Do top Professional photographers use film still ?

<p>My area is wedding and portraiture, so I follow a lot of film users in that arena. Check out the work of:</p>

<p>Jonathan Canlas<br>

Leo Patrone<br>

Leah Mccormick<br>

Jose Villa<br>

Riccis Valladeres<br>

James Whitlow Delano<br>

The Brothers Wright<br>

Polly Chandler</p>

<p>That should get the ball rolling at least. They're all film. Why? Easier work flow. Shoot it, have the lab process and scan, download and release the event. That's why I am currently around 75% to 80% film for my work. I prefer the look, the workflow, and the niche market it places me in. And I like using the older gear....Mamiya RB67 Pro S, Nikon F5, Minolta X700, Konica T3n Autoreflex, Voigtlander Bessa R2a, Shen Hao 4x5, Linhof 4x5, and my Holgas.</p>

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<p>i would like to know if there are any well known, sought after, still living photographers making their livings shooting film.</p>

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<p>A few big names in the fine art world I think are still using film (eg. they've said in recent interviews that they do): Alec Soth, Simon Norfolk, Simon Roberts, Ryan McGinley, Gregory Crewdson, Michael Ackerman, Philip Lorca di Corcia, Eduard Burtynsky, Bruce Gilden. I would assume that Andreas Gursky, Thomas Struth, Rineke Dijkstra etc. are too, though it's hard to be sure!</p>

<p>Joel Meyerowitz seems to use both film and digi. So apparently does Martin Parr.</p>

<p>Film is still pretty much a standard in that world, though digi is increasingly gaining acceptance.</p>

 

<p>I have the benefit of visiting a lot of high-profile studio shoots from my day job (shooting behind-the-scenes for television). For national magazine covers, editorial, and large promo shoots I've been on, it seems about 98% of it is shot on full-frame DSLRs. The other 2% is shot on medium-format with digital backs. Each photographer shoots tethered to an iMac, mounted on a Magliner. I haven't seen anyone shooting film for years.</p>

<p>In the art scene, however, the majority of photographers exhibiting in Los Angeles-area galleries that I've visited have been shooting medium-format film and 4 x 5 film.</p>

<p>Bill said:</p>

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<p><em>Last week I had the privilege - and pleasure - of using Phase One's new IQ180 MFDB. It clearly out-resolves my (admittedly quite old) 4 by 5 images.</em></p>

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<p>Steve replied:</p>

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<p><em>The IQ180 back is 80 megapixels. If you are comparing it to 4x5 film of 20 square inches then that's 2 megapixels per square inch. If you translate that to the 1.33 square inches of a 35mm frame then that's 2.66 megapixels.</em><br /><em>I don't think anyone will try to claim that 2.66 megapixels of digital would equal or even exceed the resolution of a 35mm frame. Therefore, 80 megapixels will not out resolve 4x5 film.</em></p>

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<p>Ray replied:<br>

<em>What we're seeing here is the difference between potential and actual performance. Steve is right: potentially, 4x5 film is way better than 80 megapixels. Bill is also right: in actual use, most 4x5 shots probably won't exceed that. I can think of 4 reasons why this is so:....</em><br>

<em> </em><br>

Surprising to me are the vastly different conclusions in the continuing film/digital comparisons. I realize that photographic “quality” is somewhat subjective, but the disparity in conclusions is remarkable. I did a number of comparisons of Pentax 645D files to those from 6X7 and 645 scans (using the same lenses for both cameras). I concluded that the 40 MP file of the 645D was roughly equivalent to a good 67 scan. I later read a review of the 645D on the Luminous Landscape in which the author compared the 645D quality to that of 4x5. Anyone have a theory as to how conclusions can be so varied?</p>

<i>"Anyone have a theory as to how conclusions can be so varied?

"</i><br><br>Yes. People want it to be so, so they do everything to make it appear so.<br>Ever since digital capture first arrived, we have been told it was better. At first, it very obviously was not. As digital capture improved, it became harder to point out that the claims that were made on its behalf were (still) false. (For instance: we did see, and still see, a lot of tests that pulled every bit out of digital it had to offer, compared that to film, showing that digital could well keep up. What these tests fail to show is how much more film still had to give from that point onwards.)<br>It's part of a wider phenomenon: the consumerist culture, in which things like convenience, perceived 'moderness', cheapness, being instantaneous, are valued much more than things like quality. People no longer want to spend the effort and time needed to do things the way that ensures the best result. Instead, the best result is redefined in terms of those things mentioned.<br>We have well and truly made the transition into that consumerist culture. Nowadays, all people do is shrug their shoulders and go on to ignore things like the above, simpel calculation, that shows that high end digital capture still delivers, per inch (for what that is worth), no more than the first digital machines did.<br>It was quite interesting though to see how along the way towards where we are now, the old values and beliefs were challenged by the apostles of the new way.

