medium format vs. 35mm, honest opinions.....

I use both of those formats all the time. I also print a lot of 5x7 test prints. There is little to distinguish between 35mm and 6x4.5 at this size. Sure the MF will be smoother but is not that noticeable.
 
bwcolor said:
Sorry, not buying the above. There isn't "color" film. There are many color films. I don't really know what to say about the iPhone, but I shoot a good bit more 35mm than MF, but not because it approaces MF in quality, but because it is good enough for what I am doing. I suspect that there isn't a generic 5"x7" print either.
Click to expand...
To me, a generic 5x7" color print would be 300 DPI. There are a lot of high end machines (lambda, lightjet, etc) that print at less than that. Because the RA4 process is not as sharp as B&W fiber, even traditional optical color printing is around that ballpark.

An iPhone image is 370 DPI at 5x7... With a standard inkjet, or digital-to-RA4 (eg, Adoramapix), you will not see a sharpness advantage to using 35mm or MF instead of the iPhone. Obviously there are other advantages to film (selective focus, manual control). The point is, 5x7 is absolutely tiny, and you should not make format decisions based on achieving sharpness at 5x7. Your phone has enough sharpness.

Yes, there are many color films, and they all can print to 5x7 without breaking a sweat. 300 DPI at 5x7 means your 35mm film only has to achieve 30 lp/mm, but nearly all of them can do more than twice that. So don't go choosing this film over that because you're worried about printing at 5x7. They can all make nice 5x7s.
 
Last edited:
If you want to use one specification and ignore other qualities of the film/format/sensor, then you have come to a good conclusion. The answer to the original question is difficult to answer in the abstract. I just shot my first and last Fuji Pro 800Z in 35mm. I find that higher ISO color films look much better in larger formats, even when viewing smaller prints when printed on my Canon pigment ink printer. Of course, the lenses are slower and depth of field reduced in MF. That said, I would need to view the prints critically to note the difference. Shoot your iPhone in poor light without a flash and you might not be so happy with the results. Repeat the above with low ISO materials and print to 5"x7" and I would probably be hard pressed to see a difference, but the film and digital would still appear differently, especially in B&W. Depth of field would vary at a give aperture based on format size. Print everything at the local drugstore and I'm not sure what you have. Anyway, if you shoot low ISO and print to 5x7, I doubt that there would be much of a difference when printing in a hybrid workflow.
 
When I was doing a "people at work" project, I'd typically have 5x7 color prints made, seek out the subject pictured, and give them a print. I was using several cameras, including Minolta CLE, Contax G2, Bronica RF645, and Fuji GA645W. Film was Fuji 400H or 800Z.

With the 800Z, the 35mm and 645 prints were fairly easy to distinguish, so I mostly restricted it to the 645 rigs with their slower lenses. So a 645 print from 800Z was still "richer" looking than a 35mm print from 400H, same when both were from 400H.

I wouldn't claim to be able to take a random stack of 5x7 prints and separate them 100% into 35 and 645 stacks. They're both very good. But the 645 ones generally have something extra, even at that modest print size.
 
The "average" viewer, being an ordinary non-photographer? I'd say no chance, I find non-photographers don't notice very much about the technical quality of shots. I consider that a good thing, it's us lot that pixel peep (or grain peep), not the average viewer.

I just ordered a load of 6x4 prints for a holiday photo album, at the that size I don't expect to be able to tell the difference between my film shots and my girlfriend's digital P&S shots, let alone different sizes of film.
 
If you wet print, you will see a difference even between a 6x7 and 4x5 negative on a 5x7 print, in fact, you would even see a difference between a 4x5 enlargement and a contact print from a 5x7 negative. However, if you print on an inkjet, things will get a little muddy, because the finest detail will be killed off at a certain point. To answer your question in simple terms: if technical quality is your main goal, then choose the biggest format camera that you can use without compromising on the photo content, on the other hand, if the photo content is your main goal, then chose the format which is acceptable given the type of camera which suits you best.
 
For a wet B+W print, using sharp film and a good lens, no question. A trick I quite like is a 3x print off 56x72mm (Linhof's version of 6x7 cm), which if done right can be indistinguishable from a whole plate (6-1/2 x 8-1/2 inch) contact print. Off 43x56mm a 3x print would be 127 x 168mm, or 5 x 6-2/3 inches, near enough half-plate (4-3/4 x 6-1/2 inches). From 35mm, it´s near enough a postcard. Much above 3x, they all start looking like enlargements, though the larger format will normally give better quality.

A non-photographer might not be able to put the difference into words, but they'd probably spot that there was a difference.

Note however that I am talking about top-quality wet printing, not inkjets or commercial colour. For those, the difference is probably visible some of the time but not always.

Cheers,

R.
 
It's not only about format. The lenses have to be excellent as well in order to make use of the format.
The reason why I do not use medium format any more are the impudent prices the local labs ask for development. (And I do not have a constant darkroom.)
 
northeast16th said:
would an average viewer be able to tell a difference in quality at 5x7 at normal viewing distance? just curious to those who have used both formats.
Click to expand...
Yes, no doubt whatsoever. I've shot on 6x6 and 35mm film and the difference is there at every print size. MF's biggest forte is skin tones in portraits. There's a smoothness on prints cropped to 3:2 format from 6x6 compared to straight 35mm film that gets noticed by non-photo-savvy people.

