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From my perspective my prints look much the same as the prints I used to make via E-6 or C-41, so it is not a digital/film thing. It comes down to a few items. Some people are not good at assessing colors or color balance, and some people just like what I think are over saturated colors. Reds are frequent offenders as many sensors seem to be oversensitive to reds,and these may very well required selective desaturation or decreased luminance. You must have a color balanced workflow: many don't. I think the OPs chariot shot is OK, but my first thought was that it was a bit oversaturated. In my experience (much like in the days of darkroom color printing), if your first reaction is that it is not quite right, then it probably needs adjustment. But I don't feel that it is egregious in this case, so if you like it keep it as is. As a caveat, all this assumes that you are going for realism, or to reproduce the subject "as it was". If this is not your aim, and often it isn't, then one can do what one likes of course.
Robin Smith
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Care to comment on my remarks about looking at un-converted RAW files?

I thought I adequately addressed that here:

All RAW converters, by default, use the EXIF data encoded with the file to simulate an out-of-camera JPEG as closely as possible. The colour temperature, tint, saturation and tone curve - as guided by whatever 'Creative Style' or 'Picture Control' is selected in the camera menu - are all automatically adjusted to give such a simulation, unless you instruct the RAW converter otherwise.

 

These inbuilt instructions are (usually) applied to the overly-green and dark truly raw image before it's shown to you. Nevertheless, that doesn't change the basic nature of what the image sensor actually captures.

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So let me thank everyone for their inputs. They've been most insightful. I posted this in "Casual Photo Conversations" because I guess I was looking to see if there were folks who had a similar feeling about digital color vs. analog color, if there even is such a difference, and what they had done about it. There is just something about my analog pics that I find more natural to my eye, be it C-41 or E-6. I've always assumed it was the colors, but perhaps is is the texture of grain, even though I don't see any grain in my 4x5 shots. Maybe I just need to put a lot more effort into my digital workflow to get the results I get right out of the box with film. Maybe it's a phase I'm going through........

BTW, my analog workflow is hybrid. I don't have a darkroom any more. Develop and scan.........

I agree with you that digital is too pasticky and too sharp. Clinical. Garish. Especially with people. Digital is fine with macros of spiders. Film has a more natural look to it. Edges blend better. Digital edges cut my eyes.

 

Unfortunately, I'm not a pro and cannot help you in your quest. Maybe if you tried a forum dedicate to advertising. Do me a favor though. If you find a link that has an answer, please post it back here. I'd like to know if there an "easy" way to give digital that film look.

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I'd like to know if there an "easy" way to give digital that film look.

Yes. Ditch your digital camera and only work with film. And, by all means, don’t scan and post your film pics for online viewing because that digitizes them and might be dangerous to your eyes.

 

[The sign of the true genius photographer, in so many forums of the early 2000s, is he who wants to live in the glory of the ... past. Damned be creativity, vision, intimacy, and expression. The prior standards of the medium are really what count!]

 

I’m imagining Beethoven spending hours writing into his local chapter of Complaints About Modern Instruments about how awful these new-fangled pianos are compared to the gold standard of harpsichords.

 

Maybe because the nature of photography is often understood as being limited to imitating the world rather than as an act of creation, we’re tied so much to imitating the look of previous generations of photographers instead of discovering something new that looks different.

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Of course, that being said, I don’t agree with the premise that digital color looks plasticky and sharp, especially since these adjectives describe texture and not color but more importantly because my sense is that that kind of look results more from workflow and individual approaches to craft than from the medium, which is more convenient to blame.
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I thought I adequately addressed that here:

 

No you didn't address my issue with your idea that there is any value in looking at an unconverted (and tonality-wise totally distorted) RAW file and your snarky remark: "I used a small app called 'MakeTIFF' that creates a 48 bit Tiff file from any RAW file you feed it, and that's exactly what a properly exposed RAW file looks like before any processing has been done to it. Excessively green from the Bayer RGGB filtering and looking dark due to linear (gamma=1) representation of tonal values.

 

If you haven't tried it for yourself, then please refrain from uninformed comments."

