doug_armstrong

<p>Gary, there are very, very few people who need "best", and it sounds like you know that since you say that you are "pretty happy" with the 6D. But let me point out that your description of your "issues" with the 6D seems to indicate that what you should be asking is "What newer Canons will give me a one to one-and-a-half stop improvement over the 6D for high-ISO noise?" You imply that anything better than that would not show any further improvement for the type of images that you usually produce.</p>

<p>Don't worry about it. The generally accepted wisdom is that 50mm lenses are among the best, simply because they are fairly easy to design. As a beginner you will make plenty of mistakes that will make the differences in lens quality unimportant -- I know I did.</p> <p>Almost 50 years ago when I was "the yearbook photographer" for my high school I took one photograph of a theatrical performance that was much better than most of my images. It ended up in the book as a page and a half spread. I took it with a borrowed Nikon F and an 85mm lens. I credited the lens quality, but now I'm pretty sure it was just the lens speed. With the TLR that I was issued the exposure under the very consistent stage lighting was f/4 at 1/60. With the 85mm I probably used f/2.8 at 1/125 or f/2 at 1/250. That would have been fast enough to get rid of the blur from camera motion. I didn't need a better lens; I needed better technique.</p>

<p>Edward, You have not told us much about who you are and what type of photography you do. You haven't even told us much about what your goal is ("better" is not a term with a generally accepted quantitative meaning, even in this narrow context). So, I'll respond as if you were someone like me. I'm an amateur; photography is a hobby which I enjoy a lot but which is not in the top five "important things in my life". I own a V700 which I am very pleased with. Nevertheless, I wish that I had a scanner which would get out a larger fraction of the information in a negative. I have not actually used a better scanner, so my decisions about a possible scanner purchase are based on what I have read on apparently knowledgeable web sites.</p> <p>I'm pretty confident that wet scanning would give me "better" resolution in my scans, but like you I would need to buy an entirely new scanner to do that. My understanding is that in this context "better" means only an incremental improvement, so I would not be willing to pay a lot to get it. An additional "expense" would be the more-than-incremental increase in the scanning time needed to get the better results.</p> <p>From a film scanner, on the other hand, I would expect to get an almost 2x improvement (perhaps 1600+ dpi to 3200+ dpi). I bought my V700 because film scanners were beyond my budget. Since then their prices have increased well beyond the general rate of inflation and they are now *well* beyond my budget.</p> <p>If I were a professional .... Well, if I were a professional, I would probably be using digital for everything that I was being paid for. But if I were a professional with a need to use film, then I would buy a film scanner without worry. Good tools are expensive, but not being able to meet the generally-accepted minimum quality standards of ones craft is more expensive.</p>

<p>David, You are completely right that some people's goals might require more time and equipment dedicated to baby photography that what worked for me. I still want to caution against getting carried away. Let me make my implicit caution explicit.</p> <p>Just as a lawyer who has legal issues of their own should always hire another lawyer to represent them, I would advise a photographer to hire another photographer if their goal is the best possible photographic record. In this case the risk is not sub-par photography but sub-par parenting. I know from experience that one can get so wrapped up in the photography that one damages ones relationship with a child or spouse. There are two ways of dealing with this that come to mind. I'm sure there are more. I used an intentional restriction of my own goals. It would have worked just as well to have had a discussion with my spouse so that we both knew when I could be a photographer first and when I needed to be a parent first. </p>

