Re: Digital camera blues

I use most of the methods mentioned in this thread. I still love to use
my 8x10 and 11x14 with film for in camera negs intended for platinum. I
still use my 4x5 with film. Sometimes that is for Silver Gelatin
printing, but most often now I scan the film and output digital negs
for cyanotype and Kallitype (Burkholder style). I shoot a Fuji S2 DSLR
(big, heavy, 6Meg Pixel interchangeable lens dig system) mainly for
commercial clients. I use a Sony F707 5Meg P&S for all of my vacation
and family snapshot images. Usually these end up being printed by Ofoto
onto "real" color photo paper. Lately some of those F707
vacation/landscapes have been outputted to digital negs and are making
fine alt prints!

So, with that said, I'll make some comments:

Shooting in camera Jpgs or Tiffs is like shooting slide film. Your
exposure needs to be very correct or you will be very unhappy! These
are 8 bit files. Shooting "Raw" will give your a "16 bit file". That is
a bit of a lie, most only use 12 of the 16 bits. But, even with the 12
bits used you now have a system much more forgiving, much more like
negative film. The "slide/neg film" comparison doesn't end there. If
you shoot slides, you only have to develop them. If you shoot negs, you
have to develop and then you or your lab has to print/interpret them.
With dig if you shoot RAW you have that extra step (conversion) and
there isn't a "lab" anymore.... it is up to you. Note: many smaller
(consumer) dig cameras (like my F707) do not offer a RAW option :-(

Scanning film or prints has its advantages and disadvantages. I'm
generally not happy enlarging a scanned PRINT more than one paper size
(scan a 5x7 print, make an 8x10 enlargement print). There just isn't
enough detail in the paper to enlarge more. Scanning film gives you far
more detail, assuming you have large enough film. 35mm on a flatbed
isn't going to give you large prints! You need to have a dedicated film
scanner for 35mm high detail work. Note (and opinion) for scanners the
Dmax or density range spec is every bit as important as the dpi spec.

Photography has always recorded images in "dots". Film is a random
collection of semi round dots (film grain). Digital is a collection of
perfectly lined up square "dots" (pixels). It doesn't take too long
before the "square pegs into round holes" jokes start. They (the jokes)
have a point. Scanning film (make up of dots) with a dot (pixel) based
system always creates errors. The digital scanner's dot looks at half
of one film grain, a third of a second film grain and the corner of a
third, so what does it output? I can generally get a "sharper" image
from my S2 DSLR at 18meg file size (6 Meg Pixel) than I can scanning a
very sharp 4x5 neg at 1200dpi (78Meg file size). But, I own a few
lenses for 4x5 that I just love. I can't digitally recreate wonderful
and/or unique glass!

Hope that helps.

--------------
Tom Ferguson
http://www.ferguson-photo-design.com
Received on Wed Nov 12 16:03:11 2003