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No you didn't address my issue with your idea that there is any value in looking at an unconverted (and tonality-wise totally distorted) RAW file and your snarky remark: "I used a small app called 'MakeTIFF' that creates a 48 bit Tiff file from any RAW file you feed it, and that's exactly what a properly exposed RAW file looks like before any processing has been done to it. Excessively green from the Bayer RGGB filtering and looking dark due to linear (gamma=1) representation of tonal values.

 

If you haven't tried it for yourself, then please refrain from uninformed comments."

If I tell you yours is bigger than his, will you let it go?

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Yes. Ditch your digital camera and only work with film. And, by all means, don’t scan and post your film pics for online viewing because that digitizes them and might be dangerous to your eyes.

 

[The sign of the true genius photographer, in so many forums of the early 2000s, is he who wants to live in the glory of the ... past. Damned be creativity, vision, intimacy, and expression. The prior standards of the medium are really what count!]

 

I’m imagining Beethoven spending hours writing into his local chapter of Complaints About Modern Instruments about how awful these new-fangled pianos are compared to the gold standard of harpsichords.

 

Maybe because the nature of photography is often understood as being limited to imitating the world rather than as an act of creation, we’re tied so much to imitating the look of previous generations of photographers instead of discovering something new that looks different.

I'm not trying to get into a pissing war, but I'd say you are ignoring that there are, in fact, many older technologies that surpass their modern counterparts, especially when the modern "replacement" was designed for any number of economies over pure performance.

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I'd like to know if there an "easy" way to give digital that film look.

It's easy. Use a digital camera to copy a slide. The results will be very close to the original, including color and contrast. That should tell you it's the medium, not the camera.

 

Corollary 1: Digital cameras tend to be true to nature

Corollary 2: Truth in imaging is not necessarly desirable

Corollary 3: All media distort. Choose a medium which distorts in a way which pleases you.

 

That said, It's difficult or impossible to achieve that "look" by manipulating the usual controls. I suspect someone has produced 3DLUT's to that end. Although mainly for video, there's no reason an LUT could not be applied to a still image. The color response of film varies with the exposure level, a fact which is especially problematic with negative film. That's precisely what a 3DLUT is designed to accomplish.

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I'm not trying to get into a pissing war

No worries. Nothing you've said gives me the impression you would do that.

I'd say you are ignoring that there are, in fact, many older technologies that surpass their modern counterparts, especially when the modern "replacement" was designed for any number of economies over pure performance.

I'm not ignoring that. I simply wasn't addressing that. I had in mind the energy and effort spent on regretting where photography has come. I was suggesting that one's ability to see, express, go out searching for great pics, thinking up great scenarios to photograph and ways to photograph them, challenging oneself to experiment with new ways of seeing, new styles, etc. hasn't changed.

 

A healthy balance can usually be reached between acceptance of what is and desire for something else. The desire for something else is best done within some confines of reason or at least what's possible.

 

I have a Steinway piano I love but it doesn't have the richness of tone that some concert grands have. I can either expend energy bemoaning that fact or get on with it. I could even expend senseless energy trying to play mine in such a way that it will sound more like the concert grands, but that would be futile, so I don't. Instead, I put my energy into getting it to sound the best it can and enjoying the music I produce, thinking about how I want to interpret Beethoven, etc.

 

I've seen people play on all sorts of qualities of instruments, use all different makes and models of different levels of cameras, older directors who made movies on the cheap or who made big-budget movies with the best gear and other ingredients. It's usually easy to tell when someone is trying too hard or not in tune with the tools they're using. Some of those grainy old movies with obvious backdrops and less star quality actors are so much better than what was being produced at the higher end. They didn't try to emulate the higher end. The movies they made and stories they told are often in keeping, though, with the look of more rudimentary tools. It works.

 

You're right that much "progress" is made due to cost effectiveness and other concerns, not just in photography. We don't build buildings like we used to, painters (for the most part) don't use the kinds of oils they used to, and many of us listen to music files as opposed to vinyl. Watcha gonna do?

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These inbuilt instructions are (usually) applied to the overly-green and dark truly raw image before it's shown to you. Nevertheless, that doesn't change the basic nature of what the image sensor actually captures.

 

I'll try one more time to get you to engage on this matter. No, the overly-green and dark image is not the true RAW image. It's the true RAW image fed directly into the very-non-linear monitor causing a significant distortion through reduction of the brightness of the middle tones. If you feel you can publicly accuse me of uninformed comments, you should have the courtesy to engage in debate. Normally, gamma correction is applied to the image to compensate for the very-non-linear nature of monitors.

