek Pro A320L? I have the A320L and have filmed a review of it that has reached a lot of people and now I'm being asked to review the A320E-which I don't plan to do but I'm curious to know if it's essentially any different than the one I have. Plustek: "Thank you for contacting Plustek Support. The A320E has a lower maximum DPI which is 800. That is the only significant difference." Back to you, Mark- Hope that helps-I'm guessing it's a little cheaper because of the lower maximum DPI but the quality will be the same. And you will RARELY need to use dpi bigger than 800 to get a fabulous scan. You only need more when you have tiny little pictures or slides that you need to greatly enlarge and that's not what this scanner is for. It's for average to large items.

Plustek has a very responsive tech support team. I would reach out to them and describe the issue you're having. They will be best equipped to help you with a solution.

@Mary Prior-No, the Plustek Optic Pro A320L scanner doesn't separate the photos automatically. If you want to select out the photos from the scan you would need to use a program like Photoshop or Photoshop Elements. I don't know of any high end scanners that do that. Photo apps can do that. Something else it doesn't have-at least in the Mac software-is the ability to pre-scan and click and drag a marquee around a photo so you only scan that one photo. One of my students who has Windows has that capability with the cheaper Plustek OpticSlim 1180 apparently, but I don't see an option for that on the Mac software for either version. (A company rep agreed that the Mac software could use some updating.) I have a regular flatbed Epson scanner I can use if I need to do that, but for larger scans, or smaller scans where you don't want to preview and select, the Optic Pro will do that automatically for you. So I find myself preferring to use the Optic Pro most of the time, even for smaller items. It saves me two steps.

@Mary Prior Yes-you can choose where you want to save the images and what program to view them in. I saved them to a folder on my computer and had them open in Photoshop for instant viewing. You can choose any program you want to open to view the finished scans so I would imagine Photos would an option, though I've never tried anything but Photoshop. I just left Photoshop open the whole time and looked at each scan briefly as it popped up.

Understood...it's a big financial commitment for sure. Regarding your question, I'll get in touch with you via email.

Great idea, that is a lot of money. If this is an option please include me in the discussion, thank you.

Is the pro scanner available to rent? I have searched near me and cannot find one to rent.

Thanks for your question about scanner settings. 12 x 12 album pages are fine to scan at 300 DPI, which will give you commercial printing quality at 100% size. You only need to use 600 DPI if you want to reproduce 24 x 24 inch pages. Scanning at 600 DPI won't really help your printing quality and will just make for much larger file sizes. If you have a photo on a scrapbook page that you want to enlarge you can do a scan of just that photo at a higher resolution. Use 600 DPI for double the size, 900 DPI for three times the size. I scan album pages to JPG format at 300 DPI, which works out to 1.5 to 4.5 MB per 12 x 12 page. Spare pages with white backgrounds will be smaller file sizes. If a page has a lot of color density, such as a saturated background paper, the pages can run upwards of 4 MB. At 300 DPI the scans happen pretty fast. With most of my albums I turned the scans into multi-page PDFs that are easier for family members to enjoy, and my three most important albums I combined and printed as book at Shutterfly. With pages scanned at 300 DPI the book turned out very well. I have my Plustek scanner settings in the PDF that’s linked below the video. Hope that helps.

Sorry I didn't see this until now. The Plustek doesn't turn individual photos on an album page into individual separate scans. It just scans the entire page. If I want an individual image I use Photoshop to select a copy to save separately or I rescan it if I want to enlarge it, for example

Hi Amy-the quality difference has nothing to do with the amount of dpi-as long as you scan at 300 ppi or above. You only need a higher ppi (dpi) when you want to enlarge a photo or scrapbook page without losing quality and with Creative Memory albums you generally don't need to increase the size-unless you have a small picture on a page that you want to enlarge. I scanned all my CM albums at 300 ppi and got excellent results. And if I wanted to enlarge an individual photo I rescanned just that photo at 600 or 900 ppi, depending on how large I wanted the photo to be. The quality of the scanner itself has to do with the image sensor in the scanner. A CCD sensor will give you better quality results than a CIS sensor. Were you able to see the difference in quality watching the video? I didn't change the dpi. The only difference was the image sensor. Often you can only know the kind of sensor you have by searching for it in the instructions document and scrolling down to the technical information way at the bottom. This document should be available online if you search for it. Hope that helps!

