what's considered a digital looking image?

[Ranchu]

Tonality is flat from a to z, image is very hard looking and colors are flat patches with no gradient. Shadow transitions look bad because channels get noisy at different rates.

 

[redisburning]

Keith to be fair SPP is doing the same edge effect manipulation to the data from your camera.

you can emulate clarity by simply doing a USM at something like 20 15 0 with a mid-tone luminosity mask and afaik that's about how it actually works.

 

[Keith]

Keith to be fair SPP is doing the same edge effect manipulation to the data from your camera.

you can emulate clarity by simply doing a USM at something like 20 15 0 with a mid-tone luminosity mask and afaik that's about how it actually works.

I agree and I stay well away from the sharpness slider in SPP. I think for me digital has too much base sharpness generally from most of the cameras out there.

 

[Stephen G]

Linear tone curve with blown highlights, especially the sky.

 

[crsantin]

I shoot both film and digital though my preference is for film. Hard to describe other than I prefer the way film renders an image. Digital looks too sharp and too vivid. Blue skies in a digital photograph can tend to look too saturated...now sometimes I like this look and that's why I might shoot digital. Digital can look a bit flat, as in two dimensional, where film images look like they have depth to them, like they are alive. I'm not talking about dynamic range or tonal range, some digital photos actually look very flat. But I've taken bad photos in either medium. 🙂 Digital can look great too and I've certainly taken and printed digital photos that I am quite pleased with. I see no reason why a photographer can't use both.

 

[willie_901]

Plastic is just a pejorative term used to insult others' work. Rarely does the term apply. Most people wouldn't use the term to someone face-to-face.

Most of the time truly awful images from digital cameras aren't even commented upon because they are so bad. Inexperienced people misuse parameters applied to automatically rendered in-camera jpegs and to raw files as well. Many of use get better, some never do.

Equally pointless and pejorative adjectives could be applied to technically inferior analog prints from analog media. Before 2001 there were millions of these printed everywhere by automated and poorly maintained equipment. And inexperienced people can produce unattractive results in wet chemistry darkrooms.

Of course most images we see from analog media are digitized. So these images can be insulted without cause as well.

 

[f16sunshine]

It's funny to say plastic now as it usually is a negative.
It seems like it used to be a word to describe a lens with a lifelike 3D kind of output.
I remember seeing "plastic" used in old photo magazines my mentor gave me when I was a kid getting started.
I still have a couple of those around. Lotsa old nakey girly pictures in the back 😛
Silly

 

[mfogiel]

No matter which way you look at it, digital images lack the bit depth of film ( I would exclude the slides, that can have a digital-like problem too). What it means, is that no amount of curve manipulation will ADD the tonal detail, that is not there. If you have ever looked at a histogram of Tri X well exposed and developed, you will have noticed a dome full of tiny scales. When you adjust the tonal values, these tiny scales open up a bit, but you still have lots of intermediate values to avoid posterization effects. In digital, this is not true, particularly in the highlights, for reasons described above. This is not to say, that I think digital will ALWAYS be inferior to film, because you can already see improvements, when you look at some more advanced sensors: Leica Monochrom, S2, MF digital backs come to my mind in particular. I think that by the time digital sensors will have 24bit depth per channel, the game will be over.

 

[Contarama]

Highlight roll off is what I have always thought about when considering a digital versus film image. Maybe that is a way to differentiate a digital image from a film image. Film seems to be way better at that. The old Fuji S5 Pro though handles it much better than other conventional sensors which begs the question why did Fuji mothball that weird sensor it seems something game changing to use that worn out cliche...along the lines of the Sigma sensor.

 

[Photo_Smith]

Plastic is just a pejorative term used to insult others' work. Rarely does the term apply. Most people wouldn't use the term to someone face-to-face.

I disagree, it's no insult and I have used it face to face to describe the aesthetic commonly used in women's magazines.
Take a look at a copy of Vogue or Harpers from the 1970's and 80's then look at those magazines from the last few years.

