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Personal thoughts on Film vs Digital

jdphoto

Well-known member
If it doesn't mean anything for digital, it doesn't mean anything for film either. With regard to the notions expressed, the two things are EXACTLY the same.

G
Now your off topic with semantics. These comments are not intended to be taken personally by digital photographers, but some seem to think so. I primarily shoot film for clients and my personal experience with both formats confirms simply, that film is not as forgiving as digital. With digital I can continuously adjust the settings and chimp until I get it right. The convenience is obvious, but the experience is not as satisfying, imo. I use a polaroid film back to check settings, but that's the closest to chimping with film I can get. With digital you can certainly shoot it like film and apply technique normally reserved for film, like the use of meters, ratio's, reciprocity, etc. But you don't have to and that's the point of this discussion.
 
V

Vivek

Guest
Reciprocity factor (among many other factors) is a film specific issue. It has little to do with photography in general.

Why some of you are stuck with film? why not glass plates or daguerreotypes? Perhaps, not that antiquated, yet? :p
 

Godfrey

Well-known member
Now your off topic with semantics. These comments are not intended to be taken personally by digital photographers, but some seem to think so. I primarily shoot film for clients and my personal experience with both formats confirms simply, that film is not as forgiving as digital. With digital I can continuously adjust the settings and chimp until I get it right. The convenience is obvious, but the experience is not as satisfying, imo. I use a polaroid film back to check settings, but that's the closest to chimping with film I can get. With digital you can certainly shoot it like film and apply technique normally reserved for film, like the use of meters, ratio's, reciprocity, etc. But you don't have to and that's the point of this discussion.
You "have to do" only what it takes for you to achieve the photographs that you want. To generalize that as a native characteristic of film or digital, an advantage or a disadvantage, is nonsense. The experience is good or bad, for either, depending upon whatever you like.

The only question is whether you can reliably get the results you want. Some things you can do with film more easily, others with digital capture. Neither is wholly 'better' or 'worse'.

Since I shoot both, regularly and in similar volume, I have to say I really couldn't care less which medium I use for the most part. I choose the capture medium based on what I want to see in the finished work, and how much time, effort, and money I want to put into the job.

To be debating these things as some dogmatically driven icon of photographic merit in 2017 is ridiculous, btw. Nothing you will ever say is going to convince me that one is "better" than the other, or is ever going to stop me from choosing whichever medium I want to use. I participate in this thread purely because I think it's absurd, and thus fun. :D

G
 

jdphoto

Well-known member
Reciprocity is indeed a film only variable and NR is digital's requirement for long exposure. The point is the same.
 

4season

Well-known member
Arguments that somehow technological advances have caused us to lose a certain something are nothing new: Once upon a time, people were saying exactly the same sort of thing about photography vs painting, and again when George Eastman popularized "You press the button, we do the rest".

Film is just one tool available to today's photographer, and sometimes it's peculiarities can have a certain appeal. But for me, it shall remain a niche.

As for digital promoting consumerism, oh come on you can stop buying new stuff any time you like. The old days weren't better, it's just that marketers had fewer avenues to deliver their message to us. Today, marketing can be so subtle that you're not even aware that it's happening. Why else do certain bloggers get early access to new products?
 

Jorgen Udvang

Subscriber Member
Why some of you are stuck with film? why not glass plates or daguerreotypes? Perhaps, not that antiquated, yet? :p
Are you kiddin' me? Of course I would, if I had the skill and the time. Check out the work of Giles Clement.

https://www.facebook.com/gilesclement/

http://www.gilesclement.com/

The iPhone XI will do all this of course, and more too. It will do a 3D scan of the victim's head and body which can then be manipulated to any portrait from any angle with any facial expression and background simulating any photographic technology and with automatic ageing, so that you don't have to do another scan for at least another 10 years.
 

jdphoto

Well-known member
Those who comment that film reciprocity has nothing to do with film photography in general, is a few pints short of a gallon. Certain film stocks have very specific time tables about reciprocity with long exposures. You can't shoot long exposures without knowing when reciprocity should be controlled. This has everything to do with photography.
 

GrahamWelland

Subscriber & Workshop Member
I swear that I’ve entered into a repeating time warp. The film vs Digital discussion has been resurrected YET AGAIN and nothing has changed.

Embrace films for what it is. I still shoot the odd roll of 120 or 35mm and enjoy it. (heck I forgot 4x5 ... just even less often now that readly loads went RIP)

Embrace Digital for what IT is ... not film.

Film guys aren't going to convince Digital guys anything. Ditto Digital guys aren’t going to change the choices of film folks.

The world is plenty big enough for both. :thumbs:
 
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Jorgen Udvang

Subscriber Member
I swear that I’ve entered into a repeating time warp. The film vs Digital discussion has been resurrected YET AGAIN and nothing has changed.

