Nikon D300: Better than Velvia results?

[johncarvill]

@Shun C "Unfortunately, my film images are every bit two-dimensional. Until 3D photography becomes popular, I

control depth of field and perspective..."

 

This is disappointing. Why do people make such snarky remarks? I said I wanted my images to look (and feel) three

dimensional, not to be 3D. And you know this. Whatever.

[johncarvill]

Rodeo Joe: "Please, please, somebody tangiblise that nebulous film "quality". You know, the one that 99.9% of us are

unlucky enough not to be able to see. "

 

I know this can be a divisive issue. But there are qualitative differences between film and digital. However, if I were a

Luddite film purist I wouldn't have just spent the guts of a thousand quid on a DSLR!

 

"Then maybe we can all finally get over film, move on and just take pictures (in an ecologically responsible medium). "

 

This argument always makes me laugh. All those redundant plastic digital camera bodies, lenses, and batteries are just

what Mother Nature ordered, eh?

[jose_angel]

<p>About the 3D look: Yes this is another topic, the three-dimensionality. I think this effect can be equally achieved with any media, including pencil drawing, digital photography, oil painting... it`s "simply" a mere control of light, selective sharpness and composition. Sadly, all is measurable in this world (at least for me). No magic...</p>

[ShunCheung]

<p>Isn't 3D merely the abbrevation of three dimensional? I don't see 3D means anything different.</p>

<p>Again, if you believe film has some intangible quality, IMO you should continue to shoot film. You will never find that in digital.</p>

[randall_pukalo]

<p>The image of the hummingbird looks nothing like Velvia. It does however have that "digital" look to it IMO.<br>

I will note that I shoot both slide and digital on my outings, and the digital can give beautiful results. However, it is still different (maybe in technically negative ways such as reduced dynamic range) than film results, and maybe because of my age (40's) and having grown up during the Film Era, I still prefer the film images many times, especially with scenics and landscapes. However, I have noticed recently that many of the outdoor images in magazines, etc. are getting sooo close to the look of Velvia and Slide film, that they have actually fooled me a few times when I go to read the captions. So it appears that it is possible to get the "Film Look" with the right camera, software, and knowledge.</p>

[ShunCheung]

<blockquote>

<p>The image of the hummingbird looks nothing like Velvia.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Nobody says it does. It is merely an example for extremely over-saturdated colors.</p>

<p>I am considerably older than Randall. Back in the 1970's and 1980's, I mainly use Kodachrome. When Velvia first came on the scene around 1990, once I shot some New England fall foliage with both, and I gave a slide presentation showing an A/B comparison. Back then, people were shocked by the exaggerated colors in Velvia. It was promptly dismissed as "Disney Chrome." Initially I also didn't like it. It took a few years until around the mid 1990's that Velvia became mainstream, and that was the beginning of the downfall of Kodachrome and perhaps Kodak also.</p>

<p>The thing is taste and preferences can change over time.</p>

[johncarvill]

<p>@Shun "Isn't 3D merely the abbrevation of three dimensional? I don't see 3D means anything different."<br>

<br /><br>

Well, you are employing rhetorical sophistry, for reasons best known to yourself. When cinemas show kids' films in '3D' does that mean they're three dimensional?No.<br>

<br /><br>

But I wasn't arguing along such literal-minded lines, anyway. I meant that film, particularly slide film, has - imho, naturally - certain qualities which are hard, if not impossible, to replicate in digital. Film often has a feeling of 'depth', which is what I meant when I alluded to dimensionality. Digital images often tend to feel flat - and, yes, that's a hard statement to quantify or objectively prove. The intangible nature of the quality or qualities which distinguish film from digital is inherent to those qualities. The fact that i cannot point to it and say, "Aha, no denying that is there?!" is a function of the very qualities I'm talking about. </p>

<p>But I'm setting film aside for a while, and I'm going to try to get the most out of my new DSLR. I'm not going in with an anti-digital attitude.</p>

<p>And no, that hummingbird pic looks nothing like Velvia. It looks flat. And yes, I did think you were equating that image's hyper-saturation with what I like about Velvia, which is not the case.</p>

<p>Here's an arbitrary comparison. Look at this:<br>

<a title="No such thing as a free lunch by John Carvill, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7113/7088373071_3a7a919458_z.jpg" alt="No such thing as a free lunch" width="640" height="426" /></a></p>

<p>Nice light, nice colours, etc. But even with a few tweaks in Lightroom, to me it still looks unmistakably digital.</p>

<p>Compare with:<br>

<a title="Bluster by John Carvill, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7038/7094446609_25a74a8c9d_z.jpg" alt="Bluster" width="640" height="429" /></a></p>

