appeal of film over digital?

[Jonathan R]

Okay, since this has devolved into a circular argument, I decided to go back to the beginning to try and give my answer to the original post.

I don't like one medium over the other, except when the technical abilities of one or the other call for using that medium at that time. I like them both and use both with the mindset that I am after the best image I can get from the situation. Having used film only for many decades one would think I'd be biased towards that way more than digital, but oh contraire, mon ami.

It's the same arguments that have been dredged up over the years over what film format is the best, whether or not b&w is better than color, which camera/lens is the best. It's no different than declaring that watercolor painting is far superior to acrylics, or that stone is better than wood for sculpting. If you are satisfied with the finished image portraying what your vision was when you decided to make/capture it, then there is no reason to doubt that the way you produced that image is somehow deficient. In the end, it is all in the eyes of the beholder whether it holds up to scrutiny or not. All the great artists over the centuries have had their fair share of detractors. Some worked in only one medium, while others used multiple methods of creation to convey their imagery to the public. And yet, they still had to suffer the slings and arrows of criticism.

I say it doesn't matter how you got to where you did in your journey to present your vision to the masses, unless I want to find out how you did it so I can emulate it.

PF

I wouldn’t argue with any of that. Well said.

 

[Erik van Straten]

gelatin silver print (elmar 50mm f3.5) leica 1a (1928)

Amsterdam, 2019

 

[Guth]

Q: Appeal of film over digital?

A: I already have more than enough digital technology in my life as it is, so I achieve some balance by embracing analog things like playing acoustic guitar, writing with a manual typewriter, driving a car with a manual transmission, and of course taking pictures with a film camera. Not only do these things require some thought, focus, or awareness on my part, but they also require a certain amount of physical interaction that I happen to enjoy. So I would say that I prefer using film cameras rather than digital cameras and this is not unlike other aspects of my life.

Yet I do make use of the digital camera in my smartphone as it is always with me and I don’t carry my film cameras with me as nearly much as I should. And I’m all for others using whatever makes them happy. I don’t wish to only view images originally captured on film. When looking at the images posted by others here on RFF, I do not concern myself with the gear used unless a person has gone to some effort to point this out. What I might consider to be a good image rarely has anything to do with the medium used.

Sadly, it feels like we have almost reached the point where the only way a person can prove that an image was not AI generated is by producing the associated film negative/positive.

 

[Godfrey]

Hmm. I have/use plenty of technology in my life, I don't really differentiate it into digital vs analog. Why would/should I do that? 🤔

G

 

[Retro-Grouch]

Hmm. I have/use plenty of technology in my life, I don't really differentiate it into digital vs analog. Why would/should I do that? 🤔

G

Much of the digital world depends on some combination of buttons and screens, and, to me, it all starts to feel the same. Analog can be a very different user experience, and largely is in photography. Guth has touched on what is probably fundamental to me in my preference for film: a more direct connection to process. And while that has no immediate relationship with the final image, it's one of the things that makes me want to go out and make images in the first place.

 

[Guth]

Hmm. I have/use plenty of technology in my life, I don't really differentiate it into digital vs analog. Why would/should I do that? 🤔

G

You do you.

 

[Godfrey]

Much of the digital world depends on some combination of buttons and screens, and, to me, it all starts to feel the same. Analog can be a very different user experience, and largely is in photography. Guth has touched on what is probably fundamental to me in my preference for film: a more direct connection to process. And while that has no immediate relationship with the final image, it's one of the things that makes me want to go out and make images in the first place.

That's all UI concern. Much of the function in my 2006 Mercedes is controlled by digital computing devices, but the operational UI remains so similar to that of my 1967 Lancia (which has only ONE electronic component in it) that it points to the notion that camera UI designers are, by and large, not really adopting the best design notions ... probably for reasons of development/manufacturing cost.

The best digital control implementation should feel and operate no differently than the best analog control implementation. There's really no need to make a digital camera a mass of buttons and menus... Currently, Leica's engineers and designers seem to understand this better than most others, one of the reasons I spend the outrageous money to use Leica Ms.

I feel no greater connection to process when I'm shooting, processing, and scanning film than when I'm rendering digital images. The film process is, if anything, more tedious and boring, and more work. I continue to shoot film because there are niceties about some of the film cameras I own that appeal to me, and there are aesthetic qualities I can achieve with film that take more work to achieve with digital capture. And then there are capabilities that allow me to do things with digital capture that are nigh on impossible to achieve with film capture.

