HI, everybody! Since there still appears to be some interest in getting the highest resolution scans from a Scan Multi, here is a report on my first prototype Universal Holder. The idea is to be able to scan a 6x6 or 6x9 cm image in three swaths, and stitch thes swaths together in software to make one large (I'm not kidding!!!) file. I wrote this at work, after doing the procedure last night, so my dimensions may be inaccurate, but I think they are ok, for the most part. Please read the WHOLE procedure BEFORE trying this on your precious MF holder!!!!!! >>>start disclaimer<<< Quick and dirty procedure for making UH-M1 equivalent using standard Medium Format film holder MH-M1 with Dimage Scan Multi II scanner. Please don't break your holder and hold me responsible as I am very irresponsible (and poor, did I mention poor? ;-) ) I have performed the following dissasembly of my MF carier/holder several times and gotten it back together again without breaking anything, so you should also be able to do this. If you are clumsy, faint of heart or just can't afford to be without your MF holder... save your money for the real UH-M1. In any case, please read on! >>>> end disclaimer<<< I wanted to experiment with scanning my MF negatives at the highest resolution possible. As the Scan Multi II software (as well as Ed Hamrick's Vuescan) allows the Scan Multi to scan the center portion of a Medium Format image at the maximum resolution of 2880 dpi, I wanted to try it. Unfortunately, the Universal Holder which I believe is supposed to allow this technique costs WAY too much for me (especially after buying the scanner itself!!). I decided to try making my own Universal Holder using nothing but my ingenuity and Duct Tape! I'm kidding about the duct tape, by the way! :-) After close examination of the medium format holder, I saw that the actual film holder portion can be removed from the carrier. I mean the part that has the glass in it as the holder, and the overall rectangular part that the holder fits into, the carrier. First, I carefully removed the hinge pin from the ... uhhh...hinge that connects the lid to the base of the holder. The pin has a liitle "handle" on the side that is held down by a piece molded into the film holder bottom. You must push it forward and rotate it free of the molded piece. This pin is spring-loaded so don't let it fly across the room or hit you in the eye... I have no insurance for that kind of thing!!! ;-) Carefully find the pin before the cat does, and place it with the lid someplace safe so that the anti-newton glass isn't damaged. Next, loosen the thumbscrew that holds the film holder portion in alignment. It is now free to rotate in the carrier. The thumbscrew is captive, so don't try to remove it completely!!! Carefully rotate the film holder while examining it from the backside. See that there are three tabs on the holder that correspond to three notches on the carrier. Rotate the holder in the carrier so that the tabs match up with their notches and CAREFULLY push the holder up and out. DON'T press on the glass!!! Press on the plastic that surrounds the glass. I'm not responsible, remember? ;-) Ok. Now that the bottom of the actual film holder has been removed from the carrier, place it carefully with the lid and the hinge pin. You DID find your hinge pin, didn't you? ;-) You now have a one piece plastic carrier with a big irregular hole in it. Now what? Screw the thumb screw back down so that the top of the screw is once again flush with the film carrier You need to have a flat surface for the film to rest on during scanning, and it needs to have a window for the scanner to look through and scan a swath 25mm wide across the center of the film carrier. I measured my carrier and found it to be 10.4cm between the edge rails. (Make your own measurements, as I am writing this from memory!) I took a sheet of mostly opaque plastic (a plastic "for sale" sign I purchased at Wal Mart for $1.50 or so) I used a stainless steel ruler to measure a 10.4cm wide strip from the edge of the sign. After scribing this line 10.4cm from the edge, I used a very sharp single edged razor blade (please don't cut yourself!!!) to cut this 10.4cm wide strip from the sign. I laid this strip into the top of the film carrier to be sure it fit properly (It did!!!) The strip I cut was too long for the carrier, so I cut it in half. It now fit entirely within the film carrier, with very little play. Now comes the tricky part. Hold the plastic in the carrier with one hand pushed all the way to the leading edge of the carrier. Using a magic marker, draw the outline of the hole in the film carrier on the plastic. Take the plastic