Alpha -Going way back up to the top, it is an old Nikon LS-1000. I've done some surfing around the news groups, and found three or four people with exactly the same problem. It seems that it is a known problem with the LS-1000, and has been fixed in later models. Only really shows up when scanning fairly dense negatives (as with snow). For normal subjects it is not a problem. [BTW, the "noise" I've been seeing in the snowy foreground is NOT negative crud, but also a known problem with the old Nikon at the denser ranges.] I haven't figured out what I'm going to do about this. Maybe ignore the problem, as it only seems to occur at extreme ranges.