Film: The Real Raw

[peterm1]

I mostly enjoy reading Rockwell (but dont take him too seriously) but recently he has been espousing some odd opinions in my view. His sudden (re) conversion to film is a case in point. I have no argument with his basic premise......perhaps its more the vehemence with which he states his case and the conviction he conveys that what he says is 100% right that I find a little annoying at times.

Its true that film holds more information than digital cameras are currently capable of - I recall reading an article years ago that put the pixel count equivalent for color film as around 36 megapixels. I have run that number by people on a few forum sites and most seem to have more or less agreed. So assuming its true or close to true then digital has a way to go, at least in pixel count notwithstanding the recent efforts of Nikon Canon and Sony.

But for me I find it hard to go back to film exclusively. Photography using film was never truly satisfying for me as I had no opportunity of having a film lab. That meant that what I saw - was what I got. What came of the camera I had to stick with. And for the most part it was mediocre.

Now the quality of my photography is at best 50% the result of what comes out of the camera. The rest is a result of post processing. In other words I can now get much much better results than ever was the case with film because every image that is a keeper gets worked over in Photoshop (or for me its more often Corel Paint Shop Pro.) Film may theoretically be the better medium, but not for me.
I will still do it occasionally for fun and I suppose I could shoot film and have my negs / transparencies scanned but the other aspect of digital is that I like being able to review my work immediately on shooting and then reshoot if I need to. Plus as there is effectively no marginal cost of shooting digital, except in my time, I shoot many more images than I ever would with film. And that means I learn more.

The cost benefit of digital now pays off for me big time. I shoot more, I get better results, I enjoy it more and I am a better artist because of it.

There is one other point relevant to his article. Most negatives and slides I have taken have been lost or thrown away. Slides and negatives almost always get scratched and damaged unless they are stored most carefully - more carefully than most people bother with or are capable of. They are tucked away and tforgotten to take their chances with the 10 year old copies of Readers Digest and Womens Weekly. They take up a lot of space and become an annoyance. So 10 years after I have taken the photos so lovingly and carefully, excluding a few exceptional photos I have specifically earmarked to keep (and these I have scanned onto digital media !!!! ) I have chucked the rest in the rubbish bin as they were taking over the house.

On the other hand most digital photos I have taken - good, bad or indifferent - are still there, sitting waiting patiently on a PC hard drive and backed up to another offline hard drive. Most likely they will be there or somewhere long after I have gone to the great darkroom in the sky. I haev not forgotten them. I know where they are and becasue theya re so accessible I look at them quite frequently.

Arguments that film is necessarily better archivally than digital may have some truth if you are talking about a library or museaum but not when you take account of the limits applicable to us normal mortals who only have a garage, basement or under the bed plastic bin to store them.

 

[Dan States]

Rockwell is, as usual, making grand statements that conflict with everything else he says. Cameras don't matter, yet he obsesses about them. Film is the greatest thing ever, yet if you look at his gallery, you only find large format film or digital. The Mamiya 7 is his favorite camera, but his gallery contains none taken with that camera. Or the 5D is his favorite, or maybe it's his Nkon D40, unless it's his D3. I don't know, it's impossible to keep track.

Rockwell's writings on this and many other subjects are easy to understand when you keep in mind that he is a complete fool.

His claim that he is a professional photographer is amazing when you consider his almost total ignorance of basic photographic technique, digital processing or for that matter FILM. He does make a lot of noise however, which is worth something, right?

 

[russianRF]

and the guest count on his site just keeps rackin' up the hits.

Your point? I for one have an adblocker plugin installed in my browser. My visits don't make him any money. And hey, he is fun...he's the Jerry Springer of professional blogger photographers (or maybe the Riki Lake). Or should I say professional photographer bloggers, since it seems the only photography he puts up come from his sporatic outings to remote, exotic, or picturesque locations. Someone shooting a roll a week could outpace him easily, unless you're counting the random photos he takes for tests, of his kids, etc.

But it's generally true than whenever he comes up with a lengthy essay someone notices it, posts it, someone refutes it, someone takes exception, someone gives qualified approval, and finally someone makes some comment about how much money/attention Rockwell is getting.

Rinse, repeat.

 

[RayPA]

Fair enough. I have always felt that a properly-scanned frame of 35mm film holds more data than some of the best dSLR cameras out there, even yet.

However...

1) It's getting close. I think the very best FF dSLR cameras can probably meet or beat a good 4400 dpi scanned 35mm neg now. If not, then soon.

2) The more I scan, the more I see the limitations in my negs and slides. Due to the quality of the film itself, the quality (or lack of it) of my processing, the lens I used, and so on. I doubt if doubling the dpi of my scanner would pull more USEFUL data out of my 35mm films at this point. More just becomes more, and no real use for it.