<p>Light not as good, and (arguably) the shot is a touch underexposed. Yet, to me, this has a 'depth' to it that is nothing to do with angle, lens, depth of field, etc etc. It's just a 'feel' that the image has which comes from having been shot on film.</p>

<p> </p>

[jose_angel]

<p>Right, it has nothing to do with angle, lens, depth of field, etc etc.</p>

<p>As I mentioned above, it has to do with light and composition. I`m not sure at all if selective sharpness is a must, but I think it helps. Your second pic show three steps of light (shadow, light, shadow) together with different planes, in a diagonal composition. If the lady were not blurred, it `d be another "flat" image. Someone could say the first one has a "pop" effect.</p>

<p>Why do you think your sample pic cannot be taken with say, a D700? Lets see:</p>

<ul>

<li>You can get the very same DoF</li>

<li>You can get the very same sharpness</li>

<li>You can "tweak" the colors (although is not not necessary, colors could change and the effect or look will be more or less the same)</li>

<li>You can get the very same contrast, dynamic range</li>

<li>Etc., etc., etc.</li>

</ul>

<p>So, where is the difference? In fact we`re looking at a digital picture. Why could a scan look "3D" but a DSLR image not?</p>

[mars790]

<p>John, here is a link to custom D300 picture controls. The link is in the first post of this thread and it includes instructions on installing them. There are Velvia, Astia and Optima settings here among others. These aren't official Nikon settings but can be useful for getting what you want out of the camera:</p>

<p>http://www.pixalo.com/community/general-photography-questions-answers/d300-fuji-velvia-astia-agfa-optima-custom-curves-24437.html</p>

<p>I have those 3 in my D300, but don't really use them. I do use the D2X modes more than anything else with D2X mode III being a nice saturated setting without being over the top. These are from Nikon and you can get them here, along with the Landscape and Portrait picture controls:</p>

<p>http://nikonimglib.com/opc/</p>

<p>edit: I see that the D2X modes do not list the D300S as a compatible camera (it is listed for Landscape and Portrait though...)</p>

<p>I'm not sure if the Velvia and others listed are compatible with the D300S, maybe someone can shed light on it. </p>

[justthings]

<p>Better than Velvia? of course. With Velvia, you get that, and only that. With a D-anything image i think you get what you make out of it, just about any look you want. Is there a tangible look and feel difference between digital and film? Perhaps, but my guess is these differences are becoming increasingly small, and that most people given a blind test would not be able to distinguish well crafted digital images from well produced film images.</p>

[johncarvill]

Can we drop the fixation on the '3D' thing? I thought I'd already made clear that by 'three dimensionsl' what I really meant

was 'depth', as opposed to the 'flatness' of digital. Film has a different look and 'feel' to digital, I don't know why people

sometimes deny or fail to see that. I'm not saying its an inferior look/feel, I'm just saying it's different.

[johncarvill]

@Jose: I don't think the lady is blurred I think she's out of focus. Yes the first image has a pop effect partly due to post

processing. In a number of ways, the first image is better, but the second looks more 'real' somehow.

[joseph_smith3]

<p>Changing the default Picture control from Standard to Vivid will make the images look more like Velvia. You can make changes to other picture controls too if you want to. I suggest you shoot in RAW and do this all in post processing. Joe Smith</p>

[rodeo_joe1]

<p>Take away the magenta cast and lighten the shadows on your digital example John, and it begins to look much more like the film. The shadows could stand a lot more lightening with access to a RAW file rather than an 8 bit JPEG. And if all you shoot is JPEGS, then obviously you won't see the full dynamic range and colour detail that digital is capable of.</p><div></div>

[johncarvill]

<p>@Ric M: Thanks for the links, I'll follow those up.</p>

<p>@Rodeo Joe: What makes you think I only shoot JPEG? I shot the image above in Raw, and adjusted the curve in Lightroom.</p>

[rodeo_joe1]

<p>Sorry John, the mention of Picture Control profiles mislead me. They only work on JPEGS.<br>

Never used Lightroom. Does it have a proper curves tool, or does it just use sliders to adjust the curve like Elements?</p>

[Peter_in_PA]

<p>Oh, yay. Another film vs. digital debate... yay.</p>

[Mary Doo]

<p>I think the results "may be" comparable to Velvia if you shoot at low ISO - e.g., ISO 200 with the D300s. </p>

<p>A well-executed Velvia-50 image can be exquisite "right out of the box". Digital needs capture sharpening, WB/Level adjustment, etc., etc. Having said that, I prefer the convenience of digital over film these days.</p>

[johncarvill]

Didn't mean to start a digital vs film war. Was just wondEring what results I could expect from my D300s. Having said

that, I'll go to my grave believing that film has a different look and feel. One more example:

 

<br>

<a href=" title="Hajma kafa by John Carvill, on Flickr"><img

src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7232/6948376960_0386bacba1_z.jpg" width="640" height="429" alt="Hajma kafa"></a>

 

<br>

 

If I'd used a DSLR to take that shot, could the resultant photo have had the same feel?

