Photog buys $100,000 of Velvia 50

I seem to recall when Kodak announced the demise of Ektachrome someone bought up as much stock of 8X10 as they could. I think it was used a lot by art houses for archiving.

There is a great exhibition in London right now of Erwin Blumenthal fashion images, many printed for the first time as the originals were always published in magazines. I was most impressed by the prints from the 40s exposed on 8x10 Kodak transparencies. The detail, the subtleties of light and tone are extraordinary.
 
It's about "the look". A standard lens on an 8x10 is 300mm. A portrait lens is often 450mm or longer. 210mm WA is a popular FL.

Digital imaging doesn't look like film imaging. A good scan of an 8x10 chrome is amazing. I'm in an environment where I see both 8x10 scans and Phase One output. The difference in "look" is vast.

No matter how good digital photography gets, it will likely never look as good as an 8x10 chrome to me. I hope you get the chance to see one before the process vanishes.

Irving Penn and Richard Avedon both used 8x10. They could have used 4x5 in recent years as the repro quality was very good. 8x10 looks very different than, 4x5 when printed. Avedon used 8x10 for his location portrait work. Surely a 4x5 would have been easier to work with.

The citation of day rate was to show that $100K+ in film cost wasn't a big deal for someone making serious money with 8x10.

I think there's a misunderstanding here. I'm quite aware of the difference between digital and film imaging as I do most of my work in 4x5 (neg, not chrome, I hate that stuff). My point with the 5D was not meant as a comparison between film and digital, I was just pointing out that the day rate usually has nothing to do with the equipment used or the cost thereof since that is a different line item on the bill. I agree that $100K in film cost isn't a big deal for a successful photographer, especially since he/she will end up charging the client for it.
But if I would had to take a wild guess I'd say that the guy who bought all that film is probably an avid amateur. There are plenty of amateurs who buy the newest PhaseOne 80mp backs, Alpa cameras with a bunch of lenses and a giant printer simply as their hobby. And I'm not even trying to mock them. If you don't have to make money with it you have the luxury to ask yourself what you want instead of what you need.

As for the difference between 4x5 and 8x10, I don't think it's that significant. I personally would like to shoot 8x10 because I like the bigger ground glass but at the end of the day I just can't justify the cost which starts at the price per sheet but grows exponentially once you factor in processing, and especially scanning since I know no lab that will do an enlarged analogue C-print from an 8x10 neg. And the resolution is not even much better since the slower shutterspeed (longer FLs, less DoF, higher F-stops - you know the drill) leads to more motion blur (wind etc.).
I'm not saying there's no difference at all but I think you can get 90% of the 8x10 look with 4x5, especially with such great modern day emulsions such as Portra 160 and 400.
 
Gregory Crewdson, my vote for the likely buyer, works in 8x10 color. Positive film produces better scans as there is no orange mask and better detail in a chrome.

No way. Firstly, I can't imagine he's ever used Velvia and secondly he seems to have switched to digital. At least that's what he used for Sanctuary.

By the way, in the documentary "How to Make a Book With Steidl" Jeff Wall appears briefly mentioning that he has something like 10000 sheets of color neg film in a freezer.

But at the end of the day I really don't think this film went to anybody well known. I just can't imagine how any self respecting photographer would use Velvia. My guess is that it's going to end up being used for cheesy long exposure photos of seashores during sunset or pictures of the Grand Canyon.
 
The person who bought that film is smart. Velvia 50 is a wonderful film and produces excellent color. Although I haven't used it in the size purchased, I have done some work in medium format with Velvia 50. The resulting images were incredibly good, IMHO. And, it was my film of choice when I shot underwater with my Nikonos V back in the 90's.

I wouldn't worry too much about the film going bad. It's a slow speed film. I've had very good luck with frozen Velvia 50 used years later. Now, OTOH, if Velvia was a very fast film, like the Fuji Nature 1600 I have in my freezer, I'd worry a lot more that it would degrade over the years.

Ellen
 
Really? I've never used the film much, but wouldn't make that statement even if I didn't like the stuff. Please expand on this comment ----

It was just a little joke. I really don't like Velvia at all but I'm sure some people do wonderful work with it and I wouldn't think any less of anyone who used it. I just don't like it because it's way too saturated for my taste and not good for skin tones.
I like Astia the most and still have a bunch of it in 4x5 but I'm not going to buy more. My lab has just hiked up the prices for E6 and my Epson scanner just isn't good enough for slides. Plus I just very much prefer the look of neg film.
 
I doubt this guy will loose any money on this purchase...I can only image what this film will go for once it's gone and this guy has a stock pile of it...
If he doesn't use it all he can sell it...
Look at the going price for Polaroid film these day...unbelievable...

I've used it in 35mm (still have 28 rolls of the original 50asa), have a few rolls of 120 and have used it in 4x5 but don't have anymore of that..it's beautiful film...
 
I worry that there's some speculation going on here but being disguised as something else.

Cynical I realise! 😀
 
Wow that's commitment to your art. I see it will last him 10 years, I hope he remembers to buy the chemicals....

E-6 chemical makeup is well documented.

does slide film even last that long? probably get some even more funky colors than the usual velvianess 😉

No, it self-destructs after 2 years.
 
