[pure-silver] Re: Comparing the Image Quality of Film and Digital
- From: Richard Lahrson <gtripspud@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: pure-silver@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2014 13:08:08 -0800
Hi!
For awhile in the 80s, Kodachrome was available in 120 roll film.
Someone posted some great
Kodachromes of World War II American woman making planes for the war
effort, on this list back awhile. No other film holds
up as well as Kodachrome!
Rich
On Tue, Dec 30, 2014 at 12:56 PM, bobkiss @caribsurf.com <
bobkiss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> DEAR RICHARD,
> Don't forget, Kodak also had a Kodachrome processing lab in Fair
> Lawns, N. J. which was where they offered us pros overnight Kodachrome
> processing. I seem to recall a 5:30 pm pickup.
> HOLIDAY CHEERS!
> BOB
>
>
> On Tuesday, December 30, 2014, Tim Daneliuk <tundra@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> On 12/30/2014 06:32 AM, bobkiss @caribsurf.com wrote:
>>
>>> DEAR PETER,
>>> If color neg still has a wider dynamic range than digital color
>>> images
>>> (raw files I assume) then at the risk of comparing gray apples and
>>> colorful
>>> oranges, black and white neg film must tromp raw files as, even with
>>> "normal"
>>> processing, it has a greater dynamic range and, with "N Minus" it can
>>> greatly
>>> exceed raw files. Further, b&w neg can record this wide SBR in one
>>> exposure but
>>> digital requires multiple exposures and post exposure image processing
>>> just go
>>> get a similar effect.
>>> But, as you said, the manufactures are working on extending the
>>> range.
>>> Further, from what i understand, the D600 does not produce the same raw
>>> file as
>>> the top of the line Nikon or Canon DSLRs which, allegedly, do produce a
>>> wider
>>> dynamic range raw. Not as good as film yet but it is just a matter for
>>> time.
>>> Then again, I don't think anything will touch the image quality I
>>> get with
>>> my 8X10 for a while! LOL!!!
>>> HOLIDAY CHEERS!
>>> BOB
>>>
>>>
>> Bob -
>>
>> My experience is that with care in exposure and a good highlight
>> compensating
>> developer like PMK Pyro, I can get a usable SBR of 15+ stops out of a
>> piece
>> of film.
>>
>> Digital cannot remotely do this, but that's not really the whole story.
>> Film
>> is an analog medium that represents *(effectively) continuous* tonality,
>> albeit in a
>> nonlinear way (i.e., The tones are not spaced equally on a log-log HD
>> curve.)
>>
>> Digital presents a *sampling* of the tonal space is a fairly linear
>> (log-log)
>> way. This means that film will capture and reproduce more tonal
>> "information"
>> than digital will.
>>
>> For example, even a 14 bit camera (which is what most of the higher end
>> ones
>> are these days, Hassy excluded), you get get only about 16 thousand or so
>> discrete tonal values (per color). I'd argue that this is where the real
>> difference shows up. Suppose the 0-th value represents complete blackness
>> and the 16 thousandth-value represent the brightest part of a 15 stop SBR.
>> Yes, you'll see both ends of the dynamic range, but a lot of information
>> between them is going to get lost because there are just not enough bits
>> to encode the subtleties of tonal gradation that film can hold.
>>
>> Then there's the problem that all those teeny sensor lenses
>> create diffraction effects way earlier than a pure optical system. This
>> is the reason most digi point-n-shoots hardwire their apertures at about
>> f/5.6 or so because below that you can see diffraction taking place,
>> especially with very dense sensors which have very small individual
>> taking surfaces.
>>
>> Then there is the issue of resolution. The best pro DSLRs are a worthy
>> competitor to 35mm film when it comes to resolving power. But there is
>> nothing even close to a decent medium format neg - again the Hassy
>> H-series
>> probably come closest - and forget trying to render what a decent 4x5 neg
>> can resolve. The silver grains are packed together so tightly that it is
>> going to take a quantum breakthrough in sensor design to begin to hold
>> that
>> kind of detail.
>>
>> But that's not going to happen ... because it doesn't need to. DSLRs are
>> more
>> than good enough for the majority of commercial shooting encounters.
>> Pictures
>> of people don't need huge dynamic range and no one wants detail down to
>> the pore when shooting fashion. Product photos are largely intended for a
>> web display that is (relatively) low resolution. The market for
>> really fine detailed, long SBR images is very small (it's us :) and does
>> not justify the money it would take to build a 4x5 equivalent sensor and
>> A/D converters to hold the equivalent amount of tonal information.
>>
>> Then again, when you see the Photoshopped dreck that is masquerading as
>> art, one could argue that the capture medium is irrelevant in any case.
>> And
>> this too has precedent. I was working in a recording studio some time the
>> first Moog synth became widely used. Everyone was whining about how this
>> would be the death of "real" instruments, the planet was doomed, blah,
>> blah,
>> blah. Well, guess what? Steinway still makes fine pianos and people
>> still
>> learn to play them. The early excesses of synth music were soon
>> surpassed by
>> real musicians making real music irrespective of instrument type.
>> Electronic
>> music (which I largely do not care for) went on to become its own,
>> distinct
>> genre. I think this is what is happening to photography, at least
>> photography
>> as art. The digital world is becoming a hybrid of captured and
>> constructed
>> (in the computer) images. The film world remains a separate artform.
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> ----------------
>> Tim Daneliuk tundra@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> PGP Key: http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
>>
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>
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