The Davinator
Forum Pro
- Messages
- 24,707
- Solutions
- 2
- Reaction score
- 37,836
We all know steak is better ;-)
-
Welcome to the new forums! Please read this first. For known issues we are working to resolve, click here.
The unmatched advantages of Film
- Thread starter noel58
- Start date
jack1000
Leading Member
Digital is expedient and provides an an immediacy adored by an ADD dominated population. Digital is highly marketable and accessible to the masses. Digital has provided a new stream of revenue in what was an otherwise fairly stagnant industry. Money talks.
Better is a relative term. Film is different. The downside to digital photography is simply when all is said and done after 20 years it does not produce a significantly better end product- i.e. a 20x24 exhibition print- different, not better. Particularly when focusing on B&W.
With TV the changes afforded through digital technical advances are so glaringly obvious to the eye and ear it's mind boggling. A top of the line 35" Sony tube attached to a VCR with a 5.1 surround audio is left in the garage when compared to a new Sony 52" LCD attached to a Blu-Ray player with a 7.1 DTS Master Audio compliant receiver.
As for the constant mentions regarding the glories of Kodachrome- only 25 was special, and once I stepped up to medium format- not even an option- and that was over a quarter century ago . Once Velvia came along Kodak could have stopped making film altogether.
Chris59
Forum Pro
What Scott wrote is that it wasn't digital that killed Kodachrome, it was slow speed Fuji film (which was used by professional and commercial photographers) and that it is only "amateurs" who think it was the advent of digital and bemoan the fact.
It seems like a good "story" to say that digital killed Kodachrome but the truth is that it was in decline well before this and perhaps the most that can be said is that digital hastened its demise.
Mark Smith145430
Veteran Member
Sorry you can't fix film in sulphuric acid, don't even try– the chemical you need is sodium thiosulfate.
Which some folks call white vinegar the concentration is 2 per cent not 28 stop bath is harmless-you do eat vinegar?
Well developer itself can be coffee (phenols), vitamin C etc sure you'll need a final p.h of 8-11 so it must be alkaline normally Borax is used as a buffer, something washing powders use after use most developers are oxidised and fairly neutral p.h wise.
I'm not impressed by your lack of knowledge of the photographic process, honestly if you drive a car or wash your clothes or even clean your toilet you're poluting the environment more than developing a film.
Being a consumer of any electronic product is not 'green'.
onlooker
Senior Member
Pity there isn't a button "Favorite" besides just "Ignore".
Luke Kaven
Veteran Member
I have one perhaps non-typical reason for being nostalgic for film, and that is that with a digital camera I am forced to use one kind of "film" from one source--the camera manufacturer.
apaflo
Senior Member
What an odd view! With film you put a roll in the camera... and every shot on the roll is the same film and will be processed in the same way. With digital every single shot can be a different film and each can have different processing too.
You don't have to shoot either JPEG or with the defaults set by the manufacturer, you know...
Jake Loves Good Glass
Senior Member
which I am not sure is actually an accurate figure, but we will say that it did. From what I remember, 12-14 stops was the standard for most color negative films, but that isn't really important either. In most cases, to view your images you make prints. None of this mattered because optical printing methods on paper only yield 5-7 stops of information. So yes, you have 12+ stops at your disposal, but you can only view a fraction of the dynamic range in any one image without creative dodging and burning or other editing methods. This is true with digital too. You can go in, manipulate curves, dodge, burn what ever makes you happy and have a more desirable representation of the dynamic range in the file. The end result, in print, comes down to the skill of the photographer and the processing. A properly shot image + skilled processing will yield a very good looking image...oh yeah, and it won't be as much of a nightmare as trying to get good quality prints from slide in the high days of kodachrome which predates good drum scanners and relied on analogue printing methods.
If you were the guy that collected slides to torture family members with for visits, then slide was just fine, but if you were an average shooter that needed prints then kodachrome was not really the answer.
Don't get me wrong. I still have some love for my old shots on kodachrome 25 and 64, but I don't try and fool myself into thinking that they yielded better results than my current dSLR's. You just had to pay more attention and try and work out exposure more accurately in camera, which is a practice that seems to be escaping many nowadays.
--
Wow...that's a pretty killer camera! Are you any good?
-Jake-
If you were the guy that collected slides to torture family members with for visits, then slide was just fine, but if you were an average shooter that needed prints then kodachrome was not really the answer.
Don't get me wrong. I still have some love for my old shots on kodachrome 25 and 64, but I don't try and fool myself into thinking that they yielded better results than my current dSLR's. You just had to pay more attention and try and work out exposure more accurately in camera, which is a practice that seems to be escaping many nowadays.
--
Wow...that's a pretty killer camera! Are you any good?
-Jake-
Chris59
Forum Pro
To my mind, this was the overriding advantage of film - the ability to purchase the newest technology (sharper, cleaner, better colour) "sensor" without having to purchase another camera.
Luke Kaven
Veteran Member
Of course. I'm being a little tongue-in-cheek. There are moments though when I'd like a choice of sensor technology without being married to any particular manufacturer or sensor. My Nikon Fs didn't need Nikon film, and by gum, I liked it that way.
What an odd view! With film you put a roll in the camera... and every shot on the roll is the same film and will be processed in the same way. With digital every single shot can be a different film and each can have different processing too.
