Memories of detail

[mauro_franic]

<p>Thank you Scott. If you can, post it at 100% without resizing.</p>

<p>We can compare it to the same area (i.e. FF digital vs 35mm film).</p>

[mauro_franic]

<p>Daniel, current B&W films are panchromatic -sensitive to all colors of light. Whereas each pixel of a digital camera is sensitive to a single color. </p>

<p>If you use a color filter with a film camera then yes, that difference is gone.</p>

<p>It is true that the response of B&W films to different wavelengths has been tailored over years and years to excel in their application. I agree this is a big component of why it is difficult to replicate with a digital conversion.</p>

[mauro_franic]

<p>Marketing is very powerful. Look at the release of today's 46MP foveon camera:<br>

http://www.dpreview.com/news/1009/10092129sigmasd1.asp</p>

<p>Now under the same marketing technique, you would say the Coolscan 9000 is not 4,000dpi but 12,000 dpi. Would you?</p>

<p>Now from your 7D, you take a red pixel, a green pixel and a blue pixel... How do you produce three full RGB pixels? You can't.</p>

[scott_ferris]

<p>Mauro,</p>

<p>I'll post anything you would like. But what is it about the latest one you are not comfortable with? It is a crop from the same area as the film, both have been resampled to fit the 700px wide format, I don't think either is hurt more than the other that way. Either the scan, or the dslr image need to be resampled to match each other as they have different dpi/ppi figures.</p>

<p>Funnily enough I just saw that announcement <a href="http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/blog_index.html">here</a>. For me, none of this is about how I get there, it is what I end up with. When digital matched my film quality and smashed the cost per image equation there was no justification for shooting film. I don't care about the number of pixels or the grain and developer combination's, I care about the images. I wet developed B&W for years, I can replicate, to my satisfaction, any effect/mood/look on a computer far easier and cheaper (and environmentally friendlier!) than I could in the darkroom. I loved my time in the darkroom, but technology has moved on. My very low volume MF film images do still realise higher ultimate IQ than my "FF" digital, if you do all the things necessary to realise that potential. But the occasions when I need that additional IQ are very rare.</p>

<p>Interesting thread, thanks all, Scott.</p>

[mauro_franic]

<p>Scott, that is fine. Coincidentally my scanner produces 21MP from a 35mm frame. One-to-one relationship to a 20MP camera. Neither one has to be resampled.</p>

<p>It is interesting since people always want to see organic comparisons (instead of maps or resolution charts).</p>

<p>Daniel, did you eve develop the Velvia from the trip you took?</p>

<p> </p>

[scott_ferris]

<p>Mauro,</p>

<p>Here is a square crop at 1:1 for pixels. It is 700x700 pixels so from my camera (a Canon 1Ds MkIII) it represents 20.25mm sq of sensor area.</p>

<p>As normal I did nothing to it, opened in PS4 as 16bit ProPhoto spaced image, cropped to 700 pixel square and saved for web and devices at 75% quality. So it ends up being a 180kb, 8bit, sRGB, jpeg.</p>

<p>EXIF data is 1/200 sec at f4, 100iso, manual flash at 1/4 power. Lens was the much maligned (though I really like it) 50mm f1.4.</p>

<p>Hope this helps future threads too. Scott.</p><div></div>

[dan_south]

<p>Here are a few more treatments of my original eye photo, this time processed in Photoshop.</p>

<p>First, let's get some math out of the way. The size of the eye in the frame is significant. If the eyes in my frame are a larger part of the entire photo, for example, then my photo might appear to have more detail. I don't have Mauro's scan, so I can't compare the size of the eyes in his photo versus my own, but I'll offer size information for my crop and the full frame. Perhaps Mauro can do the same so we can get some idea as to whether the eyes are larger in one photo or another.</p>

<p>Sorry, Mauro, but I don't believe your claim that your crop is .04 percent of your entire photo (it's probably more like 4 percent), but you can verify this by presenting data and calculations similar to the ones below.</p>

<p>The whole frame is 5,616 by 3,744 pixels.<br /> The crop below is 584 by 419 pixels.</p>

<p>584 times 419 = 244,696 pixels<br /> 5616 times 3744 = 21,026,304 pixels<br /> 244,696 / 21,026,304 = 0.0116</p>

<p>Therefore, the crop is 1.16 percent of the entire frame. Conversely, the entire frame is made up of 86 segments each the size of this small crop. That's quite a bit of detail, IMHO.</p>

<p>Here is the original 584 x 419 pixel crop processed in Photoshop with no sharpening. I can see clearly pores in the skin, individual specs of eye makeup, and very fine strands of hair throughout the image.</p>

<p> </p><div></div>

[dan_south]

<p>Next, I used Photoshop's Bicubic function to upsize the crop to 700 pixels on the long side (the largest size that I can upload here). This is the unsharpened version.</p>

<p>Note that it does not have the freakish distortion of Mauro's attempt to upsize the JPEG file that I posted on Sunday. Everything is very smooth.</p>

<div></div>

[dan_south]