that you just drew on out of the carrier. Using your ruler and pen, draw a line down the center line of the plastic, especially within the outline of the carrier hole. This should be located 5.2cm from either edge of the plastic. Again, using your ruler, Draw two lines parallel to the centerline, each at a distance of about 12.5mm on either side of the center line. These will guide your razor blade to cut out a 25mm wide strip from the center of the plastic. Similarly draw a line perpindicular to the centerline at the font end of the region you marked with the magic marker through the hole in the carrier. Make another line, perpindicular to the centerline, located about 9cm back from the first perpindicular line. Once again, the purpose of drawing this box is to allow you to carefully cut out a 25mm wide by 90mm long window in the plastic sheet. After cutting out the window, replace the plastic sheet in the carrier and observe that the entire window is visible through the hole in the carrier, and it looks well centered. If this is the case, place the leftover half of the plastic sheet directly over the sheet you just cut the window in, and push them both as far forward in the carrier as possible. Again, with one hand, hold the two plastic sheets together, while marking the uncut sheet throught the 2.5 x9cm hole you just cut. Use the box you just drew on the uncut sheet to cut a slightly bigger (by a couple of mm-- this one isn't critical) window in the uncut sheet. Now you have a bottom sheet and a top sheet, both with windows that would allow you to see a 2.5 x 9 cm portion of a negative if one were placed between the sheets. AhHa!!! we now have a universal holder. I placed a negative on top of the bottom sheet and aligned it so that the edge of the image area lined up with the edge of the window. With small pieces of masking tape, I secured the corners of the film strip so that the film stayed in place. I placed the top sheet on top of the film , and with a couple of pieces of lead sheet that I had leftover from my college days in Biology, placed on top of the top sheet to hold it down and flat, I placed this assembly into the scanner, and preivew scanned a 25mm wide strip of the left side of my negative. I turned off auto exposure in Viewscan at this point, and did a real scan at 2880 dpi. I then readjusted the negative in the carrier to scan the center portion of the film. I used a small stainless steel ruler as a guide to place the negative as straight in the window as possible, taped the film corners back down, replaced the cover and weights and did a scan of the center portion of the negative. I repeated the above process, aligning the edge of the image with the edge of the window again (the other edge this time) and scanned the right side of the image. I then did a quick and dirty stiching job in Photoshop (the dust that has been a constant irritation to me actually comes in handy as I was able to use some of the fixed dust specks to precisely align the image strips for stitching purposes. I had a problem with the color balance between two of the strips, but I was able to stitch the images together into a 240Mb file!!! (lots of paging going on, as I only have 256Mb RAM! This was only a first attempt at doing this, and I'm sure as I refine the film holder concept and add ways of keeping the center of scan parallel between scans, I'll actually get good at this. Not all my images are worth the bother, but it's nice to know that this can be done!!! Oh, yes, you may want to reassemble the MH-M1 holder to it's original condition! Remove the plastic insert sheets that you just made and store them somewhere safe. Loosen the thumb screw again, so that you can replace the film holder bottom by sliding it under the thumbscrew. Rotate the holder bottom so that the tabs once again line up with the notches. CAREFULLY press the holder bottom back into the carrier and be sure that all the tabs are in place and visible under the carrier, and that the holder bottom rotates freely in the carrier as it did before. Place the lid back in place and push the hinge pin back into the hinge, and against the spring pressure, lock it's little handle under the latch on the film holder bottom, like it was to start! At this point, you should be back where you started from, with a new ability to do high resolution scans of your MF images! I'd purchase a spare MH-M1 if I were going to do alot of this kind of scanning, so that I don't have to mess with my only MF holder. At around $80 it's alot cheaper than a UH-M1, I think!! I hope this helps and gives you some ideas to improve upon what I did!!!! (please share these ideas!!!!) Guy Clark
