Photography

[jlick]

@Ben

- For absolute pixel count, film is still king. For digital to match the resolution of 35mm film it needs to be about 25 Megapixel.

The real resolution is subject of a lot of debtate, and depends a lot on the film and lens quality to get above effective 8mp resolution. Also to be fair to film, non-Foveon digital imagers only sample one color per pixel, so the effective resolution of most digitals is about half the rated value. You’re not going to get 25mp effective resolution on 35mm except under the most extraordinary situation.

- If you run out of film while travelling, it’s usually no problem to buy more.

True, however, memory cards are cheap enough that you can buy way more than you need and should be fine on capacity. They are small enough that packing several is not an issue. If you run out you can also go through and delete unsatisfactory shots. Also you may not be able to buy professional quality film when travelling.

[quote]- You will still be able to see images on film years from now.
[/quote]

Negatives degrade over time, even when properly stored. Image files are easier to backup and archive without any loss. Both film and digital can be professionally printed on lasting photographic papers. JPEG is prevalent enough that it will last. The most popular 80s formats were GIF and TIFF both of which are still widely supported.

- Reaction time.

Current digital SLRs have zero reaction time. The better point and shoot digitals now have a much lower reaction time than those of a few years ago. The biggest delay now on point and shoots is if the red-eye reduction is on. This causes a couple second delay. The second biggest is auto-focus which is still pretty slow on point and shoots. You can press the shutter halfway to get it to fix the auto-focus ahead of time. Pro digital doesn’t have these problems assuming you have a good flash and auto-focus mechanism in your lens.

- Frame rate. On modern 35mm SLR cameras, shooting rates of 2-3 frames per second are not uncommon. The higher end models can do 8-10 frames per second. Digital cameras can’t touch this.

Digitals are getting better here. The Canon 10D for example does 3fps

- Equipment lifespan. People are still taking great pictures with 20-30 year old cameras with image quality that rivals today’s best digitals. Not many people are using even 5 year old digital cameras anymore, which 5 years ago were $$$$$$.

My 1998 digital camera still works fine. I don’t use it much because my current digital runs rings around it. In fact your argument is one in favor of digital as it is an indication of how much things have improved in the space of 5 years. Current technology is good enough to give very good results comparable to professional film SLRs. They are only going to get better from here.

As for snapshots in low light, I actually find that digital gives me better results. IMO, film only has an advantage here if you use a tripod in a carefully thought out composition.

Current digital sensors tend to add significant noise at very low light levels. A good high speed film has a much more smooth response. Digital cameras usually compensate for noise by running a smoothing pass, which reduces the effective resolution.

For most purposes, even for professional work, a good digital camera can compare quite favorably to film.

[wolf_reinhold]

One thing that bothers me about digital cameras – in the price range of normal humans – is that they are point and shoot. There is little or nothing you can do to alter the pic that the camera wants to take.
With film cameras you can alter the settings to get a wide range of effects.
Digital is good for snaps for the parents or something, but to get real quality you need to spend a bundle…at least now.

[Comrade_Stalin]

Pentax 67 (film , landscapes and outdoor nudes)

Bronica 645 (film, for portraits)

Olympus E-20 (digital, for everything)

[Ben]

[quote=“jlick”]
For most purposes, even for professional work, a good digital camera can compare quite favorably to film.[/quote]

Film and digital co-exist quite nicely, IMO.

Regarding the pixel count debate, let’s assume for sake of argument that 8 megapixel is the max that film can render. That’s still better than I’d say 95% of the digital cameras on the market.

Regarding the reaction time and frame rate, right now, only the really high end SLRs can compare to film SLRs. These features are found even on entry level film SLRs that are 1/5 or less of the price of the digital SLRs that have these features. In the point and shoot world, I’d say those digital cameras that can match film point and shoots in these 2 areas are still rare.

As a previous poster also pointed out, dollar for dollar, film is not dead yet.

[jlick]

[quote=“wolf_reinhold”]One thing that bothers me about digital cameras – in the price range of normal humans – is that they are point and shoot. There is little or nothing you can do to alter the pic that the camera wants to take.
With film cameras you can alter the settings to get a wide range of effects.
Digital is good for snaps for the parents or something, but to get real quality you need to spend a bundle…at least now.[/quote]

What do you consider a bundle? For around NT10-13k you can get a really decent 3-4mp point and shoot digital camera with a whole range of manual settings. True, you have to go through menus to get them instead of setting a dial, but there’s many cameras that have decent menu systems. Look at the Sony DSC-P8 for a good example.

[jlick]

@Ben

Regarding the pixel count debate, let’s assume for sake of argument that 8 megapixel is the max that film can render. That’s still better than I’d say 95% of the digital cameras on the market.

