B+W overused here?

[lawrence]

There are some good emulators out there, but I've not gone down that path.

I'm probably not being very logical but there's something that worries me about emulators. Digital has the qualities of digital and film of film, so in a way you are not being true to the medium. It reminds me of the attempts that were made a hundred years ago to make photographs look like paintings. Of course I know that 'only the result matters' but, as I said, I can't be completely logical about this.

 

[David R Munson]

Within the last week I discovered I was somewhat colorblind. Who knew? Anyway, it does have me wondering if it has played any role in my frustration with color photography and leaning toward monochrome.

Monochrome film certainly looks diffferent to digital files from my dslrs, both in tonality and image structure. There are some good emulators out there, but I've not gone down that path.

They are different starting points, certainly, but at this time I feel that if it's your vision you're following more than anything else and are willing to work to make that vision translate into the final image, the practical difference between the final product of a digital file or silver negative is negligible.

Others' experience may differ, of course, but this is where the current direction of my thinking and experience leads me.

 

[HenningW]

Definitely, B+W is overused. Heliopan should be given more of a chance.

 

[Gumby]

Re: post 133.

I think if that picture were in color it would better show how gray the sky was. 😀

 

[HenningW]

I totaly agree, and to me - a lot of difference between 'noise' and grain!
Dave.

I think we should be clear on this: grain is noise. It is a specific type of noise introduced by a specific emulsion composition developed in a specific way and scanned/printed a certain way. We have a large degree of control over this introduced 'noise'. But it is noise. It does not exist in the subject, and it is introduced by the medium.

The fact that we have gotten used to it, and made something of it is a result of cultural acclimatization as well as serendipity. Before photo enlargement became widely practiced grain wasn't really part of photography, and now that digital is becoming the mainstream, grain will, to an extent, fade away again. Grain can be related on a number of levels to brush strokes, but photography lacks the range of brush strokes. We can of course help it along a bit with reticulation and printing screens.

Grain, as black and white itself, is a reduction and abstraction. Smooth toned full range colour is as close as we can get to two dimensional 'reality', and desaturating the image and/or introducing 'grain' type noise leads to abstractions which can serve to make our point, or art if you will. We can, through this abstraction, focus the viewers attention on elements that might get overpowered and lost in the more realistic full colour, smooth 'reality'.

Henning

 

[pmun]

Smooth toned full range colour is as close as we can get to two dimensional 'reality'
Henning

No, it is two dimensional reality - that of the photograph.
www.urbanpaths.net

 

[pmun]

Re: post 133.

I think if that picture were in color it would better show how gray the sky was. 😀

But it would also complicate the image - as b&W it's beautifully simple.
www.urbanpaths.net

 

[HenningW]

No, it is two dimensional reality - that of the photograph.
www.urbanpaths.net

Note the quotes I used.

 

[Trius]

I think we should be clear on this: grain is noise. It is a specific type of noise introduced by a specific emulsion composition developed in a specific way and scanned/printed a certain way. We have a large degree of control over this introduced 'noise'. But it is noise. It does not exist in the subject, and it is introduced by the medium.

The fact that we have gotten used to it, and made something of it is a result of cultural acclimatization as well as serendipity. Before photo enlargement became widely practiced grain wasn't really part of photography, and now that digital is becoming the mainstream, grain will, to an extent, fade away again. Grain can be related on a number of levels to brush strokes, but photography lacks the range of brush strokes. We can of course help it along a bit with reticulation and printing screens.

Grain, as black and white itself, is a reduction and abstraction. Smooth toned full range colour is as close as we can get to two dimensional 'reality', and desaturating the image and/or introducing 'grain' type noise leads to abstractions which can serve to make our point, or art if you will. We can, through this abstraction, focus the viewers attention on elements that might get overpowered and lost in the more realistic full colour, smooth 'reality'.

Henning

I believe that film grain, especially (well, mostly, actually) in b&w is pleasing precisely because of this abstraction. The "closer to reality" noiseless image is often, though not always, less interesting to me. It can be successful, but the image needs to be made differently, IMO, especially in terms of digital capture.

Yes, we have gotten used to grain in film photography, but I believe a major reason is that is pleasing to most people in many images, even if they are not conscious of it. IOW, it's not just habituation. At least in my opinion.

 

[pmun]

Note the quotes I used.

I had a feeling you might say that. What do you mean by the quotes?
www.urbanpaths.net

 

[HenningW]

I believe that film grain, especially (well, mostly, actually) in b&w is pleasing precisely because of this abstraction. The "closer to reality" noiseless image is often, though not always, less interesting to me. It can be successful, but the image needs to be made differently, IMO, especially in terms of digital capture.

Yes, we have gotten used to grain in film photography, but I believe a major reason is that is pleasing to most people in many images, even if they are not conscious of it. IOW, it's not just habituation. At least in my opinion.

The thing is, we really have nothing to measure it against. Grain was not part of the equation until enlargement started, which happened approximately in the 1920's. Grain became a fact of life; anything printed 8x10 from 35mm had grain. We made it a virtue. That's habituation.

We never had the option to easily capture and present grain less images. Yes, we could shoot LF and contact print, but that faded into a niche, and was far removed from the bulk of photography whether snapshot or 'serious'.

Whether we like it or not is a different matter. Some do, some don't. I've certainly played around with grain in Royal-X pan in 120 size and 2475 Recording Film in 35mm, developed at 50°C or in Dektol and then printed on Brovira #6. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. It was another option. However, I think that even now, let alone in 25 years, delight in grain will become a very very minor side road in photography, even though it is quite easy to introduce 'grain-like' noise into digital images. One may argue that what is created is not true grain, and be quite right, but true grain is not one pattern of grain, but a large variety so that argument starts falling away.

