4.3 High-Volume Processing Tips

Scaling DustMagic from one folder to thousands of images. Three principles: tune cheap, batch big, verify smart.

Tune Cheap

Detection re-runs on every image as you arrow through. On a 100-megapixel scan that adds up. Use Detection Resolution to keep tuning fast.

Lower the Detection Resolution slider while you’re tuning settings on representative images. Output is always saved at full resolution — only detection runs at the lower res.
Once your profile is dialled in, raise Detection Resolution back to your scan’s native pixel dimensions for the actual batch run.

Process Batch shows progress and parallel core utilisation as it runs.

DustMagic uses every CPU core in parallel during Process Batch — there’s no thread setting to tune. To get the most out of this:

Group scans into folders by profile — same film stock, same era, same scanner. One profile per folder.
Process each folder in turn rather than mixing film types in one folder.
Run overnight or during work hours when the machine is otherwise free.

Sample, don’t open every file. Spot-check 5–10 random files from each batch — start, middle, end.
Use Mask Only (key 3). Faster than scrolling through cleaned images. False positives appear as repeating patterns across frames; clusters along edges suggest film holder marks rather than dust.
Check the _masks/ folder. If you spot a problem image, the mask is right there.

If a batch contains a few problem images, you don’t have to fix them all up front:

Press X on the current image to exclude it from Process Batch (red cross appears on the filmstrip).
Press S to include it again.
Right-click any filmstrip thumbnail to toggle exclusion.
Process the clean run, then come back to the excluded images and brush-edit them individually with Export This Image.

A workable layout for a 1000+ image archive:

Archive/Roll-001-Kodachrome/ — original scans
Archive/Roll-001-Kodachrome/cleaned/ — DustMagic output
Archive/Roll-001-Kodachrome/_masks/ — verification masks
One DustMagic profile per film stock or scanner setup, saved with a descriptive name.

DustMagic is CPU-bound. More cores = faster batches; clock speed matters less than you’d think.
16 GB RAM comfortably handles batches of 100+ MP scans.
SSDs help — slow disks become the bottleneck on very large folders.