It hooks up to a computer. I'm not aware of a USB flash drive port on the scanner itself, but if the USB flash drive is connected to a computer and the scanner is connected to the same computer, you can send the scans directly to the USB flash drive.

@@FamilyHistoryHero Thank you for the reply; that's helpful. I really appreciate this video!

You might try scanning with and without the auto color correction option. I solved my color matching issues with the help of Plustek's excellent support staff and didn't end up with any issues related to Mac display calibration. I'd reach out to Plustek. They are very responsive and helpful.

@@FamilyHistoryHero I did reach out to them, and they suggested reinstallation of the software and then an older version of the software. They only offered suggestions for setting when I asked specifically. Their suggestion--Gamma 1.2, Brightness 15, and contrast of 35, affected all the other photos on the page. I did change software, but no luck. Reds stay burgundy!

I've never calibrated the display of my Mac but I did need to recalibrate my Plustek settings when I got a new Mac. The “updated” software wasn’t giving me the quality I was used to so I ended up trying the older software and it worked better. My settings are Brightness-0, Contrast-5, and Gamma 2.00 but this may not work for you. I also have “Apply Color Matching” checked in the list on the right. There are sometimes when unchecking “Apply Color Matching” works better-especially when there’s a lot of one color. But if you’re still having trouble I would ask the chat person to connect you with someone with more experience who can help you figure it out!

Congrats on getting a Plustek scanner! Here's what I said: Scanning pages with bulky embellishments is a bit tricky, especially if the page also contains glossy photos, though matte photos can be affected as well. Bulk on the page will raise the scanner lid slightly (or a lot depending on the embellishment size) allowing light to come through that will affect the final scan. That extra light is especially bad for glossy photos as it can create a small or large glare. The only way to get around it is to not use the scanner lid and instead cover the page with soft thick material like black felt or fleece that will drape over all the scanner edges to keep out extra light. Secure the material with a few heavy objects like a stapler on the outer edges It’s kind of a pain but it works and the Plustek OpticPro is best for larger 12x12 pages since you can get the entire page in one scan. I did have to spend an hour or two adjusting my settings, but that’s just part of the process for this kind of scanner. Once you get a good setting it should work on all the pages in the album. Here are the settings I ended up using: Apply Color Matching (lower right list) Other Settings: Brightness 0 Contrast -50 Gamma: 1.40 Threshold 128 Descreen None Another option is to photograph your pages using ambient indirect light that is warm enough. (Winter light isn’t great and will give your page a cold, or even slightly blue, tint.) If you’re a member of my class: My Digital Ancestor Box, I have a whole lesson on best practices for photographing memorabilia which would apply to scrapbook pages as well. Otherwise just experiment with indirect light from a window or even outside with indirect sunlight.

H @timothy790110-Your welcome! Regarding your question: I still have the original PlustekPro I reviewed in this video so I don't know if they've updated the instructions or not. I've recently added a few updates to the downloadable PDF to explain some quirkiness and how to handle it, so if you just downloaded it you have my latest version. All the best with your watercolor prints!

@@FamilyHistoryHero Thank you! I think i will either use Vuescan or Silverfast to control the scanner. They also give you greater control and you can get RAW images out of it!

@@FamilyHistoryHero I ended up returning the scanner. it was impossible to scan watercolor paper, it would blow out the white of the paper every time, no matter how much i fiddled witht he settings. shame.

@@timothy790110 Oh no! So sorry to hear it didn't work out for you! You probably need to take your art to a business dedicated to scanning fine art.

@@FamilyHistoryHero Yes its a shame as it would have been very convenient. Even with the higher rez that the 320L has, it wouldn't have worked. blue skies went more towards Purple. I ended up just taking photos with my sony a7r iv, and a color checker passport. bit more laborious butthe resolution is amazing and the colors are spot on. just a bit more faffing abut!

Yes, and the lid is removable.

Thank you

Scan them to JPG at 300 ppi resolution. Then you can upload the JPGs to an online printing site like Shutterfly or any other one and use their book building template to put each scan on a single page. They will print your book and mail it to you. You can order as many copies as you like.