I personally like certain types of grain for certain images, but that is the aesthetic I've grown up with and dealt with unless contact printing from 8x10 (which I've done as well). It's just that I think the noise that it produces is something we've become acclimated to, and that we might well have not gone there mainstream if we hadn't been forced to.

Just as I believe that if colour painting had been as easy at the start of humanities efforts and colour photography had been available and as cheap and easy as B&W we might never have developed the various forms of B&W drawing or B&W photography as much as we have.

The abstraction that is B&W was forced on us in the beginning, and we made a virtue of necessity.

 

[HenningW]

I had a feeling you might say that. What do you mean by the quotes?
www.urbanpaths.net

I meant that it is only a nominal reality for the purposes of this discussion. Of course it is a two dimensional reality describing a fixed angle of view from a fixed viewing position captured in a specific finite duration created on mostly textured flexible media with a limited gamut and capacity for detail intended to be viewed by reflection, etc. etc. Lots of caveats.

 

[HenningW]

I believe that film grain, especially (well, mostly, actually) in b&w is pleasing precisely because of this abstraction. The "closer to reality" noiseless image is often, though not always, less interesting to me. It can be successful, but the image needs to be made differently, IMO, especially in terms of digital capture.

Sorry, I didn't really address this.

Yes, the abstraction that is B&W is enhanced often by 'fudging' detail through grain, just as severe contrast or other techniques can do that.

I think that one of the reasons we often find highly detailed, noiseless colour images less interesting is that, well, they are realistic and we have reality around us all the time. Familiarity breeds contempt. There is nothing in there that forces us to look deeper. B&W on the other hand focusses our attention on a more limited range of components and therefore makes us pay attention just because it is 'different'. Other abstractions can be achieved through posterization, diffusion or heightened saturation of colour images.

On some level, colour photography is just too hard. When we produce a highly detailed, grainless and full tonal range colour print it's very difficult to get the viewer to focus on what we focussed when shooting the picture. The easy way out is to not really focus on an aspect or personal revelation that we saw in the photographed scene, but just snap away without that kind of intent. Shooting in B&W allows us to get rid of one layer of instant recognition and dismissal, and force the view to therefore disregard the colour information and focus on tonal values. Grain forces the view to look at larger shapes and dismiss the finest detail, or lack thereof.

Please consider that these pronouncements are just coming to me as I type them, and no dogmatism is intended. 😉

 

[pmun]

I meant that it is only a nominal reality for the purposes of this discussion. Of course it is a two dimensional reality describing a fixed angle of view from a fixed viewing position captured in a specific finite duration created on mostly textured flexible media with a limited gamut and capacity for detail intended to be viewed by reflection, etc. etc. Lots of caveats.

Thanks. So you mean the 2d 'reality' as compared to the 3d reality of the subject matter. The reason I questioned it is that in photography the subject matter is often considered more important than the photograph and that's another possible reason to enclose the reality of the photograph in quotation marks.

I don't know if that's what you intended, but I think the idea that the 'reality' of a photograph is somehow secondary to the reality of its subject matter limits photography's potential.

I may be reading too much into this; or I might be exposing an underlying and hidden assumption.
www.urbanpaths.net

 

[HenningW]

Thanks. So you mean the 2d 'reality' as compared to the 3d reality of the subject matter. The reason I questioned it is that in photography the subject matter is often considered more important than the photograph and that's another possible reason to enclose the reality of the photograph in quotation marks.

I don't know if that's what you intended, but I think the idea that the 'reality' of a photograph is somehow secondary to the reality of its subject matter limits photography's potential.

I may be reading too much into this; or I might be exposing an underlying and hidden assumption.
www.urbanpaths.net

Trying to define 'reality' is largely a no-win proposition, even though it is fun trying to do it. Years of studying physics with some philosophy studies thrown in has certainly shown that.

A photograph's 'reality' is generally a separate reality, but also can be argued to be always a subset of the subject space reality. That doesn't mean it's secondary, because we can focus on it to the exclusion of the subject reality, and whereas the subject reality may become too familiar, we can, through photography and particularly B&W photography, strip away a lot of the subject reality to leave only that part on which we wish to concentrate. Whether that leaves the essence or only a stunted, stripped down reality depends on intent, execution, the viewer and a whole lot of experiential and cultural baggage.

It can give rise to strong emotions, but it is a distortion that is never fully controlled.

 

[pmun]

Trying to define 'reality' is largely a no-win proposition,

Agreed

A photograph's 'reality' is generally a separate reality, but also can be argued to be always a subset of the subject space reality.

This is really what I have an issue with - a photograph is always a separate reality - many confuse it with its featured subject matter because of a convincing illusion.

That doesn't mean it's secondary, because we can focus on it to the exclusion of the subject reality, and whereas the subject reality may become too familiar, we can, through photography and particularly B&W photography, strip away a lot of the subject reality to leave only that part on which we wish to concentrate. Whether that leaves the essence or only a stunted, stripped down reality depends on intent, execution, the viewer and a whole lot of experiential and cultural baggage.

I agree to some extent (and I think you've put it well). The viewer can see what they choose or are conditioned to see. This determines to what extent the viewer takes part in the illusion. But it is an illusion nonetheless - the photograph has nothing to do with its subject matter other than a superficial, historical resemblence. But it is this distant superficiality that so many viewers seem to grasp above all.

www.urbanpaths.net

 

[Woodrow]

No color film in your MP

No color film in your MP

I can proudly say that a roll of color film has never sullied my MP.

Jim B.

You'd better keep enjoying B&W then, as I've heard that if one doesn't run a roll of color in an MP now and then, it will only ever shoot B&W...No color film for you, my friend.

Best,
W.C.