Medium format or digital for this job?

I had the job of shooting a school picture. Aproximately 250 kids (?) in one

picture. I decided this was a job for meduim format. So, I used a 645 mf

camera. I had the film scaned at the highes resolution. I also took the same

picture on my Fuji s3. Now, I got the scan back from the lab, and I like my

digital file better. Why? Everything that I have heard is that the MF would

be the best camera for the job.

 

I am putting a sample with the entire picture, then a crop out of each media.

The crop on the left is the dital camera, and the one on the right is the film

scan.

 

The school would like a 20X24 print. I think I should print the digital

file. Any thoughts or coments on this?<div></div>

No kidding, but they shoot those on 8x10" film here. (They being the guy contracted by Herff Jones Photography in Lewiston, Minnesota even though Herff doesn't "do LF color" except in one place on the Right Coast.)

 

The tripod is rather impressive. :)

645 is <b>technically</b> medium format but it's really not. MF is 6x6cm up to 6x120cm, or 200% the size of your 645.<p>

Go with the digital shot.

I certainly see where you're coming from on this, but I wouldn't say you're technically comparing digital vs. medium format, but rather digital vs. your lab's scan. Personally, we've have had a VERY difficult time getting our lab to correctly scan in medium format film any more. Perfect medium format images are turned to pixelated, grainy, out of focus mush with distortions throughout -- much like what you are showing here. (Do you happen to use Miller's by the way?)

 

If you are pleased with your digital file and you feel that you can do a 20x24 print from it without compromise, then by all means; however, IMO, I would think that a print of that size would look far better printed from medium format. Any possibility you can make the print directly from the medium format negative rather than the digital scan they provided you?

 

BTW, great job on rounding up all the youngsters for the picture.

 

Jen

They bear about the same amount of detail to my eye, but the film shot looks sharper. offcourse this is not the film you are looking at, it is a scan. If you can get this optically printed straight from the file, I'd choose that. I think you'll get the most detail from film, because of it's longer tonal range.

 

ps why did you use ISO 400 for the digital shot? purely for the DOF?

"...I like my digital file better. Why?"

 

Because they are smiling better in the digital photo.

 

But seriously... I remember a year or two ago having a discussion where (almost) everyone claimed that a 100+ person group shot would be impossible (printed at 11x14 or 12x18, mind you) on a 20D. Many people claimed each person's face would only be a handfull of pixels, and that there would be no detail. Almost everyone suggested a MF camera or a better digicam.

 

I reviewed a picture of a crappily lit, slightly out of focus (the subject wasn't in the crowd), high ISO image of our church sanctuary, which seats about 2000... and I certainly could distinguish faces and see detail there. Oh this was off a 6MP 10D, BTW.

 

Point being... sometimes people don't know what they're talking about and just speculate. The problem is, lots of the time, speculation is presented as fact.

 

For a 20x24" print... it's going to look approximately how 1/4 of the picture looks filling up a 17" monitor, as far as detail goes. (ex, the top left quadrant filling a 17" monitor screen). It's personal preference from there whether any particular camera will do a good enough job or not.

 

Between the two crops you show, I think they both did an adequate job.

Thanks Jen, I had it scanned at my local lab that I use. I have always been happy with quality, but this is the first time I have had film scanned. So, I am not well versed.

 

JFR. I used 400 ISO because it was a pretty dark day. I had my MF camera on my tripod, and I just wanted a quick shot with my digital. I wanted enough DOF, and I have a terrible time handholding + plus I knew I might have wiggly kids. So, I wanted a ss of 1/125. So, that left me with ISO 400. I did shoot the Film on 160 ASA, and I was down to 1/60. (I was praying that those kids weren't moving too much!)

 

I can print from the negative, but I wanted to add my name in the corner (being that this is a feebie for the school) and I wanted to take out the line in the dirt in the back. (That was their boundry of where they had to stay within.) I'll have to check my crop cards (I already forget what they are called!) to see how that will line up.

Marc Williams will explain it better (than me), but basically Jennie, above, said it. You can't compare a digital file to a scan of a medium format negative. Most labs don't produce the best medium format scans, and on-line, film scans don't look so hot, especially enlarged the way you have, compared to a digital image, but print nicer than it looks. If you can have the negative optically printed (not digital, or you'll end up with the same mush), I would say you'll have a sharper image (and maybe more detail and tonal range) at that size than you can get from the digital file.

Kari,

 

That's a pretty good scan. You can see dye clouds and the separation between the guy's teeth. The resolution is actually a little better than the DSLR shot. The problem is that it's not enough better to bother, and the grain is ugly.

 

If you had used a fine grained film, like Reala (Velvia?), the difference would be more noted. That's the rub. You would like to use f/8 and 1/60 or faster, but if there's not enough light, you're stuck with ISO 400, and f/4 more often than not. Even that's not good enough for available light, not to mention color balance problems.

 

I shot groups side by side with a D1x and an Hasselblad (and NPH400)for a couple of years, always hoping for the best. The D1x always won!