[dan_south]

John, yes, you could have achieved a similar look and feel with a DSLR. (I won't claim identical, but similar). Conversely,

you could have rendered a second version with more visible detail in the shadows and less shadow on the man's face. The man's skin tone could have been improved by adjusting the white balance, or you could leave it like this (slightly bluish).

 

The color of the red letters and the blue pants could easily have been made more OR less saturated. The perspective

distortion visible in the converging vertical lines of the column and the wall in the back could have been corrected. A very

slight barrel distrortion visible as a mild curvature in the steps could have been straightened. And you could have created

an alternate black and white version.

 

All of this is very easy to do when editing raw files in Lightroom or Photoshop.

[sergio_ortega7]

Just for the sake of argument....and I'm not taking a position in the debate whether film has a different or superior "look" over digital

capture....unless all one wants is to sit in front of a light table with a loupe, wouldn't scanning a transparency to display it either on-screen

or as a digital print reduce it to just another form of digital capture, and do away with whatever "superior" film-like qualities it may have

had? All the color transparencies I printed the old-fashioned way, in the wet darkroom using Cibachrome/Ilfochrome materials, do exhibit

different qualities when compared to the same images digitally scanned, edited and printed. Anyone who can recall producing prints

using those archaic darkroom methods must surely agree that it was a real PITA, and often much less effective than using current

hybrid methods.

[johncarvill]

<p>@Sergio: "...wouldn't scanning a transparency to display it either on-screen or as a digital print reduce it to just another form of digital capture, and do away with whatever "superior" film-like qualities it may have had? "</p>

<p>Respectfully, no, this is a wholly fallacious argument. That would mean *any* image, from cave paintings through to yesterday's news, viewed online would be classed as "a digital image". But looking at the Mona Lisa on Google image search doesn't digitalise the original.</p>

<p>Looking at my scanned slide, above, you're seeing an online version of a scan of a transparency. The *medium* is digital, the original *image* is not. How the image is transmitted is not bound up with how it was captured. The chemical reaction triggered on the film by the brief presence of light created the image, that fact doesn't ever change.</p>

<p>I've seen great photos taken with digital. Many (most?) professionals have gone digital now. I'm very much looking forward to my new DSLR, and to taking a long break from film. But none of this changes the fact that film has different qualities to digital, any more than being a feminist changes the fact that men and women are different.</p>

<p>Could this image have been created digitally?:</p>

<p><a title="We are never as beautiful as now by John Carvill, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5347/6947935062_e4861d2c45_z.jpg" alt="We are never as beautiful as now" width="640" height="429" /></a></p>

 

[ShunCheung]

<p>John, I think most people notice that film is different from digital in general, just like:</p>

<ul>

<li>Kodachrome is different from Velvia.</li>

<li>The D2X is different from the D300</li>

<li>The D300 is different from the D7000.</li>

<li>The D700 is different from the D800.</li>

</ul>

<p>As I said, back in the 1970's and 1980's, I mainly use Kodachrome and still have a lot of slides from that era. In the 1990's I switch to Fuji Velvia, and Sensia/Provia for wildlife. From 2005 and on I went from mostly digital to all digital, and from one generation of DSLRs to another.</p>

<p>What is "better" is highly subjective. Therefore, with no disrespect to Thom Hogan, who is clearly a well known Nikon guru, unfortunately, his comment that "<em>You can get better-than-Velvia results with the D300</em>" is somewhat pointless and only leads to totally unnecessary debates. That was why I said if you prefer the Velvia look, use Velvia film, but we can get extremely saturdated colors from digital also, to a degree that it bothers me to no end as I demonstrated.</p>

<p>Is Velvia "better than" Kodachrom? Back in 1990, I didn't think so. Initially I didn't like Velvia's saturation, but by 1995 or so, Velvia became my preferred film for landscape; however, I never like Velvia for wildlife except perhaps in very dull, highly overcast days. Even so, Velvia's green cast on wildlife is annoying.</p>

[johncarvill]

<p>Never meant to stir up the film/digital debate.</p>

<p>Basically, I just wanted some discussion on how good I could expect the images I will get from the D300s to be.</p>

<p> </p>

[andylynn]

<p>John, that image could have been created digitally by using multiple exposures or Photoshop layers. A lot of people wouldn't call it easy to get it to look just right, but the same would be true doing it in film. Really, there isn't a lot you can't do in digital, and a D300 is very capable, so it mostly comes down to how you use it.</p>