HU: B&W -- film vs. digital

[ywenz]

1st and 3rd are digital. 2nd is neopan 1600.

My point here is that, yes, you might be able to tell a difference when printed on a piece of paper or pixel peepin' at 100%. I for one, do not look at my images under perfectly even lighting and at maximum blown up dimensions. I print them out at manageble sizes, put it in a frame and hang it up on my wall in a room with poor lighting. Both my film and digital images look fine to me.

 

[Stuart John]

What really matters is a great image more than anything else. I still like the traditional darkroom myself but digital is a useful tool also and is capable of great results when used properly. I would not want to be stuck with just digital or just film and at the moment you can use both if you want.

 

[fgianni]

On a CCD or C-Mos the pixels cannot be otherwise than monochrome.The foveon sensor has a totally different way of "seeing"colour, which means that the real black-and -white resolution can never exceed it's actual pixel count, say 5 MP or whatever it may be. The 13 MP they are playing with is only an advertising-mathematical trick, that ,in real photography, is by no means recognized by all experts.

Bear with me a moment, A ccd/cmos with let's say 8 pixels, has 2 blue pixels, 4 green pixels and 2 red pixels, this requires interpolation to get a colour 8 pixels image, and then you can convert to monochrome but you start with an interpolated image.
While an 8 pixels foveon does not need any interpolation to get the 8 colour pixels, that's why a 3 MP Foveon sensor (Sigma SD10) delivers a picture quality similar to a 6MP Bayer sensor (Nikon D70, Canon 10, and so on)

If you remove the color filter from the CCD/CMOS you have not 4 Green, 2 red and 2 Blues, but 8 greys, and as in the foveon sensor, no interpolation is required.

That's why I think a CCD/CMOS with the color filter removed will deliver a significantly better B&W image compared to the filtered sensor.

 

[fgianni]

1st and 3rd are digital. 2nd is neopan 1600.

My point here is that, yes, you might be able to tell a difference when printed on a piece of paper or pixel peepin' at 100%.

Or maybe just looking at the quality of the grain.

 

[fgianni]

The maths are correct, but there is a vast difference between film and sensor, the main in this context being that film, due to its nature, has all kinds of diffraction and diffusion effects inside the film layer itself and inside the anti-halo layer, reducing its actual resolution to 35 % of the theoretical maximum, if that. That means that the most one can hope for is about the equivalent of 8 MP.

In AP 22 April 2006 there is a comparison between the 30D RAW at ISO 400 and the EOS-1V with ISO 400 Negative film, and the the film still exhibits visibly more detail.

So ISO 400 negative film still beats 8MP, try to guess how many MP you will need to match technical PAN?

 

[Kevin]

What really matters is a great image more than anything else. I still like the traditional darkroom myself but digital is a useful tool also and is capable of great results when used properly. I would not want to be stuck with just digital or just film and at the moment you can use both if you want.

I was simply concerned that an image taken with 8mp digital camera might look fuzzy blown up to 50x60cm, more or less the dimensions to which I enlarge a few images per year.

A friend just received an eos 350d for her birthday. I will have a lab make a 50x60cm print of one of her best images and see what it looks like compared to my negative enlargements.

If I shot all of my pics with a digital camera that produced fuzzy 50x60cm prints I would seldom use it. If I knew in advance which pictures would be stunning before I took them I could obviously use both film and digital.

And yes, the image does count the most! But did you know that even mediocre pictures look good blown up really big, provided they have good grain and sharpness? Stop by Ikea sometime and go to their picture frame section. You can see for yourself.

 

[fgianni]

I was simply concerned that an image taken with 8mp digital camera might look fuzzy blown up to 50x60cm, more or less the dimensions to which I enlarge a few images per year.

50x60 may be a bit too much for 8MP, I expect the result to be sort of OK but no more than that.
A 5D should handle that quite well, so you may need to spend a little bit more.

 

[Socke]

I think I can get more out of realy good ISO 400 negative film with my Zeiss glass with mirror locked up and a sturdy tripod then with a Canon 30d, especialy with a Contax 85/1.4 against a Canon 50/1.4 or Contax 50/1.4 against Canon 28/2.8.

