Hey Rob, if you care to read the thread the OP's title is "Film vs Digital" .
As far as responses, an ignorance or lack of understanding about film; which seems to prevail among many dslr users, is hardly interesting. Glad you are learning however. Chill.........
Peter, yes, I agree, I have been able to go back to 20 year old negatives and make remarkable prints from scans when *I* was unable to do it in a traditional darkroom. Also, for stock photos or anything high volume digital is more convenient. Most people are not doing this though. Also, I am coming from a fine art/gallery background and not a high volume commercial background... which probably skews my take on this...
Safer...maybe, but which requires more work to keep safe?
Film.
You must never have been wiped out by a tornado or hurricane. At the present time, it would take a catastrophe on the order of a Texas-sized asteroid striking the US midwest or a nuclear war to wipe out all my digital files, and it's likely some will still survive lurking in internet servers in other parts of the world.
You must never have been wiped out by a tornado or hurricane. At the present time, it would take a catastrophe on the order of a Texas-sized asteroid striking the US midwest or a nuclear war to wipe out all my digital files, and it's likely some will still survive lurking in internet servers in other parts of the world.
I have negatives and slides from the 70's which I have scanned and produced very nice photos. These negatives and slides were kept in archival preservers in 3-ring binders for over 30 years without me having to do any kind of maintenance on them. If the negatives were vital to my livelihood ( which they are not ), I would have some disaster proof safe for their safe keeping. Now tell me over the next 30 years, how much work are you going to have to do to keep today's digital images safe? How many times will you have to move the images from failing media? How many times will the formats have changed over the years? Now tell me, what has more maintenance costs, film or digital?
"safe" is measured by degrees... film is way easier to keep "pretty safe," just to match it I have to have dual HD's (both are in my home). In this case digital is much more work. For safer redundant storage on separate servers etc., it is more work but definitely safer than a single negative. If you are only backing up your "best" film images and storing a digital copy you are kind of in the same ballpark and probably saving all that needs to be saved.
Before scanning it just took a single grain of grit in a negative carrier to destroy an image... now with DigitalICE and scanning things like that have become pretty minor.
Just to keep it on topic... all my digital and most of my film shooting is with Canon gear
Digital is a far safer storage medium than film. Non-lossy if you use the right format, perfectly replicable with no data loss, instantly copyable to the far corners of the earth, does not degrade with time, etc. etc. etc.
Well, For B&W and street shooting I'll stay with film and the darkroom. Digital simply can't match the silver B&W print look. It never will. It will get better, but it will never be identical because the process is different. Not that is a bad thing.
Also, if you like IR film is really the only way. A modified digital isn't the same as true IR. However, Kodak has dropped their IR film so it will die. Sad, but true. I bought 60 rolls just to be covered.
For shooting on the street for those "moment" type shots you can't be candid enough with a digital SLR. SLRs and especially digital ones are too big. I prefer a range-finder. A Leica M8 is a maybe, but the B&W look still isn't there. A digital P&S - ugh!
So back to address the OP's initial thought. I really do buy into all the arguments about why digital is better, and I have even finally succombed to the argument that ultimate print quality is usually better with digital. I've shot 12000 frames in two years on my 5D, probably more than photos then all the other 28 years I've been taking photographs. So could somebody please explain why almost all of my best shots were taken using Kodachrome? I've started using film again, if only to try to re-teach myself whatever it is about film that trained my eye to take great photographs.
rceres wrote:
So back to address the OP's initial thought. I really do buy into all the arguments about why digital is better, and I have even finally succombed to the argument that ultimate print quality is usually better with digital. I've shot 12000 frames in two years on my 5D, probably more than photos then all the other 28 years I've been taking photographs. So could somebody please explain why almost all of my best shots were taken using Kodachrome? I've started using film again, if only to try to re-teach myself whatever it is about film that trained my eye to take great photographs....Show more →
I have noticed the same thing. This summer I shot both digital and medium format during a week of day hiking in the Rockies. The ratio of digital to film was at least 10 to 1, but when it came to making photos out of the shots, I found more photos were made from the film shots and the digital images. I sold my medium format gear due mainly to the excess weight, but am seriously considering picking up a M6 or M7 system just to get back to medium format film again.
jvarszegi wrote:
Digital is a far safer storage medium than film. Non-lossy if you use the right format, perfectly replicable with no data loss, instantly copyable to the far corners of the earth, does not degrade with time, etc. etc. etc.