Use whichever makes the satisfying image that you seek, and don't be dogmatic about it ... that's my guideline.

G

 

[JohnGellings]

What about film / digital photography vs AI? That seems more relevant these days. I mean, even Aperture magazine keeps having AI articles. To me, at least digital cameras are still cameras and feel like cameras. Infinitely more fun that using text prompts, for me at least.

 

[santino]

What about film / digital photography vs AI? That seems more relevant these days. I mean, even Aperture magazine keeps having AI articles. To me, at least digital cameras are still cameras and feel like cameras. Infinitely more fun that using text prompts, for me at least.

Exactly!

And here film kicks in. A real, physical negative/slide is much more evidence than a digital file (since AI can generate images).

 

[joe bosak]

Ah yes - "The appeal of AI over using a camera". After all, what is an image? What is a photograph? Is a photograph any different from any other jpeg? What is truth? Does not perception mediate our understanding of the world? Are we not entitled to our opinions on what is a fact, on what words mean? Surely we see with the mind's lens, and the camera is our perception? Are not the semantics of the past a form of repression perpetrated by our forbears to control our future? Are we all not minorities in a sea of other people's whimsy? Who is anyone to validate anything anyone else might think? What is meaning?

 

[Jonathan R]

Are not the semantics of the past a form of repression perpetrated by our forbears to control our future? Are we all not minorities in a sea of other people's whimsy?

Crikey! If it comes to that, are we not all isopods in the rotting wood of existence?

 

[Godfrey]

What about film / digital photography vs AI? That seems more relevant these days. I mean, even Aperture magazine keeps having AI articles. To me, at least digital cameras are still cameras and feel like cameras. Infinitely more fun that using text prompts, for me at least.

For me, this dividing line is very simply drawn: Photography is the process of capturing light to form an image. Images created by instructing AI what to assemble is NOT "the process of capturing light to form an image." It is more akin to painting with a fancy brush, creating Computer Generated Images. So, for me, there is absolutely nothing to "film/digital photograpy vs AI" at all: they are two entirely different ways to create an image.

This is not to say that AI-based tools to use in the rendering process of a photograph are irrelevant or verboten. Just like digital image processing itself, such tools can improve photographs and save time and effort in doing so. The key to tools of this sort that are valid is that they don't create anything, they serve to enhance what you've created by capturing light. One simple example is the latest revisions of Lightroom which include an "AI denoise" tool. This is a tool which can do an excellent job of reducing noise in an image by adaptively recognizing, segregating, and removing noise generated by the capture medium itself, leaving a cleaner recording of captured light, as opposed to creating the image by accepting instructions as to what to draw. It's a subtle difference, but an important one.

I do Photography, I do not work to create Computer Generated Images. 🙂

G

 

[Richard G]

Speedy recovery. I can speak for all of us when I say we want you to be lugging big 8 x 10's up hillsides with heavy wooden tripods real soon. And post the pictures, OK?

Thanks Boojum. I’ll work on just this.

 

[Retro-Grouch]

For me, this dividing line is very simply drawn: Photography is the process of capturing light to form an image. Images created by instructing AI what to assemble is NOT "the process of capturing light to form an image." It is more akin to painting with a fancy brush, creating create Computer Generated Images. So, for me, there is absolutely nothing to "film/digital photograpy vs AI" at all: they are two entirely different ways to create an image.

This is not to say that AI-based tools to use in the rendering process of a photograph are irrelevant or verboten. Just like digital image processing itself, such tools can improve photographs and save time and effort in doing so. The key to tools of this sort that are valid is that they don't create anything, they serve to enhance what you've created by capturing light. One simple example is the latest revisions of Lightroom which include an "AI denoise" tool. This is a tool which can do an excellent job of reducing noise in an image by adaptively recognizing, segregating, and removing noise generated by the capture medium itself, leaving a cleaner recording of captured light, as opposed to creating the image by accepting instructions as to what to draw. It's a subtle difference, but an important one.

I do Photography, I do not work to create Computer Generated Images. 🙂

G

A problem I see is that we're now being provided with AI-driven processing tools that are beginning to blur the line between photography and AI-generated imagery. How much processing would one accept before saying, "This is not a real photograph."? Of course, in the world of commercial photography, many wouldn't care; the goal is to have a "perfect" image. But for the rest of us, the question will become inevitable.
I don't pay a lot of attention to these tools, as I don't use them. But I do get the frequent ads for many of them (one of the most frequent is Topaz Labs). They describe in glowing detail what can be done to alter a photograph, and show examples. Frankly, I'm horrified, and my personal take is that the result often is not really a photograph anymore. Of course, that's my take, and to put it into perspective, back when I shot digital I would tie myself into philosophical and ethical knots about cloning out sensor dust. That's taking things to an extreme, but it's a slippery slope...

