Scenic Byway 12, Escalante

Love this one, Dave! Once again, you got that sky to cooperate for you. How do you do it? The line of clouds receding towards the horizon compliments that large foreground peak. Great latitude in that print film. Regards.

Thanks Walter! As you know, it isn't as easy to capture clouds with a 4x5 as it is with smaller formats. Whenever I see something shot on 8x10 with strong composition *and* clouds my jaw drops.

 

Interestingly, this trip gave me a chance to do a direct comparison between 160S and digital. Slot canyons are good for bright areas and extremely dark ones. I have concluded that the 5D has at least 3 more stops of dynamic range than 160S print film. If you slightly overexpose the 5D and use the exposure and recovery sliders then the 5D sensor just can't be touched in terms of dynamic range.

 

I shot the above scene with Astia and 160S and scanned it on a Epson 4990 flatbed. This is very late afternoon light (6:30 PM, sunset at 7:30 PM), but the 160S just barely captured detail in the shadows. It did, but just barely. There is a full range of tones, spread out evenly over the scan--as close to a perfect exposure as I could hope for.

 

On the other hand, it would take a drum scan to get the detail out of the Astia slide. Some of the shadows might be blocked. I long for the day when there is an affordable digital camera with a full range of movements--front and back.

More latitude with the 5D...I would not have thought that was the case! Thanks for the info. An "affordable" digital setup would be a prayer answered for me too. The day is coming when I will have to make that move. Regards.

I really can't think of any advantages to shooting film these days. That said, unless they produce an affordable 40 MP back for my 4x5 (not a scanning back), I plan to begin shooting BW film and developing it myself. I need the dynamic range....

well, that is nice scene and I enjoy it. I also think about 4x5 digital back, but sometimes I really enjoy to develop B&W by myself. ;-)

 

darko