@@FamilyHistoryHero I do not want to print them. I already have them that way. I want to keep them as files on computer to share in flip book style

Great question! First, I need to say that the Plustek isn’t my only scanner. I also use an Epson Perfection V600 and an Epson FastFoto 680w. The Plustek is my main tool for scanning oversized items and 12x12 album pages. As an example, I used the Plustek to digitize my old 12x12 Creative Memories albums. Most of those albums just got converted into PDFs for viewing on the computer. But three of those albums chronicled a 6-month trip our family took around the USA back in 1998. Our entire family loves those three albums, so I made them into a single photo book through PrestoPhoto and gave a copy to each of our kids. They turned out great! (I've also used Shutterfly, Chatbooks, and Printique. They all do a good job.) So, really, all of the above. I scan to print, I scan to make digital archives of photos/albums, and I scan to create photo books. Hope that helps!

Yes, the cheaper version is probably fine. You'll get a slight bit better quality for colors with the OpticPro A320L but as long as the art is good your scans should look good. And inside pages should be fine also. It does well on pages with black ink for the words and if you have art on some inside pages it'll be good as long as the art is good and doesn't have dark shadow areas.

@@FamilyHistoryHero I'm torn between the Plustek scanner and the Czur ET24 pro, which works differently. Have you ever tried this device? Thanks for answering me.

@@marcodambrosio1563 Unfortunately, no. I've seen pictures of it but I only review scanners I personally have and use. A quick Google search I did for reviews of that model came up with several review options which I didn't read but might be helpful for you. One problem is that books are notorious for being awkward and not lying flat like the image in the ad for the Czur ET24 pro shows! Do a search for how to make books lie flat and you'll get some ideas, including putting a pane of glass on top. You'll have to watch out for glare from the glass, however. For me a scanner with its heavy lid does a good job of holding my books flat-and I just scanned several books!

Hi Cyndi, with the A320L, which should have the same specs for page size as the A320E, I get the entire page. The OpticSlim, which is a less expensive model, cuts a sliver off.

@@FamilyHistoryHero Terrific, thanks!! I've been looking for a scanner that will do full scrapbook pages, so this may be my answer. It's a hard thing to find!

@@cyndimessick4671 I certainly found it to be the perfect answer to digitizing my 12x12 albums. If you get it I hope you enjoy it as much as I have!

If you're talking about scanning multiple photos in one scan and having the scanner separate them, yes and no. The Plustek doesn't separate multiple photos from one scan. But you can use Photoshop or Photoshop Elements to separate all the images for you with a click-the-button action. All you have to do is save each individual file. Also some flatbed scanners, like my Epson Perfection V600 can separate multiple photos on a single preview scan and scan each photo one after the other using the Thumbnail view. This works best for standard size photos like 3x5 or 4x6. There's also the option to feed photos through a scanner like the Epson FastFoto 380W, and that's even faster.

@@FamilyHistoryHero Thank you!

Hi Lisa, thanks for the question about cloud storage. There used to be some free options that included video, but as far as I am aware you're going to pay to store video in the cloud just about everywhere at this point. There are a variety of cloud storage options available. At this point Charlie and I both use Backblaze, which backs up our main hard drives as well as the external drives we designate for backup, all at a flat, affordable monthly or annual charge. This includes our photos and videos and has no data limit. You can learn more about Backblaze here: www.backblaze.com/cloud-backup.html#af9w7j

@@FamilyHistoryHero Awesome great I will check into that. I've watched several of your videos you'll see with my comments I appreciate all the input from you both.🤗

@@livelifelbw You're so welcome!

There's a small edge on both sides of the scanner glass so a small portion of one or both sides will go up over that edge. There's a cushioned pad in the lid, though, that holds the page in place, and I didn't find any detectible problem. It's slightly harder to position Creative Memory pages that have a stiff edge on both sides but the resulting scan has looked great to me. You could always cut off the two edges on each page, but I think that's overkill. I got great scans.

@@FamilyHistoryHero Thanks Linda. If you're satisfied I'm sure I would be too.

Lisa, did you go with the OS 1180? Were you satisfied with how your 12" pages turned out? Did you happen to make 12x12 photo books from these scans?

Plustek has great customer support. Reach out to them through the contact link on the Plustek website.

While I believe you are likely to get a good result, I have not specifically scanned original artwork, so I'm not in a good position to comment definitively on that.

@@FamilyHistoryHero Thanks for answering.) Because I use the Epson 550 which does very reliable scans.. At this price range given its size, it might be wishful thinking to expect the same type of quality.. Nevertheless it seems to do a very good job for home personal projects..