Embrace films for what it is. I still shoot the odd roll of 120 or 35mm and enjoy it. (heck I forgot 4x5 ... just even less often now that readly loads went RIP)

Embrace Digital for what IT is ... not film.

Film guys arent going going to convince Digital guys anything. Ditto Digital guys aren’t going to change the choices of film folks.

The world is plenty big enough for both. :thumbs:
Indeed, but the distance between film and digital is increasing quickly due to the rapid digital development, making film more interesting than ever as an alternative medium. I notice that many of those starting out with wet plate collodion these days came into photography after digital had taken most of the market. I know people with GX680 cameras who hadn't owned a film camera at all before they bought the giant Fuji. They see it as a totally different art form. It's just an observation from my side, but when I look at the technology presented with the iPhone X and the possibilities offered by the current version of Photoshop CC, I tend to think that they are mostly right.

An interesting aspect is that many of the throwaway digital images from 10 years ago, I can process in Photoshop today, making them usable and sometimes great. If I start that process, I have so much work to do and so many interesting results, that I don't really need to take any more photos for the coming years. When I'm through, there will probably new, exciting options available, and I can start from the bottom once more... maybe I should simply sell my cameras and spend my time in front of the computer screen? I would spend less on clothes and airline tickets as well. Think of all the monies I would save :LOL: :chug:
 
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Vivek

Guest
Only difference this time around is that there aren't any "film guys" anyomore. They are all digital snappers posing as defenders of a medium of the past.


I swear that I’ve entered into a repeating time warp. The film vs Digital discussion has been resurrected YET AGAIN and nothing has changed.

Embrace films for what it is. I still shoot the odd roll of 120 or 35mm and enjoy it. (heck I forgot 4x5 ... just even less often now that readly loads went RIP)

Embrace Digital for what IT is ... not film.

Film guys arent going going to convince Digital guys anything. Ditto Digital guys aren’t going to change the choices of film folks.

The world is plenty big enough for both. :thumbs:
 

jdphoto

Well-known member
Detractors should actually read the title of this thread. One thing for sure is that digital has churned out multitudes of new photographers that have saturated a market that imo, has become sort of mundane and predictable. It is a by product of today's consumerism and motivational skills. Digital shooters might find inspiration in Fan Ho's iconic images of 1950's Hong Kong. And for those who say that film is a medium of the past Kodak has announced a revival of film production due to the increased demands of film.

https://www.kodak.com/Kodak/bd/en/c...ck_a_classic_with_ektachrome_film/default.htm

https://www.dpreview.com/news/95036...lm-sales-spurs-kodak-to-bring-back-ektachrome
 
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GrahamWelland

Subscriber & Workshop Member
Fan Ho is the asian Cartier Bresson to me. I picked up a couple of his books in HK a few years ago and the photography was outstanding. That said, I also have some Sebastian Salgado books too and his outstanding B&W work is ... almost entirely shot on Canon digital cameras.

I will say though that the best film & film grain emulation is found ... with film. :thumbup:

It's a great time in photography when film is getting a certain level of resurrection. I note also that Polaroid is having a bit of a come back - (in name at least).
 

Jorgen Udvang

Subscriber Member
Only difference this time around is that there aren't any "film guys" anyomore. They are all digital snappers posing as defenders of a medium of the past.
You are wrong, Vivek. There's a new generation of photographers shooting mostly film appearing, and many of them have their own, distinct style. That isn't to say that most of their work couldn't have been recreated digitally, but why do that when it's possible to go straight at the target... with film?

I'm repeating myself here, but with the constant advancement and perfection of digital photography, the distance to film increases further, making film an even more interesting medium. Film sales are increasing, new emulsions are brought to the market and next year we'll have Ektachrome too :)

Here's an interesting article about Portra btw., with links to photographers who use it to make a living:

A Film Photographer's Introduction to the Kodak Portra Family
 

jdphoto

Well-known member
It should be noted that Salgado's earlier work was all shot on film. I think using Leica's and 645. Apparently, he shoots digital now, but converts it to a film negative and makes prints from that. I read somewhere he likes the grain effect from that. He's obviously a great artist, but imo, the film versions have more character.
 

Jorgen Udvang

Subscriber Member
Personally, I am more interested in the beer than the bottle.
So if someone stages the scene of Rembrandt's Night Watch today, take a digital photo of it and makes a print the same size as the original painting (437 x 363 cm), it would have the same value as the printing then? Or more, since it would without doubt be closer to reality and contain more detail than Rembrandt's work.
 

MGrayson

Subscriber and Workshop Member
Yes. That is exactly what he was saying. I'm sure he had that very example in mind when he mentioned beer and bottles. :chug: :chug:

Oddly, there ARE modern composers who would defend something as stupid as playing the ASCII bitstream of Hamlet and claiming that it had merit as it contained the Bard's insights.
 
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