<p>I have an entirely different take on what you are going to be doing. You're not going to be doing non-professional photography; you're going to be doing photography-as-a-parent. In my experience that means that the two most important attributes of a camera are 1) Small & light enough to always have it with you, and 2) Capable of taking pictures in the lowest light that is common. Neither high image quality nor super-low-light capability are even on my list.</p> <p>At this point I am looking back. I'm about to become a grandfather. As the parent of a baby I found that, when I was not away at work, I was a parent 100% of the time and a photographer 5 to 10% of the time. (When you are a parent these calculations always add up to more than 100%.) That meant that the camera bag became a place to keep all my gear together when it was put away; when "in use" a camera needed to be on a camera strap and slung so that it was out of the way behind me. I don't think that we have more than 2 or 3 pictures that would benefit from being printed larger than 8x10 in. If I wanted to create a portrait of one of our babies, it would be a collage of snapshots with two larger images, one in the upper left of the newborn in his mother's arms and the other in the lower right of the 5-year-old doing something that was entirely his own idea. It's not any one of the hundreds of individual new things that a baby does which I most remember. Instead it's the large number of big changes that are most memorable. </p> <p>All this is a way of saying that the most important thing is to be able to take 30 seconds to take a picture before going back to being a parent. Since it was film, I needed ISO 400 film and a fast 50mm or 35mm lens. Today I would use a DX or micro 4/3 camera set to ISO 3200 and a small, light lens. That would be light enough to have with me and fast enough to get good results in living room or kitchen lighting. It would probably be a "kit zoom" with a "35mm-equivalent" range of about 28 to 85mm (or even 70mm). When I needed longer, I would just plan on cropping. Again, no plans to be able to print 16x20. </p> <p>There would be times when I would want more: those newborn pictures, for example. Those would be planned and only semi-candid. I would bring a longer lens, a couple of off-camera flashes, and perhaps a tripod. These days it would probably be a tele-zoom, but with planning that would not be a requirement. </p> <p>Spend plenty of time just being a parent. It can be fun at the most unexpected moments.</p>

<p>If the situation is unique, you need a lawyer. If the situation requires that many words to describe it, you need a lawyer.</p> <p>If someone here had been in your exact situation -- impossible in insure -- they would still be unable to give you help, because they are unlikely to be in your jurisdiction (which you did not specify). In the US, contract law varies from state to state. I imagine there is even more variety when you include other countries. </p> <p> </p>

<p>The US National Archives has an opinion about this. They have published a paper titled "Technical Guidelines for Digitizing Archival Materials for Electronic Access" (https://www.archives.gov/files/preservation/technical/guidelines.pdf). On page 60 they say<br> "We recommend the Tagged Image File Format or TIFF for production master files. Use TIFF version 6, with Intel (Windows) byte order."<br> Later, in "Appendix D", they go into gory detail about the preservation risks (and other issues) for various file formats. <br /><br /></p>

<p>Following up on what David and Bob said, I would suggest spending well toward the low end of their budget for something that meets both the schools minimum requirements and the minimum requirements that everyone has been suggesting here:<br> * something that one *could* grow with. (DSLR or mirrorless with interchangeable lens and a "system" of lenses and accessories behind it -- Nikon, Olympus, Canon, Fuji etc)<br> * Sensor size big enough to match 35mm film quality. (in my opinion that is Micro-4/3 or larger. I own M4/3 and would recommend DX if not much more expensive.)<br> * easy to use in manual mode with full control.<br> * small to moderate range kit zoom.</p> <p>The point is that if her parents spend no more than half their theoretical budget, they have money in reserve in case she gets interested in some aspect of photography that requires some specific gear (flash, macro lens, whatever). If she doesn't get that interested they have saved money. If she does, she gets the pleasure of picking her own direction with a small budget to fund it.<br> In my own youth the $10 Argus C3 was not enough camera, but the Nikormat that my father helped me buy served me for almost 30 years -- until digital came along. </p>

<p>The problem you are worried about is substantially the same as the problem that range finder cameras with cloth shutters, such as the film Leicas, have. The issue is that an image of the sun is focused on the shutter or sensor and burns a hole. With the relatively low-energy photons of visible light, heat is your only worry. As Barry suggested, the problem can occur if:<br> 1) The lens is focused at or near infinity. (This can be assumed to be true most of the time),<br> 2) The camera is resting in a position such that the sun might pass through its field of view, and<br> 3) The lens cap is not on. <br> In my youth when I owned a Leica III (don't ask what happened), I tried to teach my self to always set it down on its baseplate if it was not practical to put it in my bag. If I was in that much of a hurry putting on the lens cap or de-focusing the lens were not likely to happen. </p> <p>I would not worry about a camera which has been in a store window. It would have to be a south-facing window with no building across from it and the camera would have to be somehow placed that the lens was pointed somewhat upward. If the camera was on its back, the lens would point toward the ceiling and not be a problem.</p>