 

Go ahead and see what a 20x24 will look like. Resample to at least 300 ppi and USM AFTER resampling. You can take an 8x10 crop out of that file, print it and see for yourself how it will hold up to close examination. Don't worry, your customers will look at this print REALLY CLOSE too, just to see what they look like. I don't think you'll be disappointed.

Kari, can you share how big the lab's MF scan file was ? Most lab scans, even so called high

res ones, are for smaller prints like 8X10 or so.

 

Normally, negs are scanned based on end use and viewing distance. For example, if a neg

is to be printed at 300 dpi for a 20"X24" digital print, the scan file should be in the

neighborhood of 250 meg @16 bit. Personally I go even bigger because it tightens up even

nicer when you reduce it. Conversely, scans for something as big as a billboard don't need

to be a one-on-one relationship because they are viewed from hundreds of feet away.

 

If you scan a smaller file than the final size will be, then you have to interpolate up the

image.

 

I'd hazard a guess that even with the scan you already have, the film image will print nicer.

I recall being disappointed in what my first MF scans looked like ... until I printed them.

BIG difference in what it looks like on a computer screen, and how it looks on paper.

 

Here's one shot on ISO 400 Portra, from which I am finally having a 42" X 42" print made.

The scan @ 4000 ppi was well over 500 meg. I could easily make a print of just the couple

under the tree. I could make a similar sized print from the 1DsMKII, and have, but the

result is flater looking and has sort of grayish plastic feeling, especially skin ... which I

think is present in the samples you posted also.<div></div>

Hmmm, my first "real" digital camera was a D1x, and it couldn't hold a candle to my Contax

645 let alone the Hasselblad... so I sold it. And I don't mean it was close, the Contax was a

lot better.

 

As to grain being ugly, well I guess all the photographs taken before the digital age are ugly

then.

 

Different strokes and experiences for different folks I suppose.

Marc,

 

Different strokes? It boils down to good glass and good technique. It also helps to be skeptical over what "should be" and pay attention to "what is".

 

Grain is OK in the artsy sense, but not many commercial clients are that forgiving. The grain in this picture is obtrusive considering the application, not grain in general.

Whew... technical overload at the moment. No Marc, my scan was not near that big. It was a 35 meg file. That was the "High rez" scan at the lab, compared to a 12 meg "medium rez" scan. So, what do you think my best options are?

 

If I print it direct from the negative: I wanted my name on it, but I guess I can live without that if I have to. I won't be able to fix the line in the dirt. (Is that a big deal?)

 

Or should I try making it a 20X24 with both files, then take an 8X10 crop of each and compare? Then make my decision?

 

Or, just go with the digital file and forget all the work!

Kari, I also get about a 40 MB scan from my lab from a medium format negative. If you take that scan and work it yourself, including sharpening further for the size of the final print, you can get a pretty nice looking print. Not as good as from the bigger size scan Marc is talking about, but nice. As far as the grain is concerned, scans magnified as large as you did to show online always look grainier and worse than the actual print. As for signing the print, why not just get a metallic gold pen and sign it. I'd actually call the lab to find out if they do optical prints at all. If it were me, that's what I'd do. Even if you turn the negative in on a cropping card, make sure they aren't just making a digital print from it. Those digital prints always look worse than a well done optical print.

Thanks Nadine. Yes, I know they do optically print film still. I think I'll run a few tests to see what looks best. My lab is very good about testing, and this is actually fun and educational for me. It will give me a good chance to test the digital file, compared to the optically printed negative, compared to the digitally scanned film file. Thanks for all the responses!

Kari

<p>I'm a little surprised by the high res scan size you received- but I suppose it also

depends on the file format they handed you. A 35MB JPG may be from a high res scan, but

JPG is not a lossless compression format. I scan at 2400DPI 48bit color on my consumer

Epson v750 Pro flatbed - from a 56mm square image I get 150MB+ tiff files. LIke

mentioned above, at 4000 DPI (from a Nikon 9000 or the like) I get 400 MB+ images. I

can't help but think that the high res scan is not the full resolution.</p>

<p>

For a paying gig where the details count; I would take it to another lab with a drum

scanner or to somebody with a Nikon 9000 and scan it in.</p>

<p>That being said; I think someone mentioned that you can see the grain in the scan

you have. If that is the grain, I'd be curious to know the kind of film you were using and

the speed (if you mentioned it already forgive me). On enlargments digital shots can have

a more pleasing effect once you get in the realm of seeing the grain of color film.</p>

 

<p>At the end of the day you may want to have that film rescanned and handed to you as

a tiff - but even then the better shot will be the better shot - and if the digital captured it

better, then it is a moot point ("better" being more pleasing to the 250 kids that are going

to be picking out their faces in the crowd.</p>

James<br>

<a href="http://www.photographyri.com">Photography RI</a>

1. I prefer the film image. Better tonality, better color and somewhat better detail (the hair on the guy with the blue shirt). The skin tone on the digital shot would be accurate for a zombie but not a human.