95% of the digital camera market is the 3mp point and shoot. Digital SLRs are mostly 5-8mp, and there’s up to 12mp on the market now. Even a 3.2mp camera can print to 8x10 on photographic paper with very good quality. If you are shooting professionally for magazine or brochure publication, you’re unlikely to get better than 150dpi resolution due to halftoning anyways.

[Ben]

@jlick

[quote=“Ben”]Regarding the pixel count debate, let’s assume for sake of argument that 8 megapixel is the max that film can render. That’s still better than I’d say 95% of the digital cameras on the market.

95% of the digital camera market is the 3mp point and shoot. Digital SLRs are mostly 5-8mp, and there’s up to 12mp on the market now. Even a 3.2mp camera can print to 8x10 on photographic paper with very good quality. If you are shooting professionally for magazine or brochure publication, you’re unlikely to get better than 150dpi resolution due to halftoning anyways.[/quote]

I could be wrong, but can’t the number of models on the market with more than 8 megapixel be counted on the fingers of one hand? Then, don’t these models all carry price tags of over NT$35000/US$1000?

[Anonymous]

Interesting thread.

I’m a professional photographer and until know don’t own a digcam. I wasn’t satisfied about the available resolution options but this is changing since the price for high resolution digcams is coming down. Now I’m considering buying one.

I’ll probably opt for a digcam with changeable lenses as a fixed lens cam has limited options and possibly lesser quality optics. A fixed lens digcam will do as point and shoot cam or maybe to take to places you wouldn’t take all your gear though.

I used to work with Minolta and still am, as they had a good price/quality. I have and still work with a Minolta Dinax 8000i (x2) and several lenses (35-105, 100-300 and fixed 400 mm) enough to be able to do most of the work that need to be done. I also used to have a Pentax 1000SP, eons old with a 20mm, 50mm and zoomlens. Additionally, back home, I had a Mamiya RB 6x7 with a good set of lenses.

The reason why I opted for a semi pro cam Minolta 8000i is that it’s affordable and when it gets stolen (as has happened, I lost all my gear, stolen from the car trunk) it’s replaceable.
When I travel I don’t use my equipment bag anymore, I usually carry all my gear in a hip bag for obvious reasons.

This camera has served me well and still is ( it’s 11 years old). The only drawback is that you need to have a few spare batteries to carry with you on a shoot. Therefor I agree that a manual operated cam is a good thing to have as back-up as was my Pentax.

As for digpics that they can not be used for publishing in mags is not true at all. As long as you can reach a resolution of 3 megpix and over, it’s possible, depending on the size going to be published. Saved preferably not as jpeg but as raw or tif. Jpeg should be used for web use or simple use at home only for viewing on your monitor or… if you don’t care about quality and only going to print 3x5, 4x6, 5x7 pics. Jpeg has to much quality loss for highQ printing or publishing.

The thing I’m going to say now may sound contradictory, but it’s better to use a 400 ASA film in sunny conditions and 100 ASA in gray weather.
Why? Because the gamma range of 400 ASA is flatter than 100 ASA, mening that darks and lights are better controled in above mentioned conditions.

And for color publishing it’s best to use positive film (slides).

But neg. film technology improves year after year so the film and picture quality improves.
And anyway, if you are going to publish from neg. than preferably scan from the film and not from a pic made from neg. Because here too you lose out in the darks and lights (gamma) of your exposure.

In Taiwan you should be careful how to store your gear I found out. I dicovered that my minoltas had collected some condensation internally, more specific in the internal (viewer) LCD panels.

[Comrade_Stalin]

[quote=“bottleneck”]Interesting thread.

I’m a professional photographer and until know don’t own a digcam. I wasn’t satisfied about the available resolution options but this is changing since the price for high resolution digcams is coming down. Now I’m considering buying one.
[/quote]

Shoot product photography with a digital and you’ll never look back.

[_monkey]

[quote=“Mother Theresa”]I see we’ve got a few camera snobs on this thread. I’ve heard that nonsense before about how digital cameras don’t take good enough pictures for magazine publication and I know that’s false because photos that I took with my cheap Sony digital camera (2 megapix? 2.5? I know it’s not 3) have been published in magazines on several occassions, once a full page photo.
[/quote]

Here’s the math:

A magazine A4 page is 8.5 x 11.7 inches. All modern glossy magazines output to 4-color film at 300dpi or higher. So, to get an A4 size image (ignoring bleed mind you) means you need need 2550 x 3510 dots or 8,950,500 dots = approx 9 megapixels. Sure a magazine could output a 2 megapixel image and interpolate it to fit a 9 megapixel space, but it’s going to look crap. Whether you’d be proud of the printed result (assuming you had a photo-credit) would be entirely down to your vanity I guess.

