Remind me why I'm learning on film?

[scott_eaton]

<I>I looked at Dan Schwartz's home page. Nothing about wedding photography. Another hobbyist blowing smoke out his...</i><P>I looked at yours and thought I was looking at the garbage can next to the Walmart mini-lab after Aunt betty went to pick up prints from her $10.000 disposable camera. People pay you for that junk? You and Les should exchange shooting tips.<P>I spent 6 years working for a dedicated professional portrait lab handling weddings from over thousand different professional shooters (along with shooting a few myself). Given the worst 10% of the work we handled was better than 90% of the junk being posted here from film shooters, I'm feel compelled to warn Lauren shes listening to the wrong people.<P>Rule 1 - 35mm is for <b>amatuers</b>, and no truly professional or even semi-professional wedding shooter I've ever met shoots 35mm. These are typically the arrogant 'cousin tony' types who've learned everything they know from Pop Photo, and never get any better from the second month they picked up their camera. This includes Leica shooters. Their work never held up any better compared to our 6x6 and 6x7 shooters - they just think it does because they have german glass.<P>

 

Rule 2 - 35mm is for amatuers with low quality standards(just in case you missed that in rule #1). If you want to <b>see a bride cry</b>, show her formals shot on 6x6 or 6x7 side-by-side with 35mm.<P>

 

<P>Rule 3 - A digital SLR in the right hands will produce better results than 35mm film, especially if the lab is using digital printers, which 95% of them are. A dSLR won't produce better results than medium format film unless the MF shooter is incompetent, or the film lab is .<P>

 

<p>Rule 4 - MF print film has gads more exposure lattitude than digital (or slide), and if the photographer shoots consistently within the exposure window (not very hard with MF print film) and uses a good lab, their results should always be good. They will however <b>never get better beyond that point</b> because MF print film has so much exposure 'pillow' built into it that it's impossible to get anything other than soft portraits with mushy colors - unlike using a very high end dSLR like a 1Ds or 5D.<P>

 

<p>Rule 5 - Getting to rule 4 is tougher than you think because using MF cameras still means you're shooting film, and if you shoot print film you will <b>always be a slave and victim to the lab</b>. With digital, your learning curve is perfectly linear. With film, the learning curve stops when you walk into the lab. With digital, you are always under control. This is why many of the film shooters here bad mouth digital because they need the lab to think for them, or post wildly erratic and poorly scanned images I certainly woulnd't want to pay for. Simply ask yourself who has images posted you'd want in your wedding portfolio. <P>Rule 6 - The wedding forum here is a better resource.

[scott_eaton]

<I>I shot with a pentax 67II. So mine can be easily blown up to 24x36</i><P>I shot with an RB67, and I'd take a 5D anyday and be happy to compare 24x36's from 6x7's.<P>With your 6x7 neg, the quality of the print depends on if the poor, underpaid lab rat decideds to use a grain focuser or not when slapping lenses around on the 75year old dichro enlarger because the lab is too cheap to upgrade to professional durst series. The dSLR image gets printed directly digital and doesn't suffer this variable. <P>If anything, most labs will scan your 6x7 neg and print it digitally anyhow (a sucky process at best given the wildly erratic nature of scanning professional portrait films), I'll take the 5D or 1Ds capture because it will be cleaner and more linear. You 6x7 will thump 35mm or 6mp dSLR though.

[michael_ginex1]

Every photographer of any merit that know says basically the same thing...."digital isn't better, it's just faster". Also, there is a reason the end product, the final print, from a digital file requires photographic printing to eliminate the "layering" seen in digital prints. Pegasus and enlargers of that kind cost hundreds of thousands and pro labs purchase them just to get the same quality final print from a digital file that one would get from a film negative.

[fernando_mcsoto]

I supose that a mechanical camera and film have two advantages: you learn to see and take decisions. I would start with film for a short while and then after two or three months move to digital. The inmidiate feedback of digital help you grow and learn faster. In your case I would have moved to digital long ago.

 

 

 

That said I am a 70% film shooter. You may want to keep on using film for some types of pictures while using digital.

[daniel_taylor]

"Scott, on one side of your face you say don't shoot 35mm and then on the other you say 5D. How soon you forget that I've proven to you that 35mm film has more resolution then todays DSLRs - most certainly your 10D, using minilab processed film with lossy desktop scanner. Did you take a peek in my Resolution Album recently as I added a scan with the Konica Minolta 5400 which adds the resolving ability to read Libreville"

 

Attached is your latest 5400 scan put next to a 10D image shot at the same distance from the map as a 35mm or a full frame camera would be shot. The light falling on the 10D sensor was the same light that was falling on your film, the crop covering the same physical size on sensor as on film.

