Film vs Digital - Dynamic Range

[mauro_franic]

Eric A, I don't think you can vindicate a person that uses derogatory words by using some yourself.

 

You should be glad you know how many stops a 40D and Ektar can record. Some of us don't know, and have to find out with our own experience.

 

I meant no insult to Ellis. I don't find constructive to use words like ignorant or stupid though. It is a fact his portrait has blown highlights and I meant no disrespect with pointing that out.

[mauro_franic]

Mark, please don't be discouraged. This thread is overall very constructive. There is a lot of people working on it together.

 

I just posted the RAW files and some people will use better tools (than the ones I have) to find out if the burnt highlights can be recovered from the brightest stops. Stay tuned.

[jautey]

Yeah right, you two (Mauro and Mark), who aren't even paid members, are the gate keepers of decorum on Pnet. Here's some decorum for you. DO SOME GOD DAMNED RESEARCH BEFORE MAKING YET ANOTHER STUPID VERSUS POST. Those who have paid their dues, and have been around for awhile have seen them a thousand times. You have proved nothing with your post except you haven't a clue about what the hell dynamic range is. You've read it in a book somewhere so now you think you're an expert. Well guess what? Folks like Ellis and others wrote the damn book you read on dynamic range. And I'd sooner listen to his BS than your so-called comparisons.

Your first and most deadly error in your so called comparison is that you are comparing apples to oranges, pigs to cows, airplanes to helicopters. Since your premise is based upon a false comparison nothing that follows makes a lick of sense.

So in summary your post is indeed ignorant since it was done with little real understanding of the technology involved or the terms used.

 

Hows that for contributing, Mark?

[mauro_franic]

Forum moderator please help.

[craig_sander]

Mauro,

You have done excellent work here and on other threads with your comparisons.

Don't let a few "subscribers" who have more money than brains critique your work.

Your tests have shown me and others, things that translate into real world shooting.

Keep up the great work and I look forward to your future posts.

[stan_belyaev]

Some people like publicly embarse themselves. It is their problem. We should not take them seriously.

[mauro_franic]

Thank you.

[mark_l3]

"Folks like Ellis and others wrote the damn book you read on dynamic range"

 

good thing, the photography isn't very interesting, hey Eric, how is the view from Ellis's backside?

[mauro_franic]

Let's all stay focus on the discussion. I emailed the moderator for help. He will take care of it. We should ignore derogatory remarks and continue on.

[scott_turner]

"Eric, I believe Ellis took personal offense. Not sure why because when I looked at his portfolio, the main picture has the highlights blown on the forehead. He should understand this issue with digital first hand."

 

Mauro - As evidenced by his many contributions to these fora, Ellis understands digital far more than you seem willing to give him credit for. Please note - the portrait you critique is not Ellis'. It's a portrait OF Ellis, shot by, and appropriately credited to, someone else.

 

While I don't support the way Ellis chose to respond, I certainly understand his level of frustration, as I share it.

 

Predictably, this discussion has gone the way of most such discussions. Why digital "vs" film, with all of the chest-thumping that goes along with such a "smackdown" approach? I'm all for a rational discussion of advantages and disadvantages of both formats (both of which I use, enjoy and appreciate for their respective strengths), but these never ending wars between the two, with excruciatingly limited comparisons...? Which "digital" vs which "film"? With what assumptions and with what levels of expertise and experience with each? And with what intent? And yet it always boils down in too many people's minds to "film rulz" or "digital rulz", and we get ignorant statements like: "Digital cheap, but bad. Film expensive, but good.", as if there weren't outstanding work being done by talented shooters with both formats.

 

All you're showing here is a comparison between two very specific and limited examples and treatments of each format, given your equipment, understanding and skills with each. There's nothing wrong with you doing these kinds of tests to prove which format might be "best" for you in a given situation and given your skills and available gear. However, as with most such tests, there is little general relevance other than for you in these very specific situations. Summarizing these tests as being generically about "film vs digital" is, plainly stated, incredibly simplistic. And the unfortunate, but predictable, result is that those with axes to grind are out in force grinding them. Post this in a film group, and the discussion will go one way - post in a digital group, and it'll go the other.

 

I long ago proved to myself that, given my skills and equipment, and given low ISO shooting situations and no time pressures, *I* can produce "better" results from scanned film (that is, results which please *me* more) than I can from any dSLR format camera that I've tried. But I've also proven to myself that all of those qualifiers are very, VERY important. Change a few of those qualifiers, and I've also proven to myself that I do FAR better work with digital.

 

Scott

[mauro_franic]

Scott, I agree with everything you said, with the exception that I don't give Ellis the credit for his digital understanding. He may be the best photographer and I don't put that in question since I don't know him or his work. My first and only interaction with him was his contribution to this post.

 

I understand your point and I agree that this exercise is more relevant to me that I use both the 40D and Ektar than to other people who use different systems.

[mauro_franic]

I was not referring to the picture of Ellis but the portrait on his portfolio. It is not a personal criticism either, just a technical observation.

[roger_smith4]

Can you upload the full resolution flat scan (no clipping) as well? Jpeg is fine (save at level 10/12 or 90% compression).

[stephen_pitts]

Perhaps she doth protest too much?