<p>You say that the emulsion side is "smooth". From that I would infer that the side in question is not smooth -- that is you already know that these are scratches. Is that true? If you don't know, please use a loupe (or ~50 mm lens) and let us know what you see.</p> <p>If they are scratches, you are going to have to do the work to figure it out. I'm assuming that you are hoping to use more boxes of this film. First check one or two sheets fresh from the box. If they are OK, you'll need to take them through the process, checking for the problem after every step. With scratches, exposing the film to light as you check it should not affect the problem. When you know what step the problem occurs at, the explanation is likely to be easier to figure out. </p>

<p>My experience is that some things are inherently complex and hard to make easy-to-remember-how-to-use. This applies to many more things than just software, but I'll talk about the software case. The problem is that while many of us want to do only a few simple things with this complex software, we each have a different set of simple things that we want to do, so it is not financially practical to create different simple versions for small groups of us.<br> <br /> My solution is old fashioned: A notebook. I invest the time to figure out what I want to do and then write up instructions for myself so that I won't have to climb the learning curve more than once. Well, actually it's usually the second time - a year later, or whatever -- when I realize that I need to write it all down.<br> <br /> FYI, I use a notebook rather than either sheets of loose paper or an electronic file is that for me a notebook / day-book is easier to keep track of.</p>

<p>Christian, Charles is right. It is almost certain that it has nothing to do with the processing. The bands stop at the edge of the image; there is no hint of them in the unexposed edges of the film. The processing chemicals know nothing about where the image ends.</p> <p>The bands are areas that received more exposure than the rest of the image. From what I can (not) see, I don't know whether the bands have been exposed for longer or whether they have received non-image light. You should be able to tell which by finding a place where one crosses adjacent very dark and very light parts of the image.</p> <p>Now to speculate wildly. I cannot image a mechanism by which non-image light would get in to the film while it is in the film gate. Therefore, I will guess that the second focal plane curtain is "stuttering". That is, as the curtains are crossing the film gate the second curtain is periodically (we're talking milliseconds, or perhaps microseconds, here) getting stuck and then catching up to where it should be. I know absolutely nothing about the mechanical design of the mechanism which controls the curtains. That is why this is wild speculation.</p> <p>To state the obvious: Unless you have mechanical skills that you have not hinted at, you will have to get this to a camera repair person if you want to get it fixed.</p>

