Bryan Stephens
Workshop Member
That would be a great spot.
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Landscape Photography: D800E or MF Tech?
- Thread starter subrata1965
- Start date
Interesting to hear this from an IQ180 user. When I saw the first proper files with the D800 I was very impressed. The most significant improvement that the d800 made is the cleanliness of the shadows combined with great dynamic range. I find that great shadows are the foundation of a great photo from a tonal point of view. The way you can open up the blacks is as close as you can get to a water bath processing with black and white film. You can open up the shadows and still have areas of deep crisp blacks.
While the increase to 36 MP is great it's not as significant as the DR and cleanliness of the shadows.
Don Libby
Well-known member
Saw this last week but was too busy to respond until now.
If I were faced with a decision between the D800E or a tech camera I'd have to say the tech camera would win out. In my opinion. as great/nice as the D800 is it is still nevertheless a 35mm format and medium/large format wins out in landscape photography. That said, my wife still shoots landscape with a 1DsIII; she'll occasionally use the DF but never the WRS as it's too slow and complicated for her. Here again, different strokes...
Subrate, you use basically the same back as I do with the IQ160 (I still use a P65) with the added huge benefit of the IQ perfectly suited for tech cam use.
There's several advantages to using a tech camera for landscape, among them is the lens quality and flat stitching for large finished prints. You won't have to worry about the nodal point the lens with flat stitching as the back moves around the lens.
While film might still be a good option it only remain an option if you retain total control of it and process it in your wet darkroom and print in a wet darkroom. In my opinion, as soon as you send the film out to be developed you lose control. Then added to the fact that you need to scan the image into a digital format you lose information. Digital shooting with a proper system gives you total control over your image from capture to print - that is unless you have the wet darkroom and can still print. Again that's just my opinion.....
The the next question of which tech camera is better opens yet another can of worms.
Don
If I were faced with a decision between the D800E or a tech camera I'd have to say the tech camera would win out. In my opinion. as great/nice as the D800 is it is still nevertheless a 35mm format and medium/large format wins out in landscape photography. That said, my wife still shoots landscape with a 1DsIII; she'll occasionally use the DF but never the WRS as it's too slow and complicated for her. Here again, different strokes...
Subrate, you use basically the same back as I do with the IQ160 (I still use a P65) with the added huge benefit of the IQ perfectly suited for tech cam use.
There's several advantages to using a tech camera for landscape, among them is the lens quality and flat stitching for large finished prints. You won't have to worry about the nodal point the lens with flat stitching as the back moves around the lens.
While film might still be a good option it only remain an option if you retain total control of it and process it in your wet darkroom and print in a wet darkroom. In my opinion, as soon as you send the film out to be developed you lose control. Then added to the fact that you need to scan the image into a digital format you lose information. Digital shooting with a proper system gives you total control over your image from capture to print - that is unless you have the wet darkroom and can still print. Again that's just my opinion.....
The the next question of which tech camera is better opens yet another can of worms.
Don
subrata1965
Member
Thank you everyone for your thought full reply! Now I read GetDPI forum throughout the day!.... I know my boss is not on this forum, so I'm safe! LOL!
Subrata
Subrata
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subrata1965
Member
Don, I remember my Canon 1Ds with TS/E lens. I was using Jack Flesher's method of stitching by shifting the lens and body in opposite direction. The process was outlined in Digital Outback Photo.
Technical camera will be lot easier in that respect.
Thanks.
Subrata
I have a hard time to see why tech cam flat stitching would be better than 35mm camera (say a D800) on a high quality pano head with lens at nodal point (it is not *that* hard to tune). Tech cam stitching with geared movements is much slower compared to a click-stopped pano head. There's the stitching backs from Kapture group et al of course, but not many use them. Heavy to carry around.
With the pano head you always use the best center portion of the lens. Projection is chosen in post-processing, and for wide-angle landscape panos cylindrical is often better then rectilinear, but you can do rectilinear as well of course. There'll be some pixel stretching but you use over-resolution to handle that.
If one's doing composite images with stitching (and to some extent focus stacking) I think the gap between 35mm digital and MF tech cam is considerably smaller.
The main advantage for me using my Linhof Techno is the one-shot image. To me a one-shot image is higher valued than a composite, I just think it is more "true" photography. I have done stitching and large prints from it so I'm not against it, but I'm most proud of my one-shot images. And for one-shot images there is a large value of shift with high quality large image circles and tilt/swing and I think MF tech cams have a quite good lead there.
For me as an amateur price/performance has importance too. I bought almost all my MF gear second hand, so my 33 megapixel tech cam system costs "only" about twice the corresponding D800 system would have cost new. Yes price/performance is worse even when comparing second hand MF with new 35mm but it is a long-term investment, low enough purchase price for me to handle and the lens/flexibility performance aspect is better.
I think tech cams and lenses are reasonably priced. But the often silly high prices of new MFDBs is a real turnoff, here in Sweden a new 33 megapixel back costs €25,000 with VAT ($32,000), which is about 10 times a 36 megapixel D800. If it is not possible to make entry-level MFDBs substantially cheaper I think the whole MF business is threatened in the long-term. 2 - 3 higher price for similar performance I think is ok, but not 10 times... I should say though that Leaf pricing in Sweden seems totally broken. Would I buy a new MFDB today it would be a Hasselblad CFV-50, it costs €14,000 with VAT here, that is despite 50 megapixels much cheaper than the Leaf Aptus-II 7 and also Phase One P45+.
With the pano head you always use the best center portion of the lens. Projection is chosen in post-processing, and for wide-angle landscape panos cylindrical is often better then rectilinear, but you can do rectilinear as well of course. There'll be some pixel stretching but you use over-resolution to handle that.
If one's doing composite images with stitching (and to some extent focus stacking) I think the gap between 35mm digital and MF tech cam is considerably smaller.
The main advantage for me using my Linhof Techno is the one-shot image. To me a one-shot image is higher valued than a composite, I just think it is more "true" photography. I have done stitching and large prints from it so I'm not against it, but I'm most proud of my one-shot images. And for one-shot images there is a large value of shift with high quality large image circles and tilt/swing and I think MF tech cams have a quite good lead there.
For me as an amateur price/performance has importance too. I bought almost all my MF gear second hand, so my 33 megapixel tech cam system costs "only" about twice the corresponding D800 system would have cost new. Yes price/performance is worse even when comparing second hand MF with new 35mm but it is a long-term investment, low enough purchase price for me to handle and the lens/flexibility performance aspect is better.
I think tech cams and lenses are reasonably priced. But the often silly high prices of new MFDBs is a real turnoff, here in Sweden a new 33 megapixel back costs €25,000 with VAT ($32,000), which is about 10 times a 36 megapixel D800. If it is not possible to make entry-level MFDBs substantially cheaper I think the whole MF business is threatened in the long-term. 2 - 3 higher price for similar performance I think is ok, but not 10 times... I should say though that Leaf pricing in Sweden seems totally broken. Would I buy a new MFDB today it would be a Hasselblad CFV-50, it costs €14,000 with VAT here, that is despite 50 megapixels much cheaper than the Leaf Aptus-II 7 and also Phase One P45+.
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