<p>Here is the upsized crop (700 pixels) with a modest amount of the Smart Sharpen filter applied. Lots of detail is visible. It is at least comparable and possibly slightly superior to the film scan. Again, we don't know the pixel dimensions of the eyes in Mauro's film scan, so a size differential could explain the increased detail if it indeed works out that way. If it turns out the my photo's eyes were SMALLER than Mauro's, then the detail in the digital capture is even more impressive.</p>

<p>Keep in mind that these shots were handheld on a sidewalk in mid-afternoon on a clear day. No tripod, flash, reflectors, or artificial lighting of any kind was used. The exposure was 1/250 @ f/5.6, ISO 200. This shot would not have been possible with a 6x7 camera loaded with ISO 25 file.</p><div></div>

[mauro_franic]

<p>Both examples look great (Scott's and Dan's). Thank you for posting.<br>

I might have cropped minimally when I scanned but the size of a full scan with my Coolscan is 11,016 x 8,964 pixels.</p>

[dan_south]

<p>Wow! That's a BIG scan! Lots of data!</p>

[StuartMoxham]

<p>There is the full frame image of Mauro's scan at the begining of this thread.</p>

[scott_ferris]

<p>Working on Mauro's first, multiple image, by my calculations, his tightest eye crop is very close to 1% of the full image area, +/- 5%. More than 20x the 0.04 figure he thought the crop represented. I got my first figures wrong by a similar magnitude though!</p>

<p>I did that calculation by cropping the full frame out of the montage, for an image 686 X 550 pixels, then the eye crop out of that is approximately 69 X 55 pixels.<br /> The full image is 377,300 pixels<br /> The eye crop is 3,795 pixels</p>

<p>377,300 / 3,795 = 99.4, or fractionally over 1%.</p>

<p>I only point this out in the hope that we can really put some inaccuracies and fallacies to bed in this thread.</p>

[charles_ma]

<p>By using a simple ruler to measure Mauro's crops on the screen, I think his first crop is about 1/8 of the original image. His second crop is about 1/24 of the first crop. Therefore, cumulatively the last crop would be 1/192 of the original pic, that is about 0.5%.</p>

<p>I think the original 0.04% crop comment may be an unintentional mistake and Mauro did correct it to the 0.4% in a later post (page 2). I think Mauro's comment that comparing his 0.4% (or 0.5%) crop to a 2% crop from FF digital is similar to comparing a 35mm film scan to FF digital is reasonable because the crop difference is similar to the size difference between 67 and 35mm.</p>

<p>Mauro, thanks for the posting so those of us who still use film knows how much detail we can pull out of film. Currently I am still using 35mm a lot and sometimes I have problems with sharpness issue, this post shows me that the problem may likely lie within my overall workflow, instead of the film.</p>

[dan_south]

>> 377,300 / 3,795 = 99.4, or fractionally over 1%.

 

Given that the isolated eye crop that I posted on page 9 is about 1.1 percent of the entire frame, the eyes represent about

the same area of each frame. These examples represent a reasonable comparison of the two formats. Both show plenty

of detail. Use what you prefer and have no regrets.

[Dave Luttmann]

<blockquote>

<p>Use what you prefer and have no regrets.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>That about sums it up Dan. I won't argue that in terms of absolute detail, the 6x7 film will have much more real detail than the 5D2. That said, what I have found is that on normal large prints, 16x20, 24x30 for example....it doesn't make any real difference.</p>

[mauro_franic]

<p>One can definitely make excellent prints from the 5D2 and 1DsIII.</p>

[mauro_franic]

<p>Same for other films...</p>

<p>Although TMAX 100 and TP 25 capture more detail with less grain than TMAX 400, 24x30 prints from TMAX 400 are full of detail and grainless as well.</p>

[dan_south]

I'm a Velvia 100 fan, myself, but I might try some Tech Pan given these examples. It looks really creamy!

[scott_ferris]

<p>B&W is always Pan F for me, in 135 and 120. It's very fine grain and contrast are my idea of what a B&W film should do.</p>

[mauro_franic]

<p>"It looks really creamy!"</p>

<p>It does. Remember I was using a softbox and and a white umbrella fairly close, but yes - super smooth.</p>

[Dave Luttmann]

<p>I'm still got about 2 dozen rolls of TP in 120 format. Saving them for something....maybe a project in the Carmanah Valley or something. An 8000ppi Aztek scan from Lenny would be pretty spectacular!</p>

[swilson]

<p>Of course in the days of film most photos were taken with 35mm not MF, and today most photos are not taken with DSLRs but rather P&S digital or cell phone.</p>

<p>Having said that the photo does have a lot of detail in it, but for capturing memories is that level of detail needed? I mean to even start making good use of that level of detail you would need to make a print at least 20x30 inches and then view it from no more then 12 inches. I know a lot of people who really like photos of their kids but I don't know many that feel the need for photos that large that can be viewed that close.</p>

<p>I suspect that when future generation view those photos they are not going notice that great detail but rather the lack of color, but that is just my opinion because I like color.</p>

[mauro_franic]

<p>Dave, I only have a dozen left - not fair.</p>

[photo5]

<p>I wouldn't be comfortable with large prints of peoples eyes on the wall in my home, sorry.</p>