 

2. A 35MB scan is a small file even for 35mm, let alone medium format.

 

3. If the film was scanned on a Fuji Frontier minilab at your local lab, that is NOT a quality scan.

 

4. That is not the grain you are seeing, it's grain aliasing caused by the scanner interacting with the film grain. If the scan resolution is sufficient (300+ ppi @ output size), you will not see this in a print. Besides, a program like Noise Ninja will work wonders if you have a phobia of grain.

I am still surprised every time I see a photographer using digital equipment and looking to give his customer the worst work he can get away with. Not every subject shot on film can be done with an 8X10 camera. Even if the quality would be good the cost and difficulty would make it impractical. When we shoot film and get the slides or negatives scanned we are not looking to see whether it is possible to downgrade the quality of the final result so it matches what we would get with a digital camera at a specific quality setting.

 

Earlier this year I did some test shots with an old Nikon N2020 and a 105/2.5 AI Nikkor. The local photo store scanned them at "high resolution" (1200 dpi) and made a set of 8X10 prints. I then mailed the negatives to A&I in Los Angeles and had optical prints made in the same size. The prints from A&I were much better. With optical printing getting harder to find and with high quality scanning from MF film as expensive as it is you should work with the digital equipment if you aren't going to take full advantage of the MF potential.

"Nikon N2020 and a 105/2.5 AI Nikkor. The local photo store scanned them at "high resolution" (1200 dpi) and made a set of 8X10 prints."

 

This is a bad comparison. 1200dpi (to jpg too, probably) is anything but high resolution. This only extracted around 2MP from the negative, good enough for a sharp 4x6, but no more. If the local store did the usual minilab thing, I'd bet it's "bolder and brighter" print too, with Disney saturation, blown highlights, and zero detail shadows.

 

Done correctly and with care, digital color output (and inkjet in particular) can be suprior to the best optical prints.

I know digital output can be good. The local store in question outputs everything onto RA-4 paper up to about 11X14. The problem I see is that many local photo places are so used to all digital work that they don't bother to do a good enough job scanning and then printing from film. If they did then a 20X24 print from a 645 negative could look quite good and it would take many MP to equal it.

What are the dimension of the film scan in pixels, and is it a TIFF, a JPEG, or what? A 35 MB scan of a 645 negative would probably be an 8-bit TIFF from film scanned at 1800 ppi. 1800 ppi is not really high-resolution for a film scan. The scan would be about 2940 x 3970 pixels (i.e., a bit under 12 MP), plus or minus, depending on the exact size of the film gate and the exact resolution of the scanner.<P>

 

I would be inclined to send the film off to a high-end pro lab like A&I and ask them for a drum scan to a 16-bit TIFF. I think I would prefer to have them scan it at more like 2000 to 2700 ppi, because at lower resolutions you lose detail, and at higher resolutions you're probably getting more film grain than real detail. The result would give you about 160 to 220 ppi at 20x24, which should be fine. The alternative would be to ask them to scan it at more like 4000 ppi (or really, more precisely you'd need around 3700 ppi), which would give you enough pixels for 300 ppi at 20x24. But I would prefer a lower-res scan upsampled to the necessary resolution. By upsampling instead of using a higher-res scan, I think the grain will be somewhat less objectionable.<P>

 

So I'd say send the film to A&I, ask for a drum scan at 2500 ppi to a 16-bit TIFF. (Actually, some labs have this ridiculous insistence that, instead of allowing you to specify a scan resolution--which you may want to do to get an unresampled scan at a particular scanner's native resolution, if you know it--you specify an output size and resolution, in which case you could tell the lab 20x24 at 200 ppi.) The resulting file should be about 130 MB. Edit that file. Then call a good lab (again, maybe try A&I) with a Lightjet or similar printer, and ask them whether to upsample to their printer's resolution or (more likely) send at whatever resolution you have and let their RIP upsample for you, and send it to them to print.<P>

 

As to the digital shot's skin tones, gee, the camera's white balance was a little off, apply a little bit of digital warming filter (or other color correction) while converting the raw file to a TIFF to edit.<P>

 

Finally, with the film, part of the softness / lack of detail may be related to inadequate depth of field. Have you said what aperture you used? On a dark day with EI 160 and 1/60 s, I figure your 645 was at around f/8. I realize you were probably 50 ft away, but depending on all of the particulars, depth of field might be marginal to give maximum detail throughout the group. I think I would have used mirror lock-up and then gone, say, 1/30 s at f/11 or even 1/15 s at f/16. If people are basically standing still, 1/15 s is plenty fast enough to stop <I>their</I> motion, especially from this distance; faster shutter speeds are reallly more to stop <I>your</I> motion (camera shake) when you're not using a tripod, or else to limit ambient light when you're using strobes. I did a group picture of my parents' extended family (them and their children and grandchildren) and had to go down to 1/8 s. You can see motion in the beads my young son was twirling, but otherwise it was fine.