<p>OK, let's summarize. Here's what I've got. What am I missing?</p> <ul> <li>Some images are "fine" or at least way better.</li> <li>Some images are "red". The first posted sample looks almost as if only the red-sensitive layer was exposed. It is also rather underexposed.</li> <li>In fact all 3 layers are working fine: Just to our right of the statue's left shoulder there is some relatively well exposed greenery.</li> </ul> <p>The fact that some images on a roll are fine and some are not rules out any part of the process in which the entire roll is treated the same. (In theory different parts of the roll could be manufactured or processed differently. However, that would result in a change in the middle of an image more often than not, and we have been told that there are several such transitions.)<br> That means:</p> <ul> <li>The film was good when the OP received it.</li> <li>The film was not exposed to any damage either while being carried around as a roll or while in the camera.</li> <li>The processing was fine.</li> </ul> <p>That leaves just a few sources of the problem. At this point I am ignoring the question of whether there is a reasonable way the particular step could have caused the problem and only looking at when one image was (or may have been) treated differently from other images. This is where I may be missing something:</p> <ul> <li>The OP set the film exposure incorrectly. The parts of this are the shutter speed, the aperture, and any filters or other things placed in front of the lens. The OM-1 is a manual camera, so nothing else is *directly* involved with controlling the exposure.</li> <li>The OP misused the built-in light meter. I don't know exactly how this works on the OM-1, so I'm only guessing at sources of error. If this is an aperture-priority meter than the problems that I can imagine are setting the ASA incorrectly or incorrectly matching the meter indication to the shutter speed it is requesting. I can't think of a way that the aperture could be incorrectly transferred (there's no transfer involved).</li> <li>The camera exposure execution is faulty. This is limited to shutter giving incorrect timing or the lens not correctly stopping down.</li> <li>The camera exposure meter is faulty. For example, the ASA setting reading is intermittently misread by the electronics (assuming there are any), the f/ stop is miscommunicated, or the needle (again making an assumption) is sticky.</li> <li>The scanning is being done incorrectly. Again this needs to be an intermittent type of error.</li> </ul> <p>Those are the only steps that I can think of.<br> Going through them backwards. Now I *am* considering the likelihood of each problem and the way it would happen (the "failure mechanism"):</p> <ul> <li>As has been suggested, the scanning is an unlikely source. The change is so radical between the good and the bad images that it's hard to imagine a reasonable failure mechanism. HOWEVER, this is very easy to rule in or rule out. If the negative images for the good and bad prints look about the same, then it is a scanning error. If there is an obvious difference in either overall color or overall density of the image, then the problem happened before the lab got the film.</li> <li>The incorrect light meter or incorrect use of the meter seem quite possible. Collectively they are easy to check, since the error is so obviously extreme. The exposure should be about 1/ASA at f/16 in direct sun or 1/ASA at f/5.6 for open shade (and f/4 for deep shade).</li> <li>If the f/ stop and shutter speed were set close to correctly, then it must be a camera issue. I would suspect a sticky shutter or sticky aperture. Regardless, if it were my camera I would have a professional give it a CLA if I made it to this step of the analysis.</li> </ul>

<blockquote> <p>I'm seeking advice based on your experiences, not legal advice.</p> </blockquote> <p>I'm almost certain that this is not true. Unless you have a reasonable fear that your email communication was with someone pretending to be the bride, you have all the information you need about the non-legal aspect of this situation. When I started reading your OP, I expected that you were going to ask us the important non-legal question: What can I do to keep this couple as happy as is practical? But you know the answer to that question: Their silence is a clear indication that they don't want to have anything to do with you any more. That leaves only legal question(s).</p> <blockquote> <p>... and it's a horrible waste of my resources to refer to a lawyer regarding one wedding.</p> </blockquote> <p>This is also not true. "What do I do about this particular customer now?" would be part of what you would talk with a lawyer about, but you need to use that question as way to have a concrete discussion with your lawyer about how your contract can be improved. You want to be sure that you will not be in such an ambiguous situation in the future. The fact that your current contract is not working for you means that your consultation will be primarily about making all your future wedding gigs happy events for both you and your clients. </p>

<p>Taking "white" to mean a maximum-brightness pure white:<br> For prints: White == Very white paper<br /> For slides: White == clear<br /> For digital (in the 8 bits per color case): white = a value of 255 for each of the three colors.</p> <p>In theory a white print could be a mirror surface. That would reflect more than the ~98% that paper does. In theory a slide's white could be the milky white you were expecting. Figuring out why those alternate choices were not made is left as an exercise for the reader. (Hint: how is each type of image used?)</p>

<p>It depends on how you see -- or rather how you think about what you see.</p> <p>I have a only a 28-90 kit zoom (35mm eq) and have gotten into the habit of always returning it to 35mm. Often that captures "everything" when I'm looking at something. Second most common is to go all the way up to 90m (and I think I would rather a little longer). My theory is that most of the time, whether I have a camera with me or not, I'm doing one of two things. Either I'm looking at a whole or the relationship between a part and the whole, or I'm looking at a detail that I want to understand to make sense of the whole. For me these two focal lengths have a field of view matching the two most common ways for me to use my eyes. </p>