^^ +1

I think that Ken is a little late on publishing this. It would have been better to have posted this years ago, when we were all here making this argument as he was carrying on about the D70 or the D1H or one of his early dslr favs and sneering down at film SLRs. He should have posted this back before then when it was relevant/valid and crashed his site when the 5D came out. He then could have pulled the thing down, brought the site back up, and blamed the crash for the data loss. 🙂

Ken:
"Most digital shooters are wary of this, knowing that whatever they shoot today in digital may or may not be good enough to sell to tomorrow's market. Got raw files shot in 2002 on your then state-of-the-art $5,000 Nikon D1H? Enjoy going back to your 2.7 megapixel files! You may as well delete them now."

Yeah, I'm as likely to do that ^^ as I am to destroy family photos that were taken with a Kodak Instamatic or 110 film camera back in the 70's.

I usually enjoy reading Ken, but this is a thin argument and whacky in it's timing. He must have had a bad day at the computer working on his RAW files.

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[emraphoto]

Your point? I for one have an adblocker plugin installed in my browser. My visits don't make him any money. And hey, he is fun...he's the Jerry Springer of professional blogger photographers (or maybe the Riki Lake). Or should I say professional photographer bloggers, since it seems the only photography he puts up come from his sporatic outings to remote, exotic, or picturesque locations. Someone shooting a roll a week could outpace him easily, unless you're counting the random photos he takes for tests, of his kids, etc.

But it's generally true than whenever he comes up with a lengthy essay someone notices it, posts it, someone refutes it, someone takes exception, someone gives qualified approval, and finally someone makes some comment about how much money/attention Rockwell is getting.

Rinse, repeat.

my point is that there is a reason he says the things he says, in the manner he says it. regardless if you have adblocker or whatever the hits on his site pile up and to him, that's gold.

 

[NickTrop]

Second, it can only record as well as it can record - so old films were not up to the standards of new films - even new scanners can't put in quality that was never there. Third, the limitations of lenses and other incidentals used to record the images have a negative impact on the quality of the image laid down on the films of yesteryear.
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If you're talking movies, then are you saying that the films of yesteryear - The Wizard of Oz as an example, don't look as good as modern media because they were using old gear and lenses?(???) I think we all know many/most generally look better. Are you saying Hitchcock, Orsen Wells, Fritz Lang, or Ingmar Bergman films don't look as good as some video-shot reality TV show because the reality TV show is using "new lenses and new gear" and the old movie DPs were using all those outdated Zeiss primes from the the 30's, 40's, and 50's?
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[Nh3]

Rockwell could be dismissed as an opportunist but he is taking a big risk by embracing film.

Most of the people who visit his blog are amateurs who use digital, if he alienate them with such articles the traffic on his website would dwindle.

Who knows, maybe behind that loud and inflated personality of Rockwell there is someone who cares about photography...

 

[bmattock]

If you're talking movies, then are you saying that the films of yesteryear - The Wizard of Oz as an example, don't look as good as modern media because they were using old gear and lenses?(???) I think we all know many/most generally look better. Are you saying Hitchcock, Orsen Wells, Fritz Lang, or Ingmar Bergman films don't look as good as some video-shot reality TV show because the reality TV show is using "new lenses and new gear" and the old movie DPs were using all those outdated Zeiss primes from the the 30's, 40's, and 50's?
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No, I said what I said. Film technology of 50 years ago was not as good as film technology today. Colors are truer, less grainy, and more stable.

Given that, then films shot on today's film are of a higher technical quality than films shot 50 years ago. That has nothing to do with who directs and who acts in them, it's a technical observation. And I did not mention video tape, I said film.

Second, I said that lenses and cameras used in motion pictures fifty years ago were likewise not up to the technical standards used today.

For that reason, you can scan a single frame from a classic movie from yesteryear and, I have no doubt, get a lovely image from it; but it will not be up to the same technical standard as one shot in recent times.

And ten years from now, I expect the standard will have advanced even more, and again, and again as time goes by. Newer scanning technologies will likewise advance the art of extracting useful information from older film, but the limit of that is the amount of information recorded in the first place. You could have a whiz-bang 100,000 dpi scanner and it won't make a difference to a 50 year-old film - once you have crossed the threshold of retrieving information and not just noise.

And that is my point. Rockwell tries to make the point that as scanner technology improves, you can just keep extracting more and more information from old films, keeping them 'just as good' if not better than whatever the current digital standard is, ten, twenty, etc years out. I disagree for the reasons listed above. You can't extract information that isn't there in the first place. Once you pass that threshold, that's it.