[_monkey]

double post

[Richardm]

Actually, the older SLR cameras are a lot more durable than the current crop, I think. In the Nikon world, an FM series is a lot more durable than today’s N series

I bought my FM from a friend back in 1985 and it’s still tickin’ and clickin’. Except the Taiwan fungus has got ahold of it. I need to find a place to get it cleaned.

[Anonymous]

[quote]
monkey
Here’s the math:

A magazine A4 page is 8.5 x 11.7 inches. All modern glossy magazines output to 4-color film at 300dpi or higher. So, to get an A4 size image (ignoring bleed mind you) means you need need 2550 x 3510 dots or 8,950,500 dots = approx 9 megapixels. Sure a magazine could output a 2 megapixel image and interpolate it to fit a 9 megapixel space, but it’s going to look crap. Whether you’d be proud of the printed result (assuming you had a photo-credit) would be entirely down to your vanity I guess.[/quote]

Actually they screen (raster) it at between 150 and 200 lpi, depending on the quality of the paper they use to print it on.

300 dpi is printer output.

And interpolation is absolutely not the way to go as this are “invented pixels” pulled out of thin air.

But you’re close.

I could even print a 60x90 cm poster at 90 dpi and it would look wonderful if viewed at a distance.

I think we are getting of topic here.

[Anonymous]

[quote=“blueface666”]

Shoot product photography with a digital and you’ll never look back.[/quote]

Actually I’ve been thinking about that many years ago but technology wise it wasn’t far enough. And price wise it was out of the question.

For pack shots it would have cut it but else no way.

Now at last it’s going somewhere.

[sandman]

@Richardm

[quote]Actually, the older SLR cameras are a lot more durable than the current crop, I think. In the Nikon world, an FM series is a lot more durable than today’s N series

I bought my FM from a friend back in 1985 and it’s still tickin’ and clickin’. Except the Taiwan fungus has got ahold of it. I need to find a place to get it cleaned.[/quote]
The place I used for my FM overhaul was recommended to me by Wolf and several professional local photographer friends. If your camera is fixable, they can fix it. I cannot recommend them highly enough and will give the contact info tomorrow.

[MJB]

Would appreciate that contact info as well

My trusty F-1 could use a good clean and buff…

[jlick]

@Ben

I could be wrong, but can’t the number of models on the market with more than 8 megapixel be counted on the fingers of one hand? Then, don’t these models all carry price tags of over NT$35000/US$1000?

You’ll need at least 2 hands, but probably not 3. And currently all real digital SLRs (those with interchangable lenses minimum) except one cost over US$1000. The only exception is the Canon Digital Rebel which is US$899 body only or US$999 with basic zoom lens included. So yes, digital SLRs are still expensive.

[Mother_Theresa]

A couple of people have said that magazines won’t print from less than a 3 megapix camera, but I know for a fact they’re wrong. I’m looking right now at a full page photo published in a magazine that I shot with my Sony 2.0 megapix Cybershot. I agree, monkey, it’s not fine resolution, but it’s really not a bad looking photo, even at that size.

I had planned to buy a 3 megapix Canon in Osaka, but when I got there the only one with instructions in English was the Sony, so that’s what I got. I also opted for a 2 megapix then figuring I could upgrade later. I still plan to do that some day.

I admit a 2 megapix digicam may not be a professional photographer’s tool, but even such a cheapie can do surprisingly well and once you start using digital (even as a supplement to film) you’ll constantly be thankful for its various conveniences.

[Joesox]

@Mother Theresa

Some of the above points about advantages of film sound reasonable, though for me the advantages of digital outweigh them. I admit, though, I haven’t figured it all out yet and the files are always enormous when I e-mail them. Once I started learning how to Zip Mail them, but I finally gave up on that so now I can only send about 4 photos at a time from my Hotmail account.

For sending small versions of pictures to friends as email attachments, I use Irfanview, a great, free image editing program, to reduce the resolution. It does this by resampling the image and you can choose various filters to do this with. Even with the slowest, most complex filter, I have always had instant results on my computer, although admittedly the images I’m working with are 1Mb jpegs maximum.

One thing, though; if you have a picture that’s too hard and grainy, I have found the ‘soften’ effect on Microsoft Photo Editor nicer than the one on Irfanview.

[almas_john]

I hadn’t realized that there were so many photographers here. Perhaps we could all chip in and hire a few “glamour models” ? Just kidding - the ball n’ chain is insanely jealous.

I’m still a 35mm film man but I figure digital is going to be good enough (and cheap enough) for publication in a few years. In the meantime I’ll still be getting Mother T to do all my “special” photos.