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Yes. Ditch your digital camera and only work with film. And, by all means, don’t scan and post your film pics for online viewing because that digitizes them and might be dangerous to your eyes.

 

[The sign of the true genius photographer, in so many forums of the early 2000s, is he who wants to live in the glory of the ... past. Damned be creativity, vision, intimacy, and expression. The prior standards of the medium are really what count!]

 

I’m imagining Beethoven spending hours writing into his local chapter of Complaints About Modern Instruments about how awful these new-fangled pianos are compared to the gold standard of harpsichords.

 

Maybe because the nature of photography is often understood as being limited to imitating the world rather than as an act of creation, we’re tied so much to imitating the look of previous generations of photographers instead of discovering something new that looks different.

I work with both. I enjoy film because it slows me down and does have a different look. Digital looks too real, if that makes sense. Nothing wrong with it per se. When I go on vacation, I shoot a 1" P&S and make slideshows for TV display. Frankly, 4mb-8mb old P&S's have smoother and more natural looks than do 24mb DSLR's which I don't own.

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I'll try one more time to get you to engage on this matter.

The OP asked - "Do all RAW images look that way before being processed?" - and I showed what a RAW image truly looks like before being processed.

 

You then accuse me of showing an underexposed and poor example of a RAW image. Whereas in fact the picture was perfectly well exposed and typical of what any RAW image would look like before being processed.

No, the overly-green and dark image is not the true RAW image.

Yes it is. What else can it be?

 

The fact that it looks green and dark on a normal monitor is the very reason that it requires processing.

 

The fact of the matter is that you accused me of showing a RAW image that was underexposed when I did no such thing. Because at that time you obviously had no idea how much processing a RAW image undergoes before being presented for viewing by the average raw-converter software.

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Digital looks too real, if that makes sense

It doesn’t make sense. It’s a myth you’ve bought into. You, and not the medium, are most likely the party responsible for the look of your photos and simply aren’t crafting your photos to get the look you want.

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Beethoven played on pianos with thin strings and wooden frames. Notably, he had a reputation for breaking strings at every performance. I think Beethoven would have rejoiced had he access to a modern piano, developed in the mid 19th century, with a cast iron frame and high-tension steel strings. Strings rarely break and the sound is loud enough to reach the back of the hall. Nor did 20th century pianists abjure from recording on "player" pianos, the early equivalent of digital music.

 

Early (mid 1980) digital recordings weren't well received, largely due to misunderstanding of the medium by engineers and producers. There was a lot of emphasis on high frequencies, which are hard to achieve on vinyl, making the sound of early CDs brittle and unrealistic. The real virtue of digital sound is actually in the low frequencies, which are problematic for magnetic tape machines. I recall the comments of a CSO bass player on hearing my recordings, saying, "That doesn't sound digital."

 

In the late 50's, Bell Labs conducted a series of experiments in which live performers, concealed from view, were compared to then new "high fidelity" recordings, and conventional recordings, also behind screens. A surprising number of subjects preferred the old recorded sound to the live or hi-fi version, because that's what they were used to hearing.

 

There is nothing inherently gaudy nor "plasticky" in digital photography, any more than with digital sound. As with any change in technology you have to learn its limitations and take advantage of its strengths.

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It doesn’t make sense. It’s a myth you’ve bought into. You, and not the medium, are most likely the party responsible for the look of your photos and simply aren’t crafting your photos to get the look you want.

If I have to craft them to get a special look, then you have to acknowledge there's something different about them to begin with. My digital shots look different then my film shots. How would I craft my digital one to look like my film shots? What I've noticed is that my smaller 4mb size old P&S have less antiseptic look than my 20mb more advanced digital camera shots. Whatever the reason, I see the difference in my eyes. Being old, I've shot a lot of film in my life. I suppose if you only have shot digital, it might not be noticeable because you basically only look at digital.

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How would I craft my digital one to look like my film shots?

Did you craft your film shots or did a lab craft them for you? If it was a lab that did it, then you were and still are relying on someone else to produce your images. If you're shooting RAW, converting from RAW with maximal user choice, and doing your own printing, your photos should look the way you want them to. If you're shooting jpg, then a software designer has crafted the results you see, just as a lab technician crafted your photos in the past. If, on the other hand, you want to point and shoot, that's your choice, and you live with the results SOMEONE ELSE is providing you.

