B&W Analog , The only valid analogy (??)

[NickTrop]

Not overly complicated issue.

I use print film. Love it. Hate digital:

1. It has higer resolution. Period. Here's a nice article on this point by Ken Rockwell:

"OK, I've had it with this idiocy. back to top of article Here are the examples I've been too busy shooting to waste my time scanning and posting. We all know the other websites showing a big name digital SLR looking as good as film resolution. Baloney. You may not realize that those sites are actually sponsored by those camera companies and the guy running them doesn't really know how to get good results on film. He then only compares them at such low resolution that you can't see what film's resolution is all about. It takes skill to get optimum resolution on film.

These are two crops out of this image, one shot on a brand new digital camera and the other on a cheap film camera with a 50 year-old lens:"

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/filmdig.htm

Do check out the photos if you click the link...


2. Look at TV. When production companies have the budget, what do they shoot on? FILM!!! Color FILM. Why do you reckon this is? Video is used for cheap reality TV crap to save money. Dramas are shot on FILM because the FILM image is more EVOCATIVE. Directors and production companies know this.

Class, Evocative, = FILM
Cheap = Digital

3. You can wonk around in PS all you want. To my eye nothing beats the look of Kodak UC Professional. To my eye, digital images look flat, dull, crappy.

4. Have fun wonking around in PS for hours futzing with RAW files, "going nuts" over every image. I'll drop my Kodak UC Professional 100/400 off in a lab and have 36 BEAUTIFUL EVOCATIVE prints ready in an hour.

You'll still be futzing with your RAW files in PS - perhaps trying to get your bland low-rez digital images to "look like" Kodak UC Pro (and others, this is just one example) using software and plug ins and converters and sharpeners...

Fun to read folks that like to kid themselves and "re-sell" themselves on the "virtues" of digital. Looking foward to that nice huge "digital slide" that doesn't cost $20,000.

 

[john_van_v]

Not overly complicated issue.
I use print film. Love it. Hate digital

Ok, good start

1. It has higer resolution. Period.

It MAY have higher resolution; Ken Rockwell uses huge wooden frame cameras with ASA 50 film !! Rockwell is obviously into taking mural photos.

Even so, the resolution issues is a secific to the need. For magazine photography, 3 mp is adequate; for newspapers, 0.5 would be over kill.

2. Look at TV.

Why?? That is a low blow; do you want our brains to rot ??

3. You can wonk around in PS all you want ... digital images look flat, dull, crappy.

Not my picts, I may get an award just for color enhancements, and I am 50% colorblind: http://thinman.com/images/Forty_Deuce

Fun to read folks that like to kid themselves and "re-sell" themselves on the "virtues" of digital. Looking foward to that nice huge "digital slide" that doesn't cost $20,000.

That is actually a pretty good point; people are stupid.

 

[NickTrop]

john_van_vz: "It MAY have higher resolution; Ken Rockwell uses huge wooden frame cameras with ASA 50 film !! Rockwell is obviously into taking mural photos."

- Nope. Not for this comparison. Read the article. Look at the scan. He shot that with a modest 35mm camera, using 35mm FILM and a "50 year old lens". As Mr Rockwell said, "enough with this idiocy"...

john_van_vz: "Why?? That is a low blow; do you want our brains to rot ??"

No, not a "low blow"... But your answer was a transparent cop out.

Again. Why do you think that production companies spend a fortune of film stock and processing in the digital era? You would think that if digital is so good, "as good as film", then - geez, why spend all that money on film stock??? Cost a fortune??? Why do digital engineers come up with things like "24P" to "get that film look"??? Why do even high end productions transfer film, back to digital to do composite work, then BACK to film?

Answer: Because FILM IS MORE COMPELLING, DRAMATIC, EVOCOTIVE!!! Digital is used for cheap reality TV, as an on set aid to see the scene right after it is shot ON FILM, soap operas - oh, and porn. (And some say /that/ went down hill when they started shooting everything on digital...)

john_van_v: "Not my picts, I may get an award just for color enhancements"

- Whatever. I don't need to "enhance" anything. Must be fun "enhancing" each of the thousand images you shoot every year (I assume) on that digital.
All those hours spent "enhancing" digital files... Wow. Sure sounds like "fun" to me!

And - pray tell, why do these images need enhancing in the first place? Oh, because they're bland, crappy, dull digital images. How, exactly, do you enhance detail back into the highlights your digital washes out?


Me? Guess I'm lazy. I just drop off a roll of great print film, like Kodak UC Professional, at a good lab. Ready in an hour. Higher resolution, no need whatsoever to waste precious hours of my life "enhancing" each one.

Well. Think I'll go out and watch a movie tonight. Enjoy your hours of "enhancing" Wonder how much "enhancing" you would have to do to get some digital file that comes off of some sensor to fill a huge movie screen with a rich beautiful image, like 35mm FILM does, no problem.

But you enjoy your digital and have fun kidding yourself about its "virtues".

Happy "enhancing"

Nick

 

[john_van_v]

Hey buddy, jus messing w/ yah

We are on the same friggin team

Lighten up !!

 

[Toby]

john_van_vz: "It MAY have higher resolution; Ken Rockwell uses huge wooden frame cameras with ASA 50 film !! Rockwell is obviously into taking mural photos."

- Nope. Not for this comparison. Read the article. Look at the scan. He shot that with a modest 35mm camera, using 35mm FILM and a "50 year old lens". As Mr Rockwell said, "enough with this idiocy"...





Nick

In the article he states he used a Tachihara 5x4 camera and 50 year old schneider large format lens. Please read your sources properly. And lay off the caffeine.

Incidently, how many 35mm SLR's do think were around in 1947?

 

[iml]

tube amps do sound better. It has to do with the way they distort compared to solid state amplifiers. That is not a debateable position. Anyone who listens to both will say the same thing.

I own both and I prefer my solid state amps. But that's by the by.

As for digital vs. film, it's about images not technology. The two technologies produce different looking results, but all that matters when looking at an image is whether or not it's a good image. People who look at a photograph and talk about how much better it would be if it was shot on film, or with digital, or used a different lens, are missing the point, which is to look at the image in front of them as it is, and not to waste time imagining what it would be like if they were looking at a slightly different image instead.

A minority of art photographers will continue using film because it gives them results they prefer, another minority will prefer digital, and the majority of commercial and hobbyist photographers have already decided on digital, largely for convenience. Let's see in 20 years time whether photographers are still producing images worth looking at (I suspect they will be). If they are, then the whole film vs. digital debate will look like a gigantic waste of air. The picture is the thing.

I like film, I prefer it for most of my b&w work, and since I mostly shoot b&w, I mostly shoot film. But I have no problems with good photographers taking good photographs using nothing but digital, and have no truck whatsoever with any waffle about film being more "authentic" in some way than digital.

Ian

 

[NickTrop]

In the article he states he used a Tachihara 5x4 camera and 50 year old schneider large format lens. Please read your sources properly. And lay off the caffeine.

Incidently, how many 35mm SLR's do think were around in 1947?

I stand corrected.

 

[NickTrop]

Hey buddy, jus messing w/ yah

We are on the same friggin team

Lighten up !!

I'm light! These are - in total, "silly" debates. Nobody's angry on this end. That would be silly. Apologies if it came across overly serious as sometimes happens on a post. :angel: