what's the big knock against digital b&w?

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

It´s not silly or dumb, it´s how I want my pictures to look. A tad of texture looks more pleasing than a super clean file, at least to me.

Everything goes, that is digital. If I am happy with the results - or the audience is - perfect.

Who are you to tell me what is silly and dumb?

Who I am is not a secret, I do not hide behind fake internet names, and my work is online for anyone to see.

I stand by what I said. If you like grain, shoot film. There's no reason to falsify your work. Just choose the medium that works for it. I feel the same about people who make blue-toned black and white photos in Photoshop and try to pass them off as 'cyanotypes', or people who add fake film borders to digital photos. Its dishonest, because it implies that the person doing it has skills that they may not have (cyanotypes require a different knowledge and skillset, compared to digifaking it) and not necessary.

 

[dcsang]

I do think adding grain in post processing is silly. (...) and adding it to digital files is just dumb.

It´s not silly or dumb, it´s how I want my pictures to look. A tad of texture looks more pleasing than a super clean file, at least to me.

Everything goes, that is digital. If I am happy with the results - or the audience is - perfect.

Who are you to tell me what is silly and dumb?

Not to step on toes here but Chris' comment is an opinion - that can be seen with his statement (which you quoted) "I do think . . . . " - that's just his opinion on it. Your opinion is different.

No one opinion is "more correct" than the opinion of someone else. 🙂

Cheers,
Dave

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

facinating conversation...

if i were to boil everything that i have just read down to one simple statement it would look something like...'the biggest knock against digital black and white is that...it's not film!

Pretty much. Microwave ovens are not like firewood stoves (either is evil, condescending, etc. etc. depending on who you ask). Digital watches tell the time more cleanly than 10-jewel mechanical pocket watches (either is evil, condescending, etc. etc. depending on who you ask). Whiteboard markers make you write English in a different way than fountain pens.

The list goes on, and the polarized will stick to their guns.

but it's new times and i for one am embracing them.

to each his/her own...

No! Kodachrome is the only true photographic recording medium in the whole history of the world and everything else is wrong. 😱

 

[jsrockit]

Its dishonest, because it implies that the person doing it has skills that they may not have (cyanotypes require a different knowledge and skillset, compared to digifaking it) and not necessary.

I was with you up until this point. However, you seem to be saying that real cyanotypes is a much better and noble process than digital. I've done cyanotypes and they weren't that hard to do. You just paint the emulsion on a piece of paper (after mixing the chemicals required) and then use it. It's not that hard of a process.

While I'm not into "faking" things via software, I have no issue with people who do, nor do I think someone is less relavent because they use software instead of a chemical process.

 

[Teuthida]

The self-righteousness of the Pure must be a heavy burden to bear. The tortured artist lives!

I'm waiting for one of you to cut off your ear and mail it to the forum moderator.

 

[back alley]

This includes a presumption that those who think film looks better are somehow 'in denial', or backward-looking nostalgists, unable or unwilling to face the challenge of "new times".

I come from a digital background, and work every day with digital media, but then I saw the real difference between how film and a digital sensor captures light - especially bright light and abrupt transitions (amongst other differences) - and since then the rubbish I read about how these immense differences are merely a matter of 'taste' or a few clicks of software really incense me. It's as offensive as listening to some oaf in a museum laughing at a Picasso, or saying that "a five year old could paint better".

By all means use digital or film or your iPhone with Hipstamatic (I use all of these), but spare me the sermons.

no sermons here just my take on things...you seem a bit sensitive on this...i make no presumptions but merely state my feelings on the matter...your reply seems closer to a sermon than my stated observation.

 

[willie_901]

The manipulation of a raw RGB data file to produce a B&W image is no differerent than manipulating a the same data to produce a color image. If I prefer low color saturation levels in my color digital images, am I being inauthentic?

Recently I saw a series of digital photos that were produced in the style of large Kodachrome positive film used in the US before and during WW II. Obviously you can't use this medium today. Was the photogographer a fraud because they wanted to produce that look? Should that look never be used again because the original medium is no longer available?

In any case the final result can be clumsy, crude, inappropriate and inelegant. Because the manipulation tools are readily available, the chances of unthoughtful results are high. This does not invalidate aesthetically sophisticated, elegant work.

 

[BobYIL]

The issue of different spectral response is valid, as is the the issue of a sensor's linear exposure curve vs the characteristic curves of various films.

However, this is mostly resolved with a few computer strokes in you favorite film emulation software.

".. resolved with a few computer strokes in your favorite flilm emulation software."

Really? The one on the left will be turned into the one on the right? The physicists and software engineers employed by Canon, Nikon, Sony, Olympus, etc. were tearing themselves to accomplish it. Do you know how the "actual" curve based on the sensor-response curve looks like "with a few computer strokes" in that software?

Leave the overall response curve aside, the individual color curves are to cover a tiny band on the spectrum (shown in my first post), just one tenth of it maybe: Do you know any software to deliver the blue band of Velvia 50 as it is?

 

[mani]

no sermons here just my take on things...you seem a bit sensitive on this...i make no presumptions but merely state my feelings on the matter...your reply seems closer to a sermon than my stated observation.

Well let's leave aside my "personal sensitivity" about the subject, which is really just the usual internet stratagem for side-stepping the issue. I'd be more interested on your comments about the Chumps and Clumps blog article that I linked to earlier in the thread. Seems to me that the differences are more than just "digital isn't film!"

These discussions really do remind me of people who argue that there's absolutely no difference between Thunderbird wine and a really good Burgundy. They personally can't tell the difference, so anyone else who sees it must be bluffing or a fraud.

 

[paulfish4570]

speaking of digital and black and white, what does the "structure" slider in SEP do? i had SEP for trial. some kind of edge sharpening? digital accutance?

 

[dcsang]

These discussions really do remind me of people who argue that there's absolutely no difference between Thunderbird wine and a really good Burgundy. They personally can't tell the difference, so anyone else who sees it must be bluffing or a fraud.

Well, if someone can't tell the difference does it really make a difference to that person? No... .but to the wine connoisseur there's a huge difference and they are the ones that get upset about someone else NOT knowing the difference...

Ignorance is bliss after all 🙂

Cheers,
Dave

 

[dcsang]

speaking of digital and black and white, what does the "structure" slider in SEP do? i had SEP for trial. some kind of edge sharpening? digital accutance?

Paul, my understanding of the "structure" slider is that it handles something like "micro contrast" - so ya... unsharp mask is the best way I could describe it.

Cheers,
Dave

 

[overtoom]

if you dont like digital bw, than its a matter of taste. But if you hate digital bw, you simply have no clue about post processing...

 

[paulfish4570]

thanks, dave. i'd like to have that slider by itself. it seems much more delicate than plain ol' photoshop sharpening tools.

 

[MikeL]

Well let's leave aside my "personal sensitivity" about the subject, which is really just the usual internet stratagem for side-stepping the issue.

Yup.

And thanks for the link to the blog article. It is interesting to see people (e.g. Reichman) build models with insufficient or incorrect information. I know I have.

Reichman's statement at the end of his article is quite funny, in light of his (Reichman, a web expert) potential errors-

"This is why the so-called web forum experts can convince some photographers that bumble bees can't fly... errr... I mean, film can outresolve digital.

 

[DominikDUK]

Nothing wrong with digital B/W but I am with Chris when it comes to "faking" say a cyanotype a blue print does not a cyanotype make or my favourite the pigment print it's an inkjet print a pigment print is something different and was invented some hundred years ago.
Digital can be such a cool tool but it has to be able to stand on its own merits. Adding grain to a digital file is okay imho but again the look is different to real grain one is completely random (Film) and the other is based on an algorithm. If the look fits the picture I don't have a problem with it, if it's meant to confuse people in order to sell it as film based photography then I do have a problem with it, its all in the intention. The digital look can be used to great effect and I am constantly praying that people stop feeling ashamed for using it. If I want the film look I use film, if I want a different look maybe a little futuristic I'd use digital. As I often say digital can create worlds it's not constricted to a single medium it is multimedia but nearly nobody seems to use it for its strenght instead it's used to emulate things that already exist.
I also admit I have seen some extremely beautiful digital B/W work photography and CGI

Dominik

 

[Godfrey]

is it that it looks too clean? no grain? too cold?

i'm serious...
the big knock against the compact disk for music is that there is no warmth...too clean.
is that similar for the digital black & white image?

that would make sense to me...i love digital music, even as a kid i disliked the 'extras' that could be heard on a vinyl record...i like grain in an image but i much prefer that clean, clinical look.
btw, if you have not checked out the b&w digital image thread...you should, some wonderful images in there.

B&W film photography is in the realm of a capture constraint. Most here are very familiar with the characteristics of the medium with regard to spectral and exposure qualities.

B&W digital photography is in the realm of rendering. Exposure and medium response needs are very different, most of the magic happens in the rendering effort, which is digital image processing. This is new to a lot of film photographers and requires the development of new skills both for capture and for rendering.

I've been doing image processing with both scanned B&W film and digital capture for almost 25 years now. There are times when I prefer the look of a particular film and shoot with that for that specific reason, or because I just happen to like using a particular film camera. But overall my end products are indistinguishable between film and digital capture. My 'image vision' encompasses both mediums: when I'm working with digital capture I have much broader processing options, but that's about it. Film is more work to manage, digital takes more vision and skill to get what I want.

I think the 'big knock' is really that people like their film cameras and don't want to give them up. I know I missed my Leica Ms and still miss my Hasselblad 903SWC. The digital cameras that replace them are simply different and somehow never quite the same thing.

And they're not particularly happy with the notion that they need to learn a new way of seeing exposure and rendering their images. People don't like change in their comfort zone ...

 

[dcsang]

thanks, dave. i'd like to have that slider by itself. it seems much more delicate than plain ol' photoshop sharpening tools.

I would agree Paul.
It's "easier" for most people rather than having to fiddle with percentages and such.

Cheers,
Dave

 

[jsrockit]

These discussions really do remind me of people who argue that there's absolutely no difference between Thunderbird wine and a really good Burgundy. They personally can't tell the difference, so anyone else who sees it must be bluffing or a fraud.

The problem is that you think one process is better than the other when they are just different. Film excels in some aspects, digital in others. In your wine analogy, I'm taking it to mean that Thunderbird equals digital and a really good burgundy is film? I'm not so sure the differences between digital and film are that clear cut in quality in 2012. Again, they are just different mediums that each has their own strengths and weaknesses. Plus, taste is always a tricky topic.

 

[Teuthida]

Easy way to settle this whole tired debate:

Have someone post a cross section of digital b&w developed in SEP2 and film shots and see if the film purists can identify which is which. My bet is they won't average better than someone who simply guesses.