You don't have to shoot either JPEG or with the defaults set by the manufacturer, you know...
I also think that, with 24 or 36 potential pictures in the camera, we were forced to focus more and try to make the best shots we could. Digital is very flexible, but it can encourage sloppiness as we can immediately check the picture and discard it with no regret, or crop and PP it to death if we choose to keep it.
T3 funny thing we are agreeing dang I must be slipping in my dotage.
Seriously I think its time to put the get it all in the camera and no post processing philosophy behind us, and recognize the camera and computer and printer are integral and necessary part of the photographic experience. YOu cannot avoid post processing. Getting framing and exposure and focus "right in the camera is a good beginning but without the post camera work its not finished.
--
bosjohn aka John Shick [email protected]
Hello noel58,
That is one thing about digital that I hated, before finally taking the plunge with Fujifilm's S5 Pro. I hated that stark "transition" in the highlights with digital; that digital look. Thank goodness Fujifilm came up with a double sensor design to accommodate highlights.
You can see an example below, and check out thread, I linked below, for further information if you would like:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1018&message=33920123
Take care,
Huy
That is one thing about digital that I hated, before finally taking the plunge with Fujifilm's S5 Pro. I hated that stark "transition" in the highlights with digital; that digital look. Thank goodness Fujifilm came up with a double sensor design to accommodate highlights.
You can see an example below, and check out thread, I linked below, for further information if you would like:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1018&message=33920123
Take care,
Huy
Jake Loves Good Glass
Senior Member
I think that this was true when the S5 came out, but I think that it has either been matched or surpassed by standard CMOS sensors and AD converters in the last couple of generations of Canon and Nikon bodies...most likely true in Sony and Pentax as well.
These types of results looks as though they would be completely possible with my D300. All the images that you provide prove is that some good curve adjustment was made and you ended up with a happy middle ground image with detail in highlight and shadows.
Not knocking the image, it is good. Just saying that this sort of result is really a norm now with new cameras.
S5 was always a very nice camera.
--
Wow...that's a pretty killer camera! Are you any good?
-Jake-
These types of results looks as though they would be completely possible with my D300. All the images that you provide prove is that some good curve adjustment was made and you ended up with a happy middle ground image with detail in highlight and shadows.
Not knocking the image, it is good. Just saying that this sort of result is really a norm now with new cameras.
S5 was always a very nice camera.
--
Wow...that's a pretty killer camera! Are you any good?
-Jake-
M
Marcamera
Guest
I thought so too, for the longest time.
But, when you look through flickr, pbase, or any other on-line site, you can see that the sites are polluted with pictures, I mean literally: polluted. I am certain that digital has produced a whole new category of shooters, those to whom pressing the shutter is reason enough to keep and post the picture.
At the same time digital has allowed for an explosion of creativity, there are so many excellent pictures. Pictures I would not even dream about taking.
I think now that the liberty of re-taking pictures, at will, at no cost, results in pictures we would not have taken with film. We would not even know to re-take them.
All in all, progress.
Rgds
Helllo Jake Loves Good Glass,
I definitely appreciate your input, and especially the way you presented your opinion. My own guess at this point, without any test, is that I don't think it's possible with other cameras, the latitude/recoverability of overexposures. I don't have a D300, so I really can't test it. I'll have to borrow my brother's D90(?) and do some test just for kicks.
Take care,
Huy
P.S. There was actually a thread about the Dynamic Range of DSLRs (albeit jpeg engine, and not from RAW conversion) here, from which the other link I had provided, also came from:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1018&message=33893506
I definitely appreciate your input, and especially the way you presented your opinion. My own guess at this point, without any test, is that I don't think it's possible with other cameras, the latitude/recoverability of overexposures. I don't have a D300, so I really can't test it. I'll have to borrow my brother's D90(?) and do some test just for kicks.
Take care,
Huy
P.S. There was actually a thread about the Dynamic Range of DSLRs (albeit jpeg engine, and not from RAW conversion) here, from which the other link I had provided, also came from:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1018&message=33893506
onlooker
Senior Member
You can buy a tiny card that will limit you to 36 shots.
Jake Loves Good Glass
Senior Member
Well the latitude in JPEG has very little variance from camera to camera...unless the RAW signal is somehow smaller than 8bit JPEG. Most new cameras provide 14bit RAW files, and thus have that much more head room in the files. Also, there have been great advancements in AD conversion pipelines.
Technology never stands still my friend. I only wish that Fuji had kept on making better and better CCD's for their SLR bodies that would keep pushing Canon and Nikon to keep producing better and better systems to answer.
--
Wow...that's a pretty killer camera! Are you any good?
-Jake-
Technology never stands still my friend. I only wish that Fuji had kept on making better and better CCD's for their SLR bodies that would keep pushing Canon and Nikon to keep producing better and better systems to answer.
--
Wow...that's a pretty killer camera! Are you any good?
-Jake-
djwuk
Forum Enthusiast
have a big archive of kodachrome/fujichrome slides myself from my pre-digital days. can see what you mean. for sure we don't need any more megapixels on dslr's, the focus now should be on developing imaging sensors which can match the dynamic range of film, having done it with resolution.
dave
dave
Keyboard shortcuts
- f
- Forum