 

[russianRF]

my point is that there is a reason he says the things he says, in the manner he says it. regardless if you have adblocker or whatever the hits on his site pile up and to him, that's gold.

How are my hits gold for him? I don't understand. If anything, I take up his bandwidth for free and provide nothing in return...

 

[russianRF]

...once you have crossed the threshold of retrieving information and not just noise.

And that is my point. Rockwell tries to make the point that as scanner technology improves, you can just keep extracting more and more information from old films, keeping them 'just as good' if not better than whatever the current digital standard is, ten, twenty, etc years out. I disagree for the reasons listed above. You can't extract information that isn't there in the first place. Once you pass that threshold, that's it.

Great point. I also find it odd that lately, whenever Rockwell discusses digital noise, he talks as though there is no such thing as film grain...

 

[RayPA]

How are my hits gold for him? I don't understand. If anything, I take up his bandwidth for free and provide nothing in return...

OK. Sorry to butt in, but now I'm wondering if I'm missing something. I thought it was fairly simple. Doesn't he get revenue from advertising, and isn't continued or increased advertising revenue based on the number of hits his site consistently receives? Your click/hit counts regardless of your adblockers or whether you put on blinders when visiting. Your click is his "gold," right?



.

 

[emraphoto]

How are my hits gold for him? I don't understand. If anything, I take up his bandwidth for free and provide nothing in return...

"hit's" or visits or whatever you call them equal a lot of things on the web. most importantly they provide all the leverage in the world when negotiating advertising deals with the folks like adorama, amazon, ritz, sonystyle etc. regardless of wether or not you view the ad's the hits ad up. it would be easy to believe he writes the things he does, picks the subject matter he does etc. to generate the internet "buzz" he seems to provide.


not to mention where your website "appears" in searches.

nh23 was right, rockwell is a crafty fella and i salute him... that is not to be confused with "i respect what he has to say" or "i think he's a gifted photographer".

 

[calexg]

I like a few of Ken's ideas. Sometimes he's a bit over-the-top and he can become rather annoying, but he stresses getting out and shooting instead of worrying about fancy cameras. I like that.

 

[NickTrop]

No, I said what I said. Film technology of 50 years ago was not as good as film technology today. Colors are truer, less grainy, and more stable. Given that, then films shot on today's film are of a higher technical quality than films shot 50 years ago. That has nothing to do with who directs and who acts in them, it's a technical observation. And I did not mention video tape, I said film.

Second, I said that lenses and cameras used in motion pictures fifty years ago were likewise not up to the technical standards used today.

For that reason, you can scan a single frame from a classic movie from yesteryear and, I have no doubt, get a lovely image from it; but it will not be up to the same technical standard as one shot in recent times.

Don't know if I agree entirely with this. Technicolor was great stock - oversaturated. Also, film stock was slow - improvements were made in making better high-speed film. So, I might argue, if I knew more about the history of 35mm movie film, that it parallels still film in that color and resolution were equal but they got faster... The lenses - after the 40's, again, apexed - a prime is a prime. Zooms became popular in the 60's - I know that much. So, I don't know if I agree that you necessarily had a huge change that dramatically improved the final image in the end due to technology. I think the technical improvements made things easier - faster speed films and zoom lenses... Personally, I prefer that the old aesthetic and don't think innovation lead to better looking movies. Today they seem flatter, less interesting visually.

 

[bmattock]

Personally, I prefer that the old aesthetic and don't think innovation lead to better looking movies. Today they seem flatter, less interesting visually.

I don't disagree about the aesthetics. I am concentrating on the technical quality, which is subjective. Grain size is massively reduced, which renders a sharper image. Color reproduction is much more accurate - I can look at old Kodacolor II negs that I've scanned and see that difference, not just on the silver screen.

Aesthetics are what make people prefer the sound of a tube (valve) amplifier for music reproduction - but one cannot argue that it is superior sounding because it is more accurate - it simply isn't. The distortion simply sounds warm and inviting to the human ear (and yes, I have a tube amp).

So, while I may also prefer the oversaturated, slightly off colors of older films, especially given the wonderful scripts, directing, and actors of that era, I do not think that Rockwell's statement is accurate - that one can simply scan old movie stills and get technically superior images to what a high-end digital camera can produce; or that in the future, scans of old film images will continue to always be better than digital RAW files.

 

[russianRF]

OK. Sorry to butt in, but now I'm wondering if I'm missing something. I thought it was fairly simple. Doesn't he get revenue from advertising, and isn't continued or increased advertising revenue based on the number of hits his site consistently receives? Your click/hit counts regardless of your adblockers or whether you put on blinders when visiting. Your click is his "gold," right?
.

