Wow - read this re: Film versus Digital debate!

[stwrtertbsratbs5]

This is about as useful as discussing how many angels will fit on the head of a pin! So much silliness!

 

I shoot both film and digital, and both produce excellent prints. Go figure.

[nigel meaby]

Vijay do you have any pictures online we could all look at? I'd be interested to see how you apply all your wonderful knowledge to producing photographs and the results you achieve.

[rich_evans]

Vijay: My argument is not about gaps - it is that if the silver speck left behind after processing is thin enough the

silver itself will pass light. Nothing to do with the gaps. The photons will sail through the metallic silver atoms, as

they do through thin films of gold etc. Those gold films don't have holes at all, the light goes through the metal.

 

Now as the silver grows from a few atoms thick - it is transparent in the beginning - and as its size increases with

development, it becomes less and less transmissive. Depending on its size when development stops, it could

have any transmissivity value from 100% to 0% - all possible tones.

 

YES! EXACTLY! Thank you!

 

Daniel: Here are shots from a PDF I have that show cyrstals in the range mentioned. I guess it depends on the

film.

 

At first glance I was prepared to call these excellent light optical micrographs, and they indeed indicated

transparent 'grains' or crystals, however now that I've had my first cup of coffee, and I can see some of the

features and can actually now read the scale lines, those images were obtained from a Transmission Electron

Microscope (TEM) using a carbon shadowing technique - all you are seeing is an outline of all the features

present on the sample crystals, as opposed to the SEM images which give you more topographic 3-dimensional

information with regard to the subject.

 

One important point (among others) not yet touched on much is the effect of the particles on light refraction,

which will also alter perception of grey levels as density increases or decreases. --Rich

 

As an aside - how the heck do you guys get the italicized text into these responses - I can't seem to get anything

but plain text ;-(

[desmond_kidman]

The way theorical numbers at the molecular scale are are being thrown around here, then extrapolated into macroscopic "reality" dogmatically stated, with no tie-in or proof substantiating the conjecture is amazing. I asked if anyone had truly compared top end versions of digital and film in a controlled circumstance and not one poster answered. Amazing. Such passionate arguement about theory with no connection to the reality of the situation: real images.

 

Does anyone really care about how this relates to actual images, given today's level of digital technology versus today's level of film (which I think we can assume is the final level, regardless of potential and theoretical limits)?

 

Really, do yourself a favor, perform a test which will only take half a day or so, including arranging the rental (rentals are available mail-order), get enlargements made or make them yourself, making sure every vendor represents the highest level, and compare. Having the answers at hand might surprise you, but in any case will give you great peace of mind knowing that you REALLY know the comparison, at today's level of technology.

[ellis_vener_photography]

Rockwell is not a crackpot. But is just full of bad advice and the problem with that is that if you start with bad habits it is hard to shake them off later.

[rishij]

Nigel: <i>""and also in attracting the best mate by setting ourselves apart from other males and therefore being 'selected' by the female"</i>

<p>

Tell me you sensed the irony in my entire post given that in the last bit of it I said that this entire mechanism of 'setting ourselves apart from other males' of the species has been decoupled from its original purpose, which is why we're sitting around in front of computers not helping ourselves at all... :)

<p>

For me, that's ok, because my life goes in phases... this just happens to be my 'social recluse' phase!

<p>

Rishi

[rishij]

Rich: HTML. Haha, that sounded funny. Rich HTML. Get it? Nevermind.

<p>

Daniel: <i>"Also, do you mean to say that with digital, resolution at grayscale targets is the same as for monochromatic targets then?

<p>

It drops off at a much slower rate than with film. Compare the shadow detail of a digital image with a film image of the same scene at the same exposure."</i>

<p>

I'm gonna have to say that's a rather weak argument, because digital sensors have a a linear response to light, whereas both negative and positive films, I believe, have a pretty low slope for response vs. light exposure at the low (shadow) end... so that itself could be the problem, yes?

<p>

Armando, you have a good point, and I'd love to do the side by side test. After I get my 5D Mark II :) Since I do have access to an Imacon, I think I'd be able to make a fair comparison.

<p>

Rishi

[vijay_nebhrajani]

<i>Vijay: My argument is not about gaps - it is that if the silver speck left behind after processing is thin

enough the silver itself will pass light. Nothing to do with the gaps. The photons will sail through the metallic

silver atoms, as they do through thin films of gold etc. Those gold films don't have holes at all, the light goes

through the metal.

<p>

Now as the silver grows from a few atoms thick - it is transparent in the beginning - and as its size increases

with development, it becomes less and less transmissive. Depending on its size when development stops, it could

have any transmissivity value from 100% to 0% - all possible tones.

<p>

<b>Rich Evans - Ph.D. - Optics: YES! EXACTLY! Thank you! </b></i>

<p>

Finally, finally, someone gets my argument.

<p>

Damn, I had to "appeal to authority" on that one, as Daniel puts it.