 

Eric A,

 

All Mauro did was a pretty damn good job at conducting a fairly basic but relevant experiment and showed his results

in a fairly informative manner (which I also frankly thought were a bit surprising). Your protests about being "the

expert here" ring completely hollow and the shrillness in your tone only denigrates whatever point you were going to

make -- either his experiment was flawed (with no explanation as to why) or perhaps more tellingly, that amateurs

can't conduct experiments? If such attitudes had always persisted, we would never have had the

Scientfic Revolution of the Middle Ages. Many well meaning amatuers have contributed immensely to our

understanding of the world in all sorts of fields. If you are so knowledgeable (which frankly most people who try to

stop such inquiries usually aren't), then perhaps you could just address the evidence that Mauro provides? Claiming

some higher authority (which only religion not science recognizes) is wholly unpersuasive. Mauro has gone out of

his way to truly do some basic experiments and open his results to the community. You've just tried to shout him

down (with nothing but diatribe). Then you try to claim you somehow own the site? Go back and read the ordeal of

Galileo Galilei and ask where your post above fit ins.

 

Good luck.

 

Cheers,

 

Steve

[mauro_franic]

Here is the scan - uncropped - no PP. I had to convert to 8 bits to generate the JPEG:

 

http://www.yousendit.com/download/TTZtZEV6SEJrUmxFQlE9PQ

[petr_tyll]

Excellent post. Thank you Mauro! Keep it up! The Ektar looks great buy the way. I have to try it. Petr

[rashedahmed]

When you compare 35mm film to digital,compare it with a full frame CCD/COMS sensor.Not with a APS-C or APS-H sensor.Full frame sensors have a grater D-range to cropped sensors.The bigger the

sensor,the higher the dynamic range.

[jamesnjohnson]

Rashed Ahmed "When you compare 35mm film to digital,compare it with a full frame CCD/COMS sensor.Not with a APS-C or APS-H sensor.Full frame sensors have a grater D-range to cropped sensors.The bigger the sensor,the higher the dynamic range."

 

I still think the S5 can and should be considered when doing these tests. I have no issues with S5 DR.

[michael_oxford]

I suggest you all have a look at this:

 

http://www.clarkvision.com/imagedetail/film.vs.digital.summary1.html

[michael_oxford]

Actually, scratch that- This is what you want to read:

 

http://www.clarkvision.com/imagedetail/dynamicrange2/index.html

 

"This shows that the Canon 1D Mark II has a much higher dynamic range than either Fujichrome Velvia slide film

and Kodak Gold 200 print film. Kodak Gold 200, in this test, showed 7 stops of information, Fujichrome Velvia 5

stops, and the Canon 1D Mark II, over 10 stops of information! Further image analysis shows at least 10.6 stops

are recorded by the canon 1D Mark II camera (the full range of of detail in this image, Other testing of the

noise level versus intensity shows the Canon 1D Mark II has 11.7 stops of dynamic range."

[jamesnjohnson]

Do the Clarkvision test really reflects the Full Frames being mention here ? the canon 1D Mark II is a 8mp Full Frame so the sensors are a lot larger then the newer Full Frame cameras. From we see each new camera with more mp have a shorter DR and produce higher ISO noise. Now camera companies started to come out with in-camera software solutions to fix the physical limitations (Even Fujifilm does this with there digi-cams).

 

I personally will like to see Clarkvision throw the Fujifilm S5 Pro in the mix, yeah it is an older camera with a smaller user base but it is the only camera along with the S3 Pro that have a sensor that was design for the wide Dynamic Range and to come close to the results of negative film. Fujifilm was talking DR way before any other of the camera companies were but it is rarely is brought up in any of the discussions.

[david_henderson]

Whatever. After years of shooting contrasty slide film, I find exposure on my 5D a whole lot easier to the point that the spotmeter doesn't see light of day and the grads get a small fraction of their previous use. So it would be pretty pointless trying to persuade me that "film" has a higher DR than digital because for me it just doesn't.

 

But then I understand that the dynamic range of digital cameras varies and so does that of film types and emulsions. Trying to compare one to the other in general is simply unproductive. Any analysis, no matter how interestingly carried out, will have no general applicability and its usefulness is confined to the comparisons actually made.

[ndt_photo]

Stop talking about it and go out and shoot.

[tholte]

With such solid and undeniable proof, why does anybody shoot digital? Not being facetious or sarcastic, would just really like to know.

[patrick j dempsey]

That Clarkvision test really should be looked at with a high degree of skepticism. It gets posted every single time there is a film vs. digital debate for some reason.... maybe because it's got so much talky talky. The only thing that test proves is that the person who did it does not know how to operate a scanner properly. No offense to that person, but I've never seen Gold 200 behave that way except on that page. The test spends an aweful lot of time talking about how the digital photos were processed and says almost nothing about how the film was scanned, from a print or from the negative, what scanner was used, what settings where used, nothing. If it's in there somewhere, it's buried in the charts. And the funniest part is that one of Canon's most expensive cameras is being directly compared to one of Kodak's cheapest films. Yep, I've said it before and everytime I see that site getting pawned off as some sort of Final Word, I'll say it all over again.

 

I think Mauro's test is a little more fair in that we get to see all of the exposures, unlike the Clarkvision test in which we have to take his word for it about his methodology. Lots of charts and a long page doesn't mean more accurate or more fair, it just means more. And of course, the real fatal flaw with all of these tests is that you are comparing one digital image to another. A scanner is just another digital camera, and I can guarantee you that I've tried my best to scan negatives that were dramatically over or under exposed to little avail despite the fact that I can clearly see the image on the negative with my own two eyes. If someone had a microscope camera rig with some sort of controllable flash below the negative, it might be possible to take correct exposure photographs of severely under or over exposed negatives to prove how much data is actually in there, but it really doesn't do much good since pretty much the only way to get color negatives printed is via a digital scanner and printer. As mentioned by others, some of the "grain" showing up in many film scans is really digital noise created by the fact that the negative is too dense for the scanner to read through, since the scanner cannot adjust it's exposure to pump more light through the negative, it produces noise instead.