EDIT: here is a link on Wikipedia on "Performance-based advertising" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance-based_advertising As you can see from that link, performance based advertising is getting more and more popular, representing over half of all Internet advertising. If Rockwell is making money by raw clicks, his revenue stream is in grave danger...

Maybe I'm missing something, but I'm pretty sure that's wrong. I used to work as a coder for the web; during the dotcom boom pages did indeed live or die by their raw pageviews or hits. But after the boom bust, websites were required to come up with more substantial proof that the ad dollars were actually doing something. Hence google, for instance, which pays according to how many people view (or at least download) their ad, or according to how many people CLICK their ad (I believe they are separate metrics).

Let me put it this way. I can put "FREE LEZ PORN" up on a website and can get HUNDREDS if not THOUSANDS of hits but I'm not making anyone money and I'm not driving traffic to any kind of profit (except maybe if I advertise for "LEZ PORN" websites).

This is why Rockwell has a notice at the bottom of each page begging that you purchase everything through a link on his site; he doesn't get real revenue unless and until he can demonstrate bringing purchasing traffic to sites.

Rockwell himself is the only person who knows everything about his site and how it generates revenue, of course. And hey, if my and others talking s***, refuting his obvious mistakes, and generally showing him to be a pompous fraud causes him to earn a few dozen dollars a month (because even in the dotcom boom a page hit only paid a few cents at best), well then bully for him.

 

[RayPA]

EDIT: here is a link on Wikipedia on "Performance-based advertising" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance-based_advertising As you can see from that link, performance based advertising is getting more and more popular, representing over half of all Internet advertising. If Rockwell is making money by raw clicks, his revenue stream is in grave danger...

Maybe I'm missing something, but I'm pretty sure that's wrong. I used to work as a coder for the web; during the dotcom boom pages did indeed live or die by their raw pageviews or hits. But after the boom bust, websites were required to come up with more substantial proof that the ad dollars were actually doing something. Hence google, for instance, which pays according to how many people view (or at least download) their ad, or according to how many people CLICK their ad (I believe they are separate metrics).

Let me put it this way. I can put "FREE LEZ PORN" up on a website and can get HUNDREDS if not THOUSANDS of hits but I'm not making anyone money and I'm not driving traffic to any kind of profit (except maybe if I advertise for "LEZ PORN" websites).

This is why Rockwell has a notice at the bottom of each page begging that you purchase everything through a link on his site; he doesn't get real revenue unless and until he can demonstrate bringing purchasing traffic to sites.

Rockwell himself is the only person who knows everything about his site and how it generates revenue, of course. And hey, if my and others talking s***, refuting his obvious mistakes, and generally showing him to be a pompous fraud causes him to earn a few dozen dollars a month (because even in the dotcom boom a page hit only paid a few cents at best), well then bully for him.

So there's two types of revenue possibilities from advertisers. Clicks and Click-throughs to advertisers sites. Cool. Thanks.


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[emraphoto]

wouldn't the raw number of visits directly influence the amount (whatever percentage that may be) of advert "hits" as well? i'm not trying to flog a dead horse here, just trying to figure out why ken says some of the things he does.

 

[russianRF]

wouldn't the raw number of visits directly influence the amount (whatever percentage that may be) of advert "hits" as well? I'm not trying to flog a dead horse here, just trying to figure out why ken says some of the things he does.

Not if you're using an adblocker; the blocker scans the incoming HTML and instructs the browser to completely ignore the ad images. Those are never requested to begin with, and so are never counted for his site. Everyone who doesn't use an adblocker does indeed rack up those extra advertising image hits every time they visit. I installed my blocker to surf faster; it just has the welcome side effect of not contributing to the click rates of sites I don't like. 😉

As to why he does it, he's a troll who makes money trolling. I think many people, myself included, wouldn't have such a problem with him if he weren't occasionally referenced as a source of authority. Also, in other forums, I have had a couple of newbies wander in confused from some of his more blatant misinformation. For example: yes, moving back from the subject and moving the subject away from the background are good ways to isolate the subject; being aware of depth-of-field, and using a wide-open fast lens, are even better ways.

 

[emraphoto]

As to why he does it, he's a troll who makes money trolling. I think many people, myself included, wouldn't have such a problem with him if he weren't occasionally referenced as a source of authority. Also, in other forums, I have had a couple of newbies wander in confused from some of his more blatant misinformation. For example: yes, moving back from the subject and moving the subject away from the background are good ways to isolate the subject; being aware of depth-of-field, and using a wide-open fast lens, are even better ways.

i suppose that is a more succinct way of saying it.