To name just a few:

 

Hans Christian Schink

Carl Wooley

Edward Burtynsky

Peter Bialobrzeski

Matthieu Gafsou

Sally Mann (or qctually she uses mirror plates)

Michael Kenna

Ken Kitano

 

Especially Hans Christian Schink and Ken Kitano make very interesting work with extremely long exposures). Their

work would be impossible with digital camera's.

<p>I'm still using film. Film is my medium. Period.</p>

<p>I don't have a digital cam, not even a tiny point and shoot.</p>

<p>Just today I tried to recover a file from a client's HD. He saved it, copied it, updated it several times over the past 6 years. Bit error. Image gone.</p>

<p>This will never happen with my slides. </p>

<p>What else? I don't even have Photoshop because I prefer to clean a scene before I touch the shutter. OK, I don't do sports, events, weddings, just architecture, pr, documentation. No need for the speed of digital.</p>

<p>Any drawbacks? Sure. Life is getting harder without using hype tech on the fast lane. But I'd rather be a truck driver or handy man before I invest into a camera that'll turn obsolete after 4 or 6 months.</p>

<i>"He saved it, copied it, updated it several times over the past 6 years. Bit error. Image gone.

"</i><br><br>A bit error in all the copies? What luck!<br>Slides (i know from experience) aren't indestructable either. Nor are negatives.<br>On the balance of things, i'm sure that digital storage is the more robust form.<br><br>(Disclaimer: i use film. Digital only if i can't help it. I do scan (and keep the negatives so i can scan them again, and again) and digital post processing plus the then inevitable digital storage thing.)

<p>"But I'd rather be a truck driver or a handyman..."<br>

Jens, I am a truck driver and I do enjoy film. After shooting film for about 8 yrs and getting some nice landscape and wildlife shots without really understanding what I was doing to get the shots, I finally gave in and went digital with a 10 meg. That's when I hit a wall. Digital seemed to take the challenge out things with the aspect of "you can just fix it in photoshop". I recently acquired MF with an RB 67 Pro S and I love it. MF has restored my interest because of the necessity of having to think about what you're doing to get the image you want. LONG LIVE FILM!</p>

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<p>On the balance of things, i'm sure that digital storage is the more robust form.</p>

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<p>I'm sure it's the other way round.</p>

The thing that wins it for digital storage is the ease with which copies proliferate. If one goes wrong, there are numerous others to fall back on.<br>If, that is, you do keep to a simple regime of making back-ups (not on the same disk, not on the same computer, not even on a RAID array - if lightning strikes, a super redundant RAID thingy can and will go bad beyond hope for recovery. The best, and simplest way, is to copy to portable disks.)<br>Yes, people cry out, warning for format changes of either carrier or file. But that really is a non-issue. Things do not change over night into something that renders everything that came before completely unusable.<br><br>Film on the other hand is an everything or nothing thing, with no such easy way to make back ups. Damage your one and only copy, and you can spend hours in retouching. At best. At worst, it will be a complete loss.<br>You can make copies of film, true. But it's impossible to make those identical to the original. So not really an option.<br><br>Having said all that, i think that archivability is far too overrated. Very, very few images really need, or even deserve, to be kept after they served the purpose they are brought into being for. Make them, use them, and forget about them.

If digital camera files are sufficiently archivable, then so are film scans. Make a good scan of a film shot and you have

both physical and electronic records. (Or make an archival quality print from a digital file and you have the same thing.)

It's a wash. You can use either film or digital for most purposes, even if some specialized areas are best done with

one or the other, so just use whatever you prefer and don't over think it.

<i>"If digital camera files are sufficiently archivable, then so are film scans. Make a good scan of a film shot and you have both physical and electronic records."</i><br><br>I do just that (scan and save both scan and film).<br>The 'argument' in the few last posts was purely about the method of storage, film vs file, abot which one is more robust.

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<p>Having said all that, i think that archivability is far too overrated. Very, very few images really need, or even deserve, to be kept after they served the purpose they are brought into being for.</p>

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<p>A good point. I'm sure my negatives will be disposed of once I am gone.</p>

<p>There are definitely still a few. There is actually a web series put out by a group called "Framed" with host and guest photographers that only shoot film professionally. Ryan muirhead, Tanja lippert, jan scholz, and name a few others that either exclusively shoot film or mostly shoot film, ron contarsy, jonathan canlas, jonas peterson, the guys at indie film lab, the brothers wright, ect just to name some of the ones i remember. Good series. A lot of those guys are wedding photogs by the way, the indie film lab guys, canlas, jonas peterson. Lippert does both fashion and weddings, Contarsy does fashion and has his work in various vogue magazines, and harpers bazaar. Speaking of fashion, i also know Norman jean Roy shoots mostly film on mamiya Rz67's and mamiya 7 II's. His work has been on the cover of vanity fair, vogue, harpers ect. Going back to weddings i also know of kirk mastin, jose villa, alea lovely, jen huang, karen wise, ect. In the fine art world theres still alot of guys who shoot film, especially large format and even some wet plate colloidion users like sally mann. <br /><br />So yes, even in those very tough professional environments there are still people who shoot film.</p>