 

[Retro-Grouch]

Thanks Boojum. I’ll work on just this.

Start small and easy. One-arm RB67 lifts, sets of three, each arm. You'll be ripped in no time.

 

[Retro-Grouch]

Crikey! If it comes to that, are we not all isopods in the rotting wood of existence?

The short answer? Yes.

 

[Godfrey]

A problem I see is that we're now being provided with AI-driven processing tools that are beginning to blur the line between photography and AI-generated imagery. How much processing would one accept before saying, "This is not a real photograph."? Of course, in the world of commercial photography, many wouldn't care; the goal is to have a "perfect" image. But for the rest of us, the question will become inevitable.

I don't pay a lot of attention to these tools, as I don't use them. But I do get the frequent ads for many of them (one of the most frequent is Topaz Labs). They describe in glowing detail what can be done to alter a photograph, and show examples. Frankly, I'm horrified, and my personal take is that the result often is not really a photograph anymore. Of course, that's my take, and to put it into perspective, back when I shot digital I would tie myself into philosophical and ethical knots about cloning out sensor dust. That's taking things to an extreme, but it's a slippery slope...

The bottom line in all art is the provenance of the art object. Cleaning dirt (and other 'noise') out of an image in rendering it to enhance the capture has been done since the beginning of Photography, so I see little issue with that. Photographic compositing (merging photographic images into a coordinated whole in as seamless a way as possible) is also a perfectly acceptable photographic endeavor ... see the work of Jerry Uelsman, the master of this kind of photographic art.

The key is that all of these forms of art include provenance that testifies to what the image(s) are about (or "intent by the artist" to use another description), when they were captured, and how they were rendered. You can't do that if your imaging process is "tell the AI software to generate a smiling woman with a baby in her arms that looks like Aunt Darlene" ... Provenance in that case can say what the instructions were, what AI tool was used, who dreamed up the idea for the image, etc, but it CANNOT say that the image is a photograph. It's computer generated art, that's all.

If you have AI tools that can take your photograph, isolate the key subject you wanted, and then composite it into a lunar landscape setting ... Well, I can accept that the provenance in that case can articulate some of the inclusions to the art work, but the art piece is still not a Photograph ... it's a painting which includes a photographic element.

That's not what I produce or am interested in producing, but I've seen stuff like that which is pretty nicely done.

The important thing is that the provenance of whatever art piece or photograph you make is clear and honest. If it isn't then the piece is not credible, whether or not it might be considered a photograph or computer graphics.

Commercial art, whether photographs or CGA ... the intent is always to display or promote something, usually for profit. So the provenance of an image used for this kind of purpose is rather simplistic. Much more critical is the provenance of images used for documentarian and forensic purposes. Nothing "generated" by AI can be truly documentary in nature, it can at best be an artist's simulation/recreation.

G

 

[Retro-Grouch]

... it's a painting which includes a photographic element.

No argument with what you've said, but your last statement presents the problem in a different form. A painting is still, essentially, a hand-made unique object, and something very different. This whole AI thing is so new that we don't even have a vocabulary or conceptual framework with which to discuss it! Rather than as a "painting", perhaps we should think of the object you've described as a "digital collage". Can it be art? Of course! But how we conceive of it and examine it critically will require new conceptual tools.

 

[Godfrey]

No argument with what you've said, but your last statement presents the problem in a different form. A painting is still, essentially, a hand-made unique object, and something very different. This whole AI thing is so new that we don't even have a vocabulary or conceptual framework with which to discuss it! Rather than as a "painting", perhaps we should think of the object you've described as a "digit collage". Can it be art? Of course! But how we conceive of it and examine it critically will require new conceptual tools.

For sure, and I leave that to those who are intrigued with pursuing the realm of computer generated art to untangle. I'll adopt whatever language they come to use as standard. That kind of imagery is not my intent and has no relation to the Photography I produce, so I see little reason to confound myself over how to define and describe it. 😀

G

 

[Guth]

It is hard to know just where to draw the line as digital cameras are very much reliant on computers to capture an image. Thus one could say that the files produced by these cameras are computer generated art.