And the resolution is not even much better since the slower shutterspeed (longer FLs, less DoF, higher F-stops - you know the drill) leads to more motion blur (wind etc.).

Somewhat disagree. Let's take a typical Nikkor-W 300mm f/5.6 lens, RVP50 at EI50. Let's go with 1/250 just to be somewhat reasonable given the FL. Full sunlit conditions would provide f/16@1/50th, f/11@1/100, f8@1/200, f5.6@1/400. Granted, when the light gets worse, the SS will be lower than the FL - but these cameras aren't being hand-held, ever. Unless the subject matter is trees in windy conditions, I don't think motion blur/wind are a good enough justification for 8x10's resolution being "not even much better" than 4x5.

I'm not saying there's no difference at all but I think you can get 90% of the 8x10 look with 4x5, especially with such great modern day emulsions such as Portra 160 and 400.

Yeah, well, the guys want to shoot 8x10 and I support them in their efforts. Some people also exclusively shoot 8x10 in black and white because it makes a great contact printing medium with incredible detail. Provided 4x5 images are sharp, and 8x10 images are sharp (on the film), you're looking at 4x the resolution for the same scene - so no, it's not 90% the same. In fact, let's just chuck 40 lp/mm out there for RVP50 (even though it's peak is much higher). That's 2kdpi (25.4*40*2), and we know the film is capable of more than this, but anyway: 320 raw megapixels (2000^2*8*10) in the basic 40 lp/mm case. Yes, I know it's just a figure, and not what film is about, but there's some ridiculous detail in 8x10 (and 4x5 for that matter) and this is with a pretty conservative lp/mm figure.

Jamie123 said:
I just can't imagine how any self respecting photographer would use Velvia.

Please - you may not like it, but it's not a crap film or even over-saturated in any kind of ghoulish way. Took a gander at any digital photography lately?
 
I didn't know photographers had that much money. I'd guess it was an amateur infatuated with it whose ego likes the idea he has the last batch, and he could break even on it if he wants to sell it off. Of course if it were a paid photographer, he'd be laying claim to an exclusive "look" for the rest of this decade with it.
 
Somewhat disagree. Let's take a typical Nikkor-W 300mm f/5.6 lens, RVP50 at EI50. Let's go with 1/250 just to be somewhat reasonable given the FL. Full sunlit conditions would provide f/16@1/50th, f/11@1/100, f8@1/200, f5.6@1/400. Granted, when the light gets worse, the SS will be lower than the FL - but these cameras aren't being hand-held, ever. Unless the subject matter is trees in windy conditions, I don't think motion blur/wind are a good enough justification for 8x10's resolution being "not even much better" than 4x5.

You're missing the point. For the same scene where I'd use f16 on 4x5 with a 150mm lens I need at least f32 on 8x10 with a 300mm lens to achieve the same Dof. That's a two stop difference. This might not be that relevant when it's 1/500th vs 1/125th but personally I'm used to shooting less than fully sunlit conditions so often it would be the difference between 1/4th vs 1s. Most of the times there's something in the frame that can move in the wind. And that's not even including portraits where you might be using sligthly larger apertures but where movement is even more of a problem.



Yeah, well, the guys want to shoot 8x10 and I support them in their efforts. Some people also exclusively shoot 8x10 in black and white because it makes a great contact printing medium with incredible detail. Provided 4x5 images are sharp, and 8x10 images are sharp (on the film), you're looking at 4x the resolution for the same scene - so no, it's not 90% the same. In fact, let's just chuck 40 lp/mm out there for RVP50 (even though it's peak is much higher). That's 2kdpi (25.4*40*2), and we know the film is capable of more than this, but anyway: 320 raw megapixels (2000^2*8*10) in the basic 40 lp/mm case. Yes, I know it's just a figure, and not what film is about, but there's some ridiculous detail in 8x10 (and 4x5 for that matter) and this is with a pretty conservative lp/mm figure.

Who are "the guys" you're talking about??? I've never mentioned any guys. Are we talking about the same thing???
You can list numbers all you want and I'm quite aware of the theoretical differences in resolution given two differently sized sheets of the same emulsion. My point was that in the real world one is often faced with conditions that will drastically reduce the theoretical advantage of 8x10.


Please - you may not like it, but it's not a crap film or even over-saturated in any kind of ghoulish way. Took a gander at any digital photography lately?

Please - read my previous comment on this in reply to PKR. I did concede that it's not a crap film but that I just really don't like it. It's over-saturated and that's enough for me not to like it, whether or not you want to call it "ghoulish". I happen to look at a lot of digital photography aswell as film photography. As far as I can tell there's no correlation between digital photography and over-saturation.
 
I see what you mean. I guess they assume men are the only ones crazy enough to make this type of purchase. 🙂

Gregory Crwedson.

It's what he shoots. He explained it in an article some time ago. He is a prominently featured photographer on the BBC documentary The Genius of Photography. The other possibility is Jeff Wall.
 
Gregory Crwedson.

It's what he shoots. He explained it in an article some time ago. He is a prominently featured photographer on the BBC documentary The Genius of Photography. The other possibility is Jeff Wall.

Yes, they both make sense being conceptual and all... I would imagine, at least with Crewdson, that he spends a lot of cash on many things other than film to get what he wants.
 
Back
Top Bottom