This kind of thing is what most people call plastic

In reality I see this type of image, transforms a normal skin tone into a detail less 'glow' that no foundation could ever aspire to.

So it's not just a snide insult rather a very real aesthetic.

 

[Ronald M]

Any poorly processed digital file looks digital.

There is a skill much like darkroom has a special skill. There is no burning in highlights as they are gone just like slide film. So you use care in exposure not to overexpose, then resort to shadow recovery or HDR. So it is unlike negative film where shadows can not be recovered. Do not mention pushing in development, I know better.

If you want grain, it can be added, large or small, sharp or soft, mono or color. Take care to use "blend if" to keep it from the shadows and highlights.

Want a mushy low resolution print, that is possible also.

I love being able to get medium/large format quality from a hand camera. The image can again be downgraded if you want. Any degree of downgrade is possible. I am using Leica M9 and D800 Nikon. I could only dream of this 50+ years back when I started.

If your prints look plastic, it is your fault. Learn color management and profile the cameras and printers. I send out files to a laser printer who prints on Kodak Pro paper, not the high contrast junk found in many places. A well done digital print looks better than a film print or the same .

How else can I tell a digital print? HDR over processed. High contrast or high color saturation. Calibrate your monitor. There is no shortcut just as there are no shortcuts in a darkroom. There is much more to learn and you need to learn it all and the prints will look good, better than film. If not, well garbage in, garbage out.

 

[raytoei@gmail.com]

a bit like porn isn't it ? i can't differentiate
it but i know a digital image versus a film
image when I see one.

 

[CK Dexter Haven]

• Too 'realistic.' I like photography because it's an 'impression' of reality. Not so different from how painters developed a style that was deliberately non-realist.

• 'Too' sharp? If your visual reference is film, anything that's sharper than that probably seems artificially so. And, the same probably holds for different formats of film, or even different films. I like Tri-X, from 35mm to 120. I don't really like it in 4x5+, because the grain isn't there. Maybe digital is smooth like large format. Which may not make it 'non-filmlike,' but may make LF-like, which may be aesthetically objectionable for some people.

• White Balanced. I like what varying temperatures of light do to film. Digital people tend to scrape away that 'character,' and all light looks neutral. "Neutral" can mean 'sterile' or 'clinical.'
http://pennstatermag.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/mccurry.jpg
It's cold. And, the people are not 'well exposed.' And, it's evocative and atmospheric because of it.
http://www.google.com/imgres?q=stev...page=5&tbnh=172&tbnw=236&ndsp=26&tx=109&ty=88
It's warm. And, it has a sense of time because of it.

http://b.vimeocdn.com/ts/335/018/335018080_640.jpg
If this had been shot in digital, there would probably be a tendency to re-shoot it, and get 'better' exposure on the bodies/faces. But, this way, it's more graphic and impactful. Not safe. Not sterile. It might be regarded, technically, as a mistake, but somehow it seems honest, and it's evocative.

• "Plastic?" We've seen that kind of smoothing done with film. But, yeah — skin can look like vinyl. Like a mannequin.

 

[thegman]

Digital looking for me is probably:

1) Bad highlights
2) High ISO noise
3) And oddly, I associate camera shake with digital, I guess because if you're shooting a sunset with film, you're almost certainly using a tripod, with digital you could try to get away with 16,000 ISO, and probably still get shake.

I agree with the white balance thing too from CK Dexter Haven, digital photos are often 'accurately' exposed, with 'correct' colour, but so often inaccurate exposure and colour looks so much better.

 

[alistair.o]

i get confused sometimes...

too smooth? Some say that about Ilford Delta 400
grainless? Some say/said that about Efke film
higher contrast? Some say that about asph lenses on TriX 400
crisper blacks & whites? Some say that about Fuji Neopan 100 & 400 RIP

can we be specific and not wander off into the moral netherland please?