If you believe digital storage medium does not degrade with time...well all I can say is good luck.
Seriously, there is a side effect from the heavy digital processing that results in *something* of substance being lost in the images... of course that *something* is only important to certain images... hence the unresolvable argument whether film or digital is "better."
My contention is that at the higher frequencies that having some signal/noise is better than no signal/noise and that we somehow still respond to it... or at least some of us do... my theory, so no one has to agree or disagree.
Same goes for printing as well. Last week I had a minor shootout with a fellow photog where we compared my scanned HP 8750 b&w prints to his traditional prints. We both were convinced our own prints were better... it's all in how you interpret the differences and compromises...
PKuglin wrote:
Well, For B&W and street shooting I'll stay with film and the darkroom. Digital simply can't match the silver B&W print look. It never will. It will get better, but it will never be identical because the process is different. Not that is a bad thing.
Edited by PKuglin on Dec 25, 2007 at 07:30 PM GMT
I have to disagree dude. The high level of imagery produced by digital now i don't believe has ever been done with film, at least on a regular basis. Not that it was impossible but you can do work on an image in 20 or so minutes that would have taken hours in the darkroom so photographers are doing better work more often.
I have to disagree dude. The high level of imagery produced by digital now i don't believe has ever been done with film, at least on a regular basis. Not that it was impossible but you can do work on an image in 20 or so minutes that would have taken hours in the darkroom so photographers are doing better work more often.
Well we will agree to disagree. I have shot digital for years, use a 1Ds2 and a Epson pro printer. I know photoshop very well, good at printing and still I can't duplicate a B&W silver print after much more that spending 20 minutes at it. Sure the digital dark room is more precise, but the B&W darkroom print is still better and that is my opinion - period.
So photog's are doing better work more often because the digital darkroom takes them less time - boy you don't have a clue. It not about quantity. Can you say quality -oh that's right a photoshop action can add that
chez wrote:
If you believe digital storage medium does not degrade with time...well all I can say is good luck.
I don't need it, and obviously know far more on this subject than you. You cannot avoid degradation of film storage, whereas you easily can with digital files.
PKuglin wrote:
Better work = better quality.
I have books from many years of professional photography awards and you only have to compare what was being done pre digital to now. The qualityis far better and the quantity more. The two are not mutualy exclusive.
I'm happy to disagree re your position on the darkroom versus digital but i have not seen samples to convince me despite being told that many times.
You may be the exception of course.
I'll usually take a 4x5 over my 1Ds2 when ever it's convenient. At times I like the digital better (when I don't have time, space, or energy to take a 4x5 setup), and at times I like the 4x5 better (when I DO have time, space, and energy to take a 4x5 with me).
For 35mm film or medium format film, Idon't use them anymore, they just doesn't give me much more than my 1Ds2 can.
chez wrote:
I have negatives and slides from the 70's which I have scanned and produced very nice photos. These negatives and slides were kept in archival preservers in 3-ring binders for over 30 years without me having to do any kind of maintenance on them. If the negatives were vital to my livelihood ( which they are not ), I would have some disaster proof safe for their safe keeping. Now tell me over the next 30 years, how much work are you going to have to do to keep today's digital images safe? How many times will you have to move the images from failing media? How many times will the formats have changed over the years? Now tell me, what has more maintenance costs, film or digital?...Show more →
Some people just don't get it and can't be made to understand. They lack the understanding that this problem goes far beyond what we may be discussing here. There is the very real problem that studios with digital movies, costing $100 million to produce, are facing these same issues and dilemmas. They too have realized that "digital" storage today is a sham, and the cost to maintain their digital work is 10-20x more than a comparable film movie in many cases.
Time for some here to wake up. Digital storage, with todays solutions/schemes, is not a safe bet. Be sure to back up multiple times, keep your files rotated onto new media every couple of years, make sure you keep a PC with the right software/OS around that can read the old files or convert them as necessary.
Adobe realized this too (they had a self interest of course) and began promoting DNG as part of the solution. Camera companies balked at standards and want to maintain proprietary information (Nikon is the worst and should be clubbed). There is no camera mfg today that can guarantee we will be able to read or view our files in 10 years. As a small example, MS released Vista and Canon has NOT released a codec allowing us to view any CRW file (pre-20d). That alone should give many a cause to look closer at what's happening, and possibly realize it will not only continue happening, but will do so at an accelerating rate.