[vijay_nebhrajani]

<i>Rishi: Armando, you have a good point, and I'd love to do the side by side test. After I get my 5D Mark II :) Since I do have access to an Imacon, I think I'd be able to make a fair comparison. </i>

<p>

You don't need a 5dmk2. Just look at this thread: <a href="http://www.photo.net/film-and-processing-forum/00RV7N">26 Megapixel 40D Compared to 35mm Film</a>

[dustin_fletcher1]

Okay, there are people literally putting film under microscopes and everything else here. Is that useful? No offense to anyone, but if it looks good it looks good. I think most of us can agree that a person who's good at using Photoshop as a creative tool can produce wonderful images with a digital camera. But if you want a mural, you're going to have to shoot large format film.

 

So film's not dead. In fact I still love to use film, but primarily because I love the feel of the old cameras. 99 percent of my work is digital because I don't want to deal with labs and scanning.

 

At the same time, I know lots of photographers who will still only use film and their stuff looks great.

 

Why does there even have to be a debate about this? I've never seen anyone in a gallery walk up to a print and pull a loupe out of their pocket. This is all a bit silly. Shoot what you like. I've never understood why people spend hours of time shooting at test targets. Maybe they enjoy it...if so that's great. But if it's to prove some point, just let it go and spend that time shooting something else, you know?

[bernardwest]

<i>Why does there even have to be a debate about this?</i><p>

 

Because a group of intelligent people find it an interesting subject. Is that OK with you D?

[bernardwest]

<i>Vijay Nebhrajani , Nov 16, 2008; 04:29 a.m.<p>

 

Rishi: "But, I have to argue & ask you this: In Reichmann's article, he says that a grain has to be binary? What's a 'grain' in developed film anyway? What's your definition of a 'grain' in developed film, where there are no more 'silver halide crystals' because the non-reduced silver halide salts are dissolved away... " <p>

 

There is a standard definition of film grain. It is the silver halide crystal itself. Hence you notice that I've been using the word "silver speck" to mean what is left behind on processed film i.e., to disambiguate the word "grain". A silver speck is a self contained entity - i.e., a quantity of metallic silver surrounded by gelatin or empty space on all sides, regardless of its size. <p>

 

...<p>

...<p>

...<p>

 

Now, regardless of just how many or how few tones can be formed by a single crystal of silver halide you'll find that the upper limit for resolution has nothing to do with these tones. It is limited by the size of the largest crystals. Smaller crystals would contribute in the formation of silver specks as would the larger ones. They may even improve the tonality by "filling in" the clear areas, as could partially transmissive silver specks. But it is the largest crystals that impose a resolution bound, independent of tonality. <p>

 

Now do you get the independence of tones from resolution limit thing I was saying like 80 posts ago? That you shouldn't confuse tonality and resolution? </i><p>

 

That's a wonderful thesis Vijay, but um, where's your evidence for all this?<p>

 

DLT, Rishi, at least we have had a small win as we finally have Vijay talking about RESOLUTION. It's taken a while, but we are making headway. He has agreed that it takes far more than 1 grain to respresent VISIBLE tone, so already we have him backtracking a little. This is good. Finally we've got him answering some questions.

[bernardwest]

<i>Vijay Nebhrajani , Nov 16, 2008; 06:37 a.m.<p>

 

Daniel: Adams'/Reichmann's description correctly predicts that film should have higher resolution with monochromatic targets than grayscale targets. It does. Your theory suggests the resolution should be the same. It's not.

<p>

What's so hard to understand about a "theoretical upper bound"? </i><p>

 

What's so hard to understand about REALITY? Honestly, this is farcical. <b>NO</b> observation (i.e. reality, as opposed to hypotheses) supports your argument (whatever it is exactly). It is indeed a strange world you inhabit Vijay.

[bernardwest]

<i>You keep missing the point that it is observed to be a halftone process. You keep trying to build reductio ad absurdum arguments to disprove this. I don't know why I didn't think of it this way before, but your theory that grains could be observed as gray at a lower magnification yet appear opaque at higher magnification is reductio ad absurdum.</i><p>

 

Daniel.... Exactly!!

[vijay_nebhrajani]

What is the color of the surface of the moon?

 

Gray.

 

What color does it appear at night?

 

White.

 

Go put a neutral density filter in your microscope between the film and the objective. That neutral density

filter has tone, right? See the grain through the microscope. Do you see opaque silver specks on a gray

background because of the ND filter? No. You'll still see opaque silver specks on white.

 

Why is this?

 

Does this mean that the ND filter doesn't contribute to tone in the final print? Put it in on top of the paper

and make a print. You'll see quite well that it does.

 

Silver specks, too small to see under an optical microscope - attenuate light. If they didn't attenuate light,

it'd be like they didn't exist because they were too small to be seen under a damn optical microscope. That's

stupid. If they attenuate light they act like tiny ND filters, attenuating light and contributing to tone in the

damn final print.