 

I can all but guarantee that were someone to post 20 images taken with film and 20 images taken with digital, and processed all images well and in a refined manner, you wouldn't be able to identify which was which.

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The digital vs film discussion (putting it mildly in some cases) has been going on for decades now, it joins the list of old vs new discussions, e.g. vinyl vs CD. I like the one above Ed_Ingold involving pianos, that's a new one for me. I am of the opinion that 'better' is in the eye (or ear) of the beholder and I am thankful to have options.

 

Is there a difference between film and digital color? I am of the opinion there is. Perhaps it's my age and my past experience with film but there is something about film colors that I like. You can call it nostalgia. But I won't go so far as to say film is better. IMHO it's not better it's just different and there are times and circumstances when I appreciate and prefer the difference. I shoot mainly digital now, and I love it, but I still get drawn to film on occasion and when I do I generally like what I get.

 

I agree with OP in his comment that Kodak Portra colors are subtle. Portra colors have a painterly quality that I cannot achieve with digital (yes, I know there are tools and plug-in that are designed to do this but I don't care to go that far). Below are two photographs made within minutes of each other, the first is Kodak Portra 400 the second is with a Nikon D850. Both were processed in LR and had tweaks and adjustments made to them, independently of course, and done to make them pleasing to me on my screen. I don't think that with all the digital tweaking in the world I could make one look like the other and I don't want to. I don't think that even with a plug-in "Kodak Portra" emulator would the D850 shot have the colors in the Portra shot. Regardless, I don't want them to be the same. To summarize, I'd have to say the D850 image looks more like the reality I experienced on the day the photographs were made but hanging on my wall I'd personally prefer the Portra.

 

 

1578326601_201906134x5VotGUT.jpg.d0760c933ebad289b5178c3d5c3c5883.jpg

 

636287281_20190613596VotGUT.jpg.853571fd47cbf3d3294ba17a5293bc64.jpg

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yes, I know there are tools and plug-in that are designed to do this but I don't care to go that far).

 

Well, you have rather torpedoed your argument. If you buy a plugin- "problem" solved, but you don't want to. I do agree that Portra colors are subtle. That is why it was/is aimed at portrait and wedding photographers.

Robin Smith
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I agree with OP in his comment that Kodak Portra colors are subtle.

That may be the case, but maybe it needs to be seen in a print to be truly appreciated. It may also be a matter of how we use the word subtle.

 

While I find the colors of the first shot you posted more interesting and complex, I don't find them more subtle. Because the color stands out more in the first shot. The gradation in the sky of the first shot feels not smooth to me, leaning toward an almost white as our eye moves downward in the sky. There's also a pretty distinct shift from the blue at the very top of the sky to the more cyan or greenish blue in the midsection of the sky. The 2nd photo, which is a more dull blue, though perhaps more sky-like, doesn't have such obvious lacks of consistency.

 

In any case, this gets to some difficulty in discussing these things. First, we don't know how much was lost or changed in whatever process brought the film image to the computer. Second, since I would describe the 2nd photo as more subtle and the 1st as more energetic and more exposed, I'm not clear how much of this might also be semantics.

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The OP asked - "Do all RAW images look that way before being processed?" - and I showed what a RAW image truly looks like before being processed.

 

You're right, Joe; I mistook your first image as being underexposed. My apologies. However, that image does not show what a RAW image really looks like before being processed and here is why.

 

A number of processes need to be applied to the RAW file before it can be correctly shown on a monitor:

a) demosaicking the RAW data

b) applying CCT, tint, saturation, etc. etc. as selected in the camera menu

c) applying adjustments selected from the RAW converter menu

d) and finally applying gamma encoding to compensate for the non-linear behavior of most monitors

 

So, if you want to correctly show an unprocessed RAW file, you can skip processes a), b) and c) but you cannot skip process d). Process d) compensates for a monitor issue, not a RAW file issue. The tonality values of each pixel in a RAW file are a linear representation of the photographed scene and that's what you want to display on your monitor. RAW files don't exhibit dim middle tones.

 

Displaying the image as you did and claiming that's how an unprocessed RAW file looks like is incorrect.

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