But I wouldn't scan with my Canon FS2710 I'd have the neg drumscaned at 8000 dpi.
OTOH, a drumscan is around 100 Euro here, a Canon 30d some 1100. And when I pay that much money for a scan, why not dust up the Linhof and shoot a real negative?


For PanF I'd add studio lighting, too much shaddow in my town.

 

[Bertram2]

1st and 3rd are digital. 2nd is neopan 1600.

The one in the middle looked really different, but if I had known it is film I had rather said some C41 BW film @ 800 or even 1600. The lack of grain is amazing for a Neopan 1600, scanned with grain redux or neat image in the postprocessing ?

The bright parts of the digital shots look quite good, but as usual there are some totally black portions which look as if the chip (or the software) simply had given up.
These portions of "absolute black" in digital shots to me look like real holes in an landscape of informations, I cannot get used to it.

Regards,
bertram

 

[Socke]

50x60 may be a bit too much for 8MP, I expect the result to be sort of OK but no more than that.
A 5D should handle that quite well, so you may need to spend a little bit more.

Depending on the crop 50x60 is a 20x enlargement. Back when my father did advertising the photographer he worked with did not more than 15x enlargements from slow B/W and 10x from colour.
They considered 24x36mm suitable for holiday snaps and 6x7 good enough for full magazin pages. A3 and bigger was shot on 9x13 and 13x18.

 

[Kevin]

Volker, I love the look of grain and I get quite sharp pictures with my summiluxes and zeiss sonnar (when I use them properly) so 50x60 (usually 40x60) is what I end up enlarging a few pics to. I have an easel and archival washer that handles this dimension so I take advantage of this. I really dont mind the grain because the pictures are still sharp enough.

Of course I also enlarge MF to this size as well and the difference is clear. Still sometimes I want to make a big print from 135 and so now I understand that a 5D is the ticket if I were to start using digital?

 

[sf]

In AP 22 April 2006 there is a comparison between the 30D RAW at ISO 400 and the EOS-1V with ISO 400 Negative film, and the the film still exhibits visibly more detail.

So ISO 400 negative film still beats 8MP, try to guess how many MP you will need to match technical PAN?

guess how many you need to match techpan in 120? More than any digital out there. Including the hilarious 39MP back. You know, it's not the resolution of digital that turns me off. . .

it's the dead, flat, lifeless look of it. Like a picture that's been bled dry.

 

[Toby]

The bright parts of the digital shots look quite good, but as usual there are some totally black portions which look as if the chip (or the software) simply had given up.
These portions of "absolute black" in digital shots to me look like real holes in an landscape of informations, I cannot get used to it.

When I studied photojournaism Martin Parr was held up to be pretty much at the vanguard of modern british colour photography (I'm sure this had nothing to do with the fact that my tutor was at college with him!). But anyway this modern look was very dependent on the use of fill in flash (In Parr's case mounted often on a Plaubel Makina) so produced a very different type of RF photography like his series on New Brighton The Last Resort (for examples seewww.martinparr.com . What is noticable in the past 20 years a lot of news photography has been done with flash -look at news footage of any press call. So with film cameras fill in flash and negative film had been de rigeur just before the digital revolution. As press photography was one of the first areas to embrace digital the widespread use of fill in flash probably helped flatter digital as it minimised the effect of digital's lack of dynamic range. The average RFF'er is not a fan of flash, and I myself rarely use flash with an RF because it goes against the whole ethos of being less noticable. It is no surprise then that digital is less good at meeting our needs. What RFF members want form digital is on the whole quite different from the needs of flash dependent SLR based photographers. Whilst many of us here strive to go unnoticed photography like Parr's demands quite a high level of aggression to be able to stand close to your subject and blast flash at them. Digital SLR work fits more neatly into this method of working whilst RF's are based upon 1950's technology and a more gentle way of shooting. So I think digital shooting demands a whole different approach to the one that you would favour with a rangefinder camera. It may well be that until the issue of dynamic range is really resolved a digital RF will be of limited use unless flash is used with it and that of course negates the point of using an RF in the first place

 

[Socke]

Kevin, the 5d is what I want. Not for the MPixel since I'm happy with the 6MP I have now from the D60 but for the viewfinder and the fact that I can use a smallish 35/2 for 80% of my shooting.