Digital has closed the gap somewhat, the color and detail processing in portrait modes takes the harshness out of the image without doing away with the detail. But still, 6x6 remains easier to get good images out of. To be honest though, I've sold my MF gear a couple of years ago because of the convenience of small format.
 
It's been shown again and again that most (not all, most) good MF lenses are capable of considerably less absolute resolution (in lp or cycles/mm) than most (not all, most) good 35mm lenses. And it has been shown again and again that it is very straightforward to make a really good 35mm system resolve as much total detail as a decent MF system.

Yet most everyone agrees that even pretty good MF prints often look better than outstanding 35mm prints.

Why should this be?

I strongly suspect that the perceived difference has more to do with what happens at the scanning or printing stage than at the initial capture stage. It is *not* necessarily the case that the MF negative holds more detail information, as mentioned above. Rather, MF is simply more demanding of enlargers and scanners, and requires considerably better technique. With MF you can get away with worse exposure, worse scanning, more dust, more scratches, worse enlarging lenses, less accurate enlarger focus, and still pull out a terrific print. With 35mm, every defect in the image is more apparent, and the human eye is incredibly sensitive to even small anomalies in image structure.
 
...I think the "average viewer" would notice something, but not really know what it was. I've had plenty of people look at my prints and say "what was this shot with? It looks different/better" when it was with medium format.

Either way, if you're seriously considering just 5x7 prints, you're really limiting yourself. If it's a theoretical question, I'm not really sure what the purpose is as I know no photographer just making 5x7 prints. I personally only do 8x10 for workprints and then print at 11x14, 16x20 or 20x24. All of which, 35mm and medium format can handle.
 
I don´t know what it is, but I tend to think that MF prints in certain cases have a certain 3D feeling to them (if well composed, exposed and discerningly focused) that is not apparent on enlargements from 35mm. That and a smoother tonal graduation. But then again I don´t subscribe to 6x4.5, if I´m to bother with MF at all I prefer 6x6 and bigger.
 
semilog said:
It's been shown again and again that most (not all, most) good MF lenses are capable of considerably less absolute resolution (in lp or cycles/mm) than most (not all, most) good 35mm lenses. And it has been shown again and again that it is very straightforward to make a really good 35mm system resolve as much total detail as a decent MF system.
Click to expand...

Sure, if the lens is the limiting factoring. Shooting with faster film though, grain often limits the amount of perceivable detail. Once you hit that point, MF wins.

I can see your argument if we're talking about using a tripod with iso 50 or film but with 400, I don't think lens resolution is necessarily the gating factor.
 
at 5 by 7, who would really care about the slight differences (in MF's favor); who would care at thumbprint size either.

BUT the main difference is when you enlarge. A 6 by 6 negative will not break up, but continue to give ever more detail, tones, resolution until you are above 30 by 30 inches or thereabouts, while the 35mm can possibly do 12 by 18 max (without scanning and fractals ..)

So, if you want really good large prints: forget about 35mm even with Zeiss/Leica glass. For 5 by 7, who cares.

And to boot, who actually cares about ho-hum pics anyway. A terrific capture on 35mm will still shine at 20 by 30 inches while a blah 6 by 6 stays blah even at 12 by 12.
 
I am using a Contax G1 setup (4 lenses) in 135 and a Rolleicord V with a Xenar 75/3.5 in MF (I also have a Mamiya 330f setup with 3 lenses, but that is semi-retired right now due to weight). Using Nikon IV scanner for the 35mm and a Epson 4990 for the MF and Kodak 100 speed slide film (E100/Elite) in both. From my experience it matters on 5*7.

Subtle nuances in green tones (e.g. grass or foliage) can be quite mushy on 135, they are way better reproduced from the Rollei.

For 135 film, the Nikon scanner beats the Epson by a long margin.
 
i like to think that i don't notice the difference in formats on flickr, but somehow it even seems possible to notice on a computer monitor. if you get rid of the distinctive frames of large format, and hasselblad with its double V's on one side, or square vs. rectangle, etc, it still seems possible to notice a difference, so i'm not surprised so many are coming back saying it will be noticeable at 5x7 on an actual print.

granted, there are so many factors with scanning that a large format can look like crap and 35mm can look great, but for someone who knows how to scan, large format just pops, even on a monitor.

so, like someone said, size does matter.....

i would love to shoot large format, but the inconvenience is just too much to deal with when outdoors as compared to a tlr with a 500th shutter speed.
 
Dear ne16th,

When the same lenses, same film and same settings were used to shoot both pictures, the DOF on the MF would be quite different from the DOF on the 35mm. It would be much shallower.

Usually that is one of aspects I look for when judging a picture, how does the DOF look. And differences are quite distuingishable.
 
northeast16th said:
for those who have used both medium format and 35mm, give me your honest opinion on this:

say you shoot 35mm and enlarge to 5x7, and you shoot 6x4x5 and enlarge to 5x7. say the lenses were, for all intents and purposes, identical in quality and characteristics. same film, same subject, same developments etc etc etc.

would an average viewer be able to tell a difference in quality at 5x7 at normal viewing distance? just curious to those who have used both formats.

cheers.....

ne16th
Click to expand...

Average viewer? no.
They may like one over the other, but they won't be able to tell you which one is which, or why.

Non-average viewer (meaning has spent considerable amount of time thinking and doing *film* photography) however, will definitely be able to pick some things up.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom