Bullet proof Portra 400 – Pictures from Thailand

[Colin Corneau]

BTW, I'd be remiss if I didn't compliment you on your Alone In Bangkok collection...terrific solid photographs, all. I love them because they make me realize I didn't even scratch the surface when I was there!

 

[Nowhereman]

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

[avvsergius]

What scanner have you used ? I don't think M9 with Visoflex...
PS: They have beautiful colors. My compliments.

 

[Nowhereman]

avvsergius - Thanks. I digitalize using a Leitz BEOON copy stand with a Leitz Focotar-2 enlarger lens and an M9 camera. I don't think that one can tell from an image whether it was scanned or digitalized with a camera, nor what camera was used. For example, in the next-to-last image in post #6, of the fishing boats, the blue barrels come out the way they look in the scene — I've photographed the same scene with the M9, in the same light, and the barrel color came out as an intense "electric blue" that had to be reduced in hue and saturation to look natural. Indeed, it's the color rendition of the Portra 400 the comes through: that is because color negative film records a very low contrast image in which the long dynamic range of the scene is compressed into a very small density range on the film — thus the "scan" I get with the M9 is a flat and low contrast DNG file.

My experience is with the Imacon Precision III scanner, which has a dMax of 4.2 and a resolution of 6,300 dpi, as well as with commercial scans with the Epson 800/850 scanners. The results I get with the BEOON/Focotar/M9 digitalization are substantially better than with the Epson scanners and very close in quality with the Imacon scanner: the resolution is slightly lower (not noticeable) and the dynamic range looks the same.

Nevertheless, the look you get depends also on the white balance adjustments that you make, whether scanning or digitalizing with a camera, particularly with scene with mixed natural and artificial lights.

_______________
Alone in Bangkok essay on BURN Magazine