mallik Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 After watching many pictures of digital and analog (film) pictures (both taken by me as well as by others that I see on Web, Magazines etc.), I tend to get a feeling that pictures from digital cameras seem to have a graphical quality as opposed to showing the REAL image. So much so, that I start guessing if the picture was taken with a digital camera or a film one. I get a feeling that there are more shades in color and light (in the scene photographed) than shown in the picture, and feel an analog picture would have done more justice. On the same front, I feel colors are often brighter in digital pictures, though. A result of lesser gamut in digital pictures probably. Am I being biased or do you also feel the same way. Mallik. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gerry_szarek Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 All has to do with post processing, grain, AND dynamic range. Most photographers over sharpen images, don't run noise reduction programs (easy to tell just look in the dark area's of the image), along with overzealous use of the contrast control kind of like very cheap consumer films by Fuji or Kodak. The best digital images IMO look like they were taken with fine grain negative film minus the grain. Note you can add in grain back in to digital images btw. It is still very difficult to get the B&W digital images to look like tri-x however. Gerry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Troll Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 Well, I do too. Without even thinking about it. To me it's the OOF portions of an image which identify Dig/film. Part of it is the post procesesing, but mostly the very short FL of most digital cameras, I think. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spearhead Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 How many times is this ridiculous comment going to be made? It seems like a specialty here. <p> <center><img src="http://www.spirer.com/images/grabshot.jpg"><br> <i>Grab Shot, EOS 10D, Copyright 2004 Jeff Spirer</i></center> Music and Portraits Blog: Life in Portugal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spearhead Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 <center><img src="http://www.spirer.com/NY2004/images/subgirl2.jpg"><br> <i>Underground, EOS 10D, Copyright 2004 Jeff Spirer</i></center> Music and Portraits Blog: Life in Portugal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grant_. Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 i dont see that at all....maybe ur eyes are crossed? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spearhead Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 <i>I tend to get a feeling that pictures from digital cameras seem to have a graphical quality as opposed to showing the REAL image. </i><p> By the way, this makes no sense. Film doesn't show the "REAL image," it shows what light recorded on film. If it showed the "REAL image," we wouldn't need darkrooms or different films or anything. What a goofy post. Music and Portraits Blog: Life in Portugal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spearhead Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 Here's a film shot, is this the "REAL thing"? Do you really believe that this boy looks like that, blurry and see-through?<p> <center><img src="http://www.spirer.com/images/viet20.jpg"><br><i>Muong Children, Copyright 2004 Jeff Spirer</i></center> Music and Portraits Blog: Life in Portugal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rico_tudor Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 <center> <p align=center> <img src=http://patternassociates.com/rico/d30/misc/miafrancesca.jpg> <br> Canon D30 (red channel) </center> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phule Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 Holy Cow! Jeff found the fabled Transparent Children! They exhibit the strange behavior of being only partially seen yet heard for miles in any direction! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad_ Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 Jeff is channeling to the spirit world through his film camera. You can't do that with digital... www.citysnaps.net Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grant_. Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 u need at least a 1gb card to do that with digital... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
socke Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 In a magazin or on a monitor I can't tell the difference between a scanned picture and one made with a digital camera. I don't look for missing grain and such :-) The difference for me is in handling, give me a camera with the FoV of a 50mm lens on 135 film with comparable sensitivity to ISO 800 not bigger than my Rollei 35 and I may leave it at home. DSLRs are too big to be carried around anywhere and the smaller digicams are not sensitive enough (with reasonable quality, that is).<div></div> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
el_fang Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 Just another of those desperate delusions by luddites who think film will live forever... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pamela_edwards Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 or a fantastic fantasy from someone who thinks that digital makes one a better photographer... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stephen_jones4 Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 Why do the same old bullies try to smash down any and all disagreement with their views? If they are sure of their opinions, perhaps they ought to be a little gentler expressing them.In answer to the question - yes, it seems clear to me that there is a graphical quality to many digital images - semi-posterised would be one way of describing it. Presumably it is due to lack of grain (texture) and a reduced palette of colours (through sharpening, sampling, whatever). In this way, very noisy images (such as those posted above) tend to look more like film, while those cameras such as the latest digilux or the Minolta A2 which have higher noise give images that look closer to what we might expect of film. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beau 1664876222 Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 Digital cameras do weird stuff that our eyes find less familiar than the weird stuff film does. If you prefer the stuff film does, great, use film -- digital cannot yet accurately emulate how film records light. But we're also at the point where film can't perfectly emulate what digital does, so pick your axe and go with it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Karim Ghantous Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 Stephen, I have no idea what you're talking about. I mean, Rico's D30 shot looks worse than any grainy film image I've ever seen; where Volker's D60 shot looks very much like Tri-X in a Leica. If I could afford to shoot film I would, though not because it's 'REAL'. But I'm almost as happy with my DSLR so the conclusion is obvious as to what I will be using - for now anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grant_. Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 <i>digital cannot yet accurately emulate how film records light.</i> <br> <br> how so? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul t Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 They are different. Don't agree digital shows anything other than the real image, but Jeff's shot, which looks great, doesn't look like a Tri X shot. In some ways it looks even better, even more impermanent and snatched., But we've spent so many years being conditioned into liking that TriX look. Photography, both analogue and digital, is an inherently complex medium, and there's no way that two different methods of capturing images should look the same, But that will come, Within 5 years there's be a 'TriX' preset on yer Epson, that will work much like the Theremin preset on your digital synthesiser. <p> AS far as digital v film goes, I'm more interested in the different mental approach imposed by having an unlimited number of shots to play with - because you can instantly trash the bad ones - vs having a film with 35 exposures. Is being limited good, or bad? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
larry_kincaid1 Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 I use the word, "cartoonish" to describe a lot (not all) of the photos posted on photo.net done with digital cameras. But be very careful here. When Fuji film first started to challenge Kodak with color film, its photos looked very much like cartoons. Very saturated cartoon-like colors. Over time, however, we have all come to appreciated (unrealistic?) oversaturated color prints/slides and consider the colors to be quite "normal," whatever that means. Kodachrome is still considered to reproduce colors as the human eye sees them. What this suggests is that we will all get used to digital photos in whatever form they evolve on the web, which is to say on our computer screens in whatever state of development and calibration those monitors are. In other words, I think we are losing the capacity to judge photographs very well in the terms used here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beau 1664876222 Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 "But that will come, Within 5 years there's be a 'TriX' preset on yer Epson, that will work much like the Theremin preset on your digital synthesiser." Or maybe there won't. A couple years back, me and another guy burned a ton of studio time trying to make $300,000 worth of synthesizers sound like a Theremin, and we failed. Had to find a real one or give it up. And this guy is a world-class studio wiz. And another guy I know still rents out a 1960's Optigan, which he found in an alley, for $200 per day to studios that have every synthesizer ever created. That's my answer to Grant's question too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grant_. Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 the difference is im not trying to emulate something else like you are....perhaps thats why u failed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bacsa Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 <i>"digital cannot yet accurately emulate how film records light"</i> -why should it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul t Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 COuld be right, Beau. But funny how many people go on about the Theremin on Beach Boys or Portishead records, and there isn't one to be found on there. For most people, an imitation that gets 85 per cent of the way, for 10 per cent of the effort, is good enough.<p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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