 

You can't see them? Go get the eyesight of the entire human race fixed. With sensitivity to gamma rays, maybe we

could. What a stupid argument - "I can't see something so it can't exist and can't possibly affect anything else

that I can perceive either."

 

I can't see gray moons so the color of the surface of the moon must be white.

 

And I'm not disagreeing that opaque silver specks form tone. Of course they do - exactly like a halftone process.

But so do those non-opaque ones, invisible under an optical microscope - denying they do leads to the absurdity

of "my observation does not match reality, so reality must be wrong".

[dustin_fletcher1]

Bernie, this isn't much of a discussion. It's more like a bunch of brick walls talking to one another. To answer your question, of course that's okay with me but I still find it silly. My real point was that people should shoot whatever they want, and that's all I came here to say.

[bernardwest]

<i>What a stupid argument - "I can't see something so it can't exist and can't possibly affect anything else that I can

perceive either."</i><p>

 

Do you really take us for being this stupid? It borders on offensive. Perhaps your intent isn't to win us over, but to

win over casual observers of this thread who might not be following along with all the lines of reasoning. If you can't

see something, that certainly doesn't mean it does not exist. None of us are even coming close to saying that.

What it means is this: If you can't see it, it can't contribute to the <b><i>VISUAL</i></b> phenomenon that

is resolution. Please stop the condescending debating tactics. It does nothing to add to whatever credibility you

have left.

[bernardwest]

<i>My real point was that people should shoot whatever they want</i><p>

 

They (we) do. No one is forcing me to shoot anything.

[bernardwest]

<i>If you can't see it, it can't contribute to the VISUAL phenomenon that is resolution.</i>

 

<p>I meant to say: If you can't see it, it can't contribute <b>by itself</b> to the VISUAL phenomenon that is resolution.

[bernardwest]

<i>Do you see opaque silver specks on a gray background because of the ND filter? No.</i><p>

 

Actually, that's exactly what I would expect to see. How could it be white? Our eyes don't act like an auto levels command in photoshop.

[petrana_batik]

<p><i>".. and Petrana's 4x5 camera would be worthless"</i></p>

<p>That's narrow minded thinking. I have never claimed that always use the full size of the emulsion. LF allows me to carry less lenses and crop aggressively. More over, LF allows for far more perspective control options, at the expense of turn around and framing speed. It's a trade off I'm sometimes willing to make.</p>

 

<p>In the end, it's not whether a 4x5 can do the job of a D3 or vice versa. The tool in question is very often an arbitrary decision beyond my scope: most work demands digital capture, and will never print beyond A3 size. Some work demands high speed shooting. Some work requires perspective manipulations and a huge print size... and my hobby shots are required to make me happy.</p>

[rich_evans]

Armando: I asked if anyone had truly compared top end versions of digital and film in a controlled circumstance

and not one poster answered.

 

Well I for one don't shoot film anymore, and my D3 gives me results the meet my clients requirements better than

I was ever able to provide with film, ergo, no more 35mm for me, so I can't answer that challenge. Now, when I

get hold of the Mamiya 645 AFD ii that I've been looking at, that may change.................nah, it'll only make results

from shooting my own stuff more satisfying.

 

Seriously though, I don't see the point. When you boil any format - be it 110(?) to 8x10 in film vs. the highest

resolution available on commercial sensors - when you boil the 'technologies' down to the nano levels we're

discussing here, there are no differences - grain from tri-x is grain from tri-x, and a 1 micron photosite is a 1

micron photo site. The only discernable differences are in the final prints and we all agree that more is always

better - more megapixels/mm2 and finer 'grain' always result in perceptibly better final prints. --Rich

[petrana_batik]

<i>"Nothing so general. I'm trying to prove that grains are opaque and Vijay is trying to prove they are translucent."</i><br><br>

So essentially, you're trying to prove that the cup is either half empty, or half full.<br><Br>

Why don't you take into account that most digital imagers peruse a Bayer matrix, and therefore extrapolate digital captures? In that sense, digital imaging (most of it, anyway) is far from being "Real photography". Following that line of thought, what exactly "Real photography", and where is that borderline that separates "Real" from a "Theoretical limit"?

<br><br>

My point is as follows: Humans are analog. We can digest a high definition image that is a few feet across, at the most. It doesn't matter what can be captures theoretically, through either film or digital processes. Debating whether grain is opaque or transparent is beyond the photographic exercise: simply, no photographer really cares.

[bernardwest]

<i>more megapixels/mm2..... always result in perceptibly better final prints. --Rich</i><p>

 

Absolutely not, but, that's for another thread.

[rishij]

Wait wait wait, are there really people out there reading this forum who think that we're actually having this debate to decide what's better: film or digital?

 

Being a scientist, as well as a photographer, I find it kind of funny that some people can't understand that some of us 'just need to know'. Understanding fundamentals in one area often helps you understand fundamentals in another area, or to see things in a different way to new ideas can emerge.

 

This is a debate, at this point, for serious nerds. That's all.

 

Rishi