[pure-silver] Re: Tonal gradation/smoothness in 35mm negs c.f. larger formats

Bob....
At one point those many years ago, I had a somewhat similar discussion with my mentor.
When discussing "graininess" in prints..... it gently explained to that it was NOT "grains of silver" that caused the effect I was noticing in similar conditions, It was the space between the silver 
'grains' that was allowing me to see the image on the print.


Ken

On 13-Jan-08, at 9:16 PM, BOB KISS wrote:


DEAR PETER,
Firstly, if you will never make a print bigger than 5X7 the differences will be less noticeable than if you were making 11X14 or bigger prints. Let’s assume you will make 8X10 prints regardless of the negative size and that you will use the same film/ dev combination in all formats. The concept is that, the more pixels you have per square inch, the more possible levels of tone (grays) you can achieve. With film, this translates VERY loosely to, the more silver grains imaged on your print per square inch, the more possible levels of tone you can achieve on the print. Clearly, a 4X5 (20 square inches of film) enlarged to an 8X10 print will have more imaged silver grains per square inch than a 35mm neg (as mentioned in the posting below, 1 ½ sq in of film) enlarged (approximately, given the different aspect ratio) to an 8X10.
I am counting on Richard Knoppow to give the more rigorous explanation but this is the basic idea. 

                        CHEERS!

                                    BOB
From: pure-silver-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:pure-silver- bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Peter Badcock 
Sent: Sunday, January 13, 2008 9:51 PM
To: pure-silver@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [pure-silver] Tonal gradation/smoothness in 35mm negs c.f. larger formats
There has been a discussion on APUG about the differences between 35mm negatives and larger format negatives in relation to tonal gradation and smoothness of tones (particularly in the highlights). So all other things being equal, can somebody please tell me why I can't get the same tonal gradation/smoothness onto a print made from a 35mm neg cf. a larger negative of the same film, same scene, same exposure conditions, same developer etc etc. If possible, assume grain size is small enough to be irrelevant - i.e. keep the print smallish, say no bigger than 6-7 inches.
Rather than pre-empt any explanations you folks come up with , I'll just supply you with quotations for now rather than the original APUG thread (of course you can search for it yourself, but I'd rather you thought about it independently because I'm not satisfied with the only answer that was posted on APUG) 



regards
Peter

Quote:

Originally Posted by Allan Swindles
Lol, IMHO the biggest advantage of medium/large format is in the gradation, particularly noticable in monochrome work. 

Quote:

Originally Posted by mhv
What is important when you print from a small negative is to get proper contrast. Too many people end up with flat, ugly stuff when they enlarge a lot. You need to get proper exposure, development, proper paper grade, a good paper developer, know how to dodge and burn, etc. If your goal is to get the smooth tones of MF or LF, forget about it, it just won't happen. But you can make excellent full-scale prints if you set your heart to it. 

Quote:

Originally Posted by aldevo
But let's not kid ourselves. In photography there's no substitute for square inches and 35mm gives you all of 1 1/2 to play with. And the real issue here isn't necessarily grain or apparent sharpness - it's smoothness of gradation, particularly in the highlights. You can create adjacency effects till the cows come home in 35mm - so much so, in fact, that I believe you can actually make an 8x10 print in 35mm appear sharper than a print of the same size taken in 120 with good equipment. But smooth, translucent highlights? Not a chance. 

Quote:

Originally Posted by aldevo
I've developed 35mm FP4+ negs in straight Edwal 20 from the photographer's Formulary (and that's about as solvent as you can get, btw) and at 8x10 there is still, very definitely, inferior highlight gradation relative to any MF negative enlarged to the same print size I have ever seen. And I've seen many of those. The highlights will betray 35mm every time once we are above about 4x. 





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Eccles: You didn't order any cases of frozen feet!


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