 

I'm confused Les...*why* is the 10D image so much sharper, crisper, cleaner, better? I thought film was to be worshipped and that you had proof that not even the mighty 1Ds mkII could compare. Looks like a sensor with 10D level technology manufactured to 24x36mm would be more than a match for the best film on the best desktop scanner. Where would that place the latest technology 5D and 1Ds mkII sensors?

 

Well, you can show us, right? Where are the 1Ds mkII images? And are they any better than your hobbled 20D "test" images?

 

(Libreville, eh? Sorry, on the film it looks like Libeville. Try again though!)<div></div>

[daniel_taylor]

Hey Les...what's that word right above Nigeria on the film? It's...oh wait, I can see it CLEARLY on the digital: Kaduna.

 

I guess if I ever want to get into photographing maps I better buy a full frame digital. 5D good enough, or should I go straight for the 1Ds?

[daniel_taylor]

"Now that I've been practicing so much, it gets frustrating and I am trying to remember why I am doing this on film? Can someone just refresh my memory and keep me on the film track? Thanks!"

 

My guess is because you've been listening to people who don't know what they're talking about. Let's see, you can shoot on film, wait a week, get the results, wonder what settings affected what or if the lab mucked thinigs up...

 

OR you can shoot digital, evaluate on site, change settings and shoot again, and learn exactly what affects what. And if you ever need to look back at your shots, settings are stored in the image files. Sounds like a MUCH better way to learn to me.

 

Refresh my memory: why on Earth do you want to stay "on the film track" again?

[discpad]

Sounds like another "measurebator" has entered the fray...

[daniel_taylor]

"You most certainly will get considerably larger quality images with a lot less effort from 35mm film then you would with this kit."

 

Let me second Scott's point that serious wedding pros do not shoot on 35mm film, nor would I ever hire a 35mm wedding photographer or advise a friend to do so. Les can wet himself over maps all day long if he wants, extinction point lpmm doesn't mean jack in a portrait or wedding photo. Portraits need clean, beautiful tones, and benefit greatly from having certain details, such as the eyes, come off very sharp (i.e. high MTF in the 10-40 lpmm range). This plays right into digital's greatest strengths. Portraits are probably the most extreme example of APS 6 MP sensors beating up on 35mm despite having a lower lpmm extinction point. A properly shot digital portait holds up to enlargement far better than scanned, grainy, color all over the place, blotchy tones, small format film.

 

Wedding pros do not use MF because they need more lpmm, they use it for the tonality. If you're serious about getting into weddings, pick up a MF system or a body like the 5D, 1Ds, or Nikon's highest end (always forget the number). I would recommend the digital. You will have to be more careful about exposure, but you will be in a far better position than the poor guys having to depend on a dwindling number of good, pro labs.

[daniel_taylor]

"Sounds like another "measurebator" has entered the fray..."

 

Actually I don't give a rat's a** about the lpmm tests Les gets in a fit about. To know why I made those posts would require you to know the history surrounding his little "tests". Go read past posts if you're interested.

[brian_flaherty1]

Great discussion! And, a lot of GOOD information. A large "Thanks!" to each and everyone of you.

 

I've been shooting Nikon since 1968, beginning with an "F" and, progressing through FE, F-3, F4S, N90, and, presently, a couple F-100's(I'm getting older and weaker and that MONSTER F4S was just too much to lug around). As a "sop" to the digital age, I got a D70s.

 

Just about all the shooting was for fun. . .though, for 20 years, I used it for "evidence" in the courtroom(5947 was great for that--getting both a slide and a print from the same shot).

 

Now, after thousands of photos, I have decided to "become" an artist in the photographic medium. I am "looking" again at the works of the "greats" and "near-greats" who have gone before(Adams, Steichen, et al). And, I have bought a couple of RB-67's. Nothing fancy. . .just good solid optics and mechanics.

 

And, quickly comparing my 35mm stuff with the digital, I gotta say, digital is fun and quick, and, "nice pictures." But, film is PHOTOGRAPHY!

 

The late, great Ernie Kovacs, once remarked, "A woman is just a woman. But, a cigar is. . .a great smoke!"

 

And, that's MY opinion!

[brian_flaherty1]

By the way. . .to the guy who was apologetic about his Tamron 28-200. I'm with you. . .when I travel by air, or, I am back-packing, and weight is a factor, I carry two lenses and two cameras: the F-100's and a Tamron 28-300mm(upgraded from the 28-200 when I got the digital); and, a Sigma 18-35mm.

 

When I travel by car and have unlimited space, I carry EVERYTHING! The above stuff; an F-3; the D70s; an assortment of "other Nikkor" lenses; a couple tripods; a hundred rolls of film! Add to all that now, the two RB-67's and their lenses.