See above for my remarks. Also, with regard to the last point Joe, it is virtually impossible so to do!

What 'you' are trying to do is lay down distance markers and yet it is a fast moving target called inovation. With modern products such as SilverEfexPro, it is quite possible to get as close to film monochrome to fool the 'experts'. As for the general public, they want to see pictures that will make them go 'Wow!'

It is a very small group of people who care what the medium is and is quite possible to get so trammelled by this question/arguement that we are unable to be free.

 

[thegman]

See above for my remarks. Also, with regard to the last point Joe, it is virtually impossible so to do!

What 'you' are trying to do is lay down distance markers and yet it is a fast moving target called inovation. With modern products such as SilverEfexPro, it is quite possible to get as close to film monochrome to fool the 'experts'. As for the general public, they want to see pictures that will make them go 'Wow!'

It is a very small group of people who care what the medium is and is quite possible to get so trammelled by this question/arguement that we are unable to be free.

No question that what you are saying is correct. I will disagree on a couple of points though:

I don't think SilverEfexPro and the like can be considered innovation really, all it's really doing is making digital photos look like film photos, so it's probably better described as a fix for a problem that was introduced by digital. i.e we had film cameras, digital came along, and people preferred the way film photos looked enough to buy software to make their digital photos look like film. So really, it's correcting a deficiency that was not there in the first place with film.

Don't get me wrong, I think digital can look fantastic by not looking like film, but if you're trying make digital look like film, really you're correcting a fault which did not exist before.

Second, I'm not 100% sure it's that small a group who care about medium. I guess many art collectors will care if something is an oil painting or an inkjet print. I'm not a collector, or even a decent photographer, but I care if I'm looking at a 4x5 film shot or a digital shot, why? I don't know really, but I do. Much like I care if a watch is quartz or mechanical, they look the same, but sometimes we just prefer a certain way of doing things.

I like that my whisky has sat in a barrel for 16 years on a Scottish island, and even if you could replicate it perfectly with chemicals and treatments in an hour, authenticity can have it's own value even if that value is purely emotional.

 

[clayne]

 

[lcpr]

A good point of reference on the aesthetic differences between film and digital would be Salgado's Genesis project - the exhibition in London has massive film and digital b/w prints displayed alongside each other, both mediums were printed in a darkroom, with the digital files being transferred over to celluloid before being hand printed (I have the book but I haven't gone over it yet). The differences were there - film was slightly grainier and impressionistic while digital had a certain acuity that almost seemed hyperreal, which falls in line with the way each medium interprets light. Tonally they were subtly different too, I found that the digital images were a tad more silvery and metallic looking in the midtones. Both mediums looked excellent though, and the non-photographers I went with couldn't initially tell the difference until I pointed out certain details. I think one mistake that many people make is that they take the best examples from film and compare it to the ugliest trends in photography, which is why Genesis is a good reference point as it is one photographer with a consistent vision being applied to one project that has to be linked aesthetically as well as thematically. It also shows us what each medium is capable of in a top of the line process.

 

[jsrockit]

I think one mistake that many people make is that they take the best examples from film and compare it to the ugliest trends in photography...

I agree. Film photography has had a long and impressive history. Digital's history is still being made...and sorted out (it'll take time).

It seems to me that new photographers associate film with "cool" these days because digital is too pedestrian. They think that using film will give them the extra edge in being an "artist." A lot of digital vs. film myths come from beginners who are informed by the internet and buy into the BS. However, it's a proven fact that both digital and film produce wonderful images. Any bias towards either is that person's problem to deal with because most of the world doesn't care about which medium you used... Good work is good work.

 

[Michael Markey]

I was concerned when this thread started that it was going to go the usual way
It hasn`t and instead has been both informative and has clarified much of my own thoughts regarding the differences between the two .

I use both but have a bias towards film ...don`t see it as a problem.
Happy to have the choice.