I'm still undecided since some 3000 Euro for a camera is a lot of money which I might better spend on traveling with what I have now 🙂

The biggest prints I have from my D60 are 30x45 and they look good at reading distance, I can clearly see that I didn't focus properly.

 

[Kevin]

I'll be bled dry soon if no more customers can afford a film-based wedding. And if someone can only shell out a few euros for their studio portraits then they will look dead, flat and lifeless too.

I spend way too much time scanning negatives of images that might not need to be done on film. But if I cannot nicely blow up the best ones to 50x60cm then why should I bother with 8mp?

Nevertheless, scanning is driving me nuts. And I either shell out 1700 euro for a nikon 5000 ED with a rollfilm adapter or buy a pro digital camera. But you say the images look lifeless. Is it true?

I think it is time for bed. Past 1am here now.

 

[Socke]

That's what I like to shoot, same cost, same time, different days 🙂

 

[Bertram2]

In AP 22 April 2006 there is a comparison between the 30D RAW at ISO 400 and the EOS-1V with ISO 400 Negative film, and the the film still exhibits visibly more detail.

So ISO 400 negative film still beats 8MP, try to guess how many MP you will need to match technical PAN?

Technical Pan makes 380lpmm, a theoretical number valid for developing to 100% contrast only . A ISO 400 film achieves something like 70lpmm best case afaik, a good ISO 25 I would estimate at 180 -220.

I am not sure tho if the MP and Lpmm are directly comparable when it comes to "information". In general the whole resolution issue is interesting only related to the enlargement ratio, and the enlargement ratio is only interesting related to a certain viewing distance. And within this framwork of relations there is one thing for sure: You do not need more than you can perceive with your eyes.

As far as I remember you'd need a print 5X3 meters large to make 380 lpmm perceivable for your eyes. Viewing distance best at 15 meter. Well, if you got a real laaaaaarge flat................ 😉


Bertram

 

[Bertram2]

Depending on the crop 50x60 is a 20x enlargement. Back when my father did advertising the photographer he worked with did not more than 15x enlargements from slow B/W and 10x from colour.
They considered 24x36mm suitable for holiday snaps and 6x7 good enough for full magazin pages. A3 and bigger was shot on 9x13 and 13x18.

Yes, and this is still as true as it was in those days , tho films and lenses got better.

Bertram

 

[Andy K]

I'll be bled dry soon if no more customers can afford a film-based wedding. And if someone can only shell out a few euros for their studio portraits then they will look dead, flat and lifeless too.

I spend way too much time scanning negatives of images that might not need to be done on film. But if I cannot nicely blow up the best ones to 50x60cm then why should I bother with 8mp?

Nevertheless, scanning is driving me nuts. And I either shell out 1700 euro for a nikon 5000 ED with a rollfilm adapter or buy a pro digital camera. But you say the images look lifeless. Is it true?

I think it is time for bed. Past 1am here now.

Why not contact print your negs onto a sheet of 8x10 and examine them through a loupe? It is a lot easier on the eyes than looking at a monitor while you scan a whole roll of film.
Even easier make yourself a lightbox and examine the negs on that.

 

[ywenz]

The one in the middle looked really different, but if I had known it is film I had rather said some C41 BW film @ 800 or even 1600. The lack of grain is amazing for a Neopan 1600, scanned with grain redux or neat image in the postprocessing ?

The bright parts of the digital shots look quite good, but as usual there are some totally black portions which look as if the chip (or the software) simply had given up.
These portions of "absolute black" in digital shots to me look like real holes in an landscape of informations, I cannot get used to it.

Regards,
bertram

Bertram: I had processed those digitals in that high contrast fashion. I can bring out much more info than what I've shown in my examples. I'll post a new version later tonight.

The Neopan one is actually 1600 + 1. Below is a slightly larger version. I believe I only adjusted the curves, no noise filters applied because I did not own Noise ninja at the time.