<p>Ryan,</p> <p>I would not worry. It seems to me that you have done all you can, and it also seems that it will be good enough for your needs. I would suggest following the advice given here about making a TIFF copy and about making sure that multiple electronic copies exist (to cover the risk of fire or flood). Just email them to some of your more task-oriented family members and specifically ask them to save the files to cover the possible risks.</p> <p>People seem to have assumed that your question was "Did I do a good enough job on these prints to meet archival, throw-away-the-original standards?" The answer to that question is "No, you did not." But I read your question as "Did I do a good enough job to preserve <em>these particular </em>prints?" In my judgement, you did. I'm guessing that you are not likely to want to know what houses were in the background or what pens he kept in his pocket. It is true that you can't see exactly what he looked like; there is some fuzziness in the image of his face that I doubt was in the original. But you have the other two pictures which cover that _really_ well. Sure, if you get the chance, rescan the two prints directly to TIFF, but it's not worth the social cost of stirring up family difficulties.</p> <p>:-) The only thing I would be sorry about is that his smile seems more natural in the photo by the water. In the wedding pictures his smile seems tinged by the stresses of having some responsibility for an important day to some family member (daughter?). Or maybe that's a projection of the anxiety I feel in that situation.</p>

<p>That is so cool!</p> <p>On this Windows monitor, for a fraction of a second as the image is loading, I see a really bad, oval moire on the right-most illuminated panel of the building. Once the image is fully loaded, that moire goes away. When I look at that same panel at 100%, I see a weak moire on the lower half of that same panel. It's a roughly vertical series of lines which curve to a more upper-right to lower-left orientation toward the bottom. With all the various observations, I thought another monitor was called for.</p> <p>On my iPad ("Retina display"), I see nothing at "fit-to-screen" size. When I enlarge it "a lot" I don't see it. If I go from "fit" to "large" in small steps, there is a small range where I see roughly the same pattern as I saw on this monitor. It seems like it is indeed at the size where the original pixels are the same size (or at least about the same size) as the monitor pixels. </p> <p>That seems to support the "it's the monitor" argument. It never occurred to me that this could happen without being an inherent part of the image -- something that would show up at any degree of enlargement over 100%. </p>

<p>John Wheeler nailed the technical question. Sebastian nailed to business question.</p>

<p>Jeff's link points to a discussion of damage from visible light and near infrared lasers, *not* a flash. I would also not worry about non-visible "light" (photons). It's ultra-violet photons that have more energy per photon. After a certain frequency they are very dangerous to the human retina. People who have gone to the trouble of getting a "light" in that frequency range generally know what they are doing. If not and you have something like that sending photons in random directions, you have a much bigger problem than possible damage to a camera sensor.</p>

<p>+1 on the Fujis. </p>

<p>All: Don't forget that there was a major burst of inflation, at least in the US, between 1972 and 1980. I don't remember the exact start and end dates, but I'm pretty sure it's between those limits. That means that a 1975 price would be a lot higher than the equivalent (inflation adjusted) price in 1972.</p>

<p>+1 for studying the Zone System. Once you really understand what it means, it will help you understand digital photography as well.</p>

<p>As some have said, DSLRs are not high-quality audio devices and at the very least you need not just an actual pre-amp, which the DXA-5Da is not, but a pre-amp with some omph. Many pros who decide to use a DSLR for video use a real audio recorder and just use the audio recorded by the camera to synch the sound from the recorder with the video.</p> <p>I strongly recommend going to Transom.org and clicking on the "Tools" tab. Or search for "good, better, best" to find an article describing their opinion of what minimum level of equipment does acceptable audio capture. I also found a column by Martha Smith to be helpful, although I don't work anywhere near her level of professionalism: http://digitaljournalist.org/issue0105/videosmith.htm</p>

<p>Electronic shutter?! That was the late sixties, dude. :-)</p> <p>The year that I was the high school yearbook photographer I used the school's Yashicamat. Contrary to what some say, I found the meter was right more often than a stopped watch -- although maybe not a lot more often. I had a lot more faith in my used Weston Master II with its big selenium cell.</p>