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| 08-21-2010, 08:34 AM | #16 |
 Originally posted by Wheatfield  If you are talking about colour films (widest spectrum of colours?), then you are just plain wrong. | |
| 08-22-2010, 09:21 PM | #17 |
| Originally posted by penties rider why am i "just plain wrong" in here? Even small tank minilabs tended to have better plots after the chemistry had seasoned a bit. | |
| 08-28-2010, 05:06 AM | #18 |
| Originally posted by Wheatfield Presuming colour film (widest spectrum of colours) my experience in some 30 years of working in Photolabs running processors on a daily basis (Almost all of my lab time was spent being at least partially in charge of QC) I found that colour processing was at it's best in high volume large tank equipment that took on a lot of replenishment. Even small tank minilabs tended to have better plots after the chemistry had seasoned a bit.  there's nothing wrong with replenishment of photographic chemicals really, when large volumes of film / paper are to be processed *commercially*... only, replenishment of such material changes the way grains and color / contrast / overall density of the negative (or reversal film) would look in the end: they simply degrade a bit. you also thus get some drop in film sensitivity: at least 1/3 stop, if not more and so on ... that's quite ok for commercial work and family snapshots, even for a number of professional, technical and industrial works but not when truly high quality results are expected to come of the negative or reversal material, especially for large format negatives / reversal material intended for blow ups and so forth, where grain structure (granularity) has to be at its best possible shape: how grains will look when film is developed in replenished chemicals highly affects sharpness, since one key factor to sharpness is the 'granularity' of the processed material ... then also take the drop in film sensitivity, which means either the photographer has to compensate by over-exposing the film when taking pictures (accordingly losing some closer aperture settings and / or higher shutter speeds) that will affect the looks, sharpness and contrast of the final results, or he'll have to end up with 'pastel like' colors in the end ... a nice effect when desired but totally unusable when ultra-sharp enlargements are what we're after ... the "seasoned a bit" chemicals in case of small tank processing, especially in case of the developer, is a must thing to do not because aged chemicals are better but quite simply because totally freshly prepared chemicals do not work properly YET... and the "seasoning" usually is not to take more than half to a full day though, otherwise you'll end up with 'old', about to be rotten developers, even if the manufacturer's recommended shelf life tells you they can be kept longer, which is ok, but not recommended for best quality results, b&w or color ... and finally, if push processing is in mind, then replenishing is simply out of the question (unless for some weird effects ...) interestingly, really high quality b&w film / print requires even more careful processing and handling than most average color material, since the mere presence of colors on a final print or transparency would appease most regular folks viewing tastes but a b&w print has to be really high quality in order to attract attention from viewers of all kind ... (same applies true to how a digitally reworked b&w image looks vs most regular color digital pictures ...) i have worked either way: with non-replenished chemicals as well as replenished ones and i know which one works best for *ultimate* quality... in fact, any small or big lab specialists worthy of their titles and acquired expertise i have worked with or talked to, have all told me the same thing ... best regards PR Last edited by penties rider; 08-28-2010 at 05:12 AM. Reason: typo | |
| 09-02-2010, 08:26 AM | #19 |
| Originally posted by dugrant153 thank penties rider, and all others who have provided info! I still like the look of film, but as you know being a digital shooter has made me so comfortable with just flipping the ISO button and going nutso in any lighting... but AWB is just not the same as film - not as consistent (guess that's what RAW files are for but that's extra comp work - something I'm trying to push away from with film). I think I'm beginning to now understand the 'latitude' and all the different factors that affect a film. Curious, then, on what people do to "switch ISO" to a higher ISO when things get darker? Sounds like a lot of people just changed films out, though I can see that being an extra step that could be really distracting during a very busy day. Let's take a wedding scenario and split it into 3 scenarios - getting ready, ceremony, reception. I love 400 ISO film simply for availability and ease of use in most lighting conditions. Going flashless (for personal style reasons) and using low light prime lenses (Thinking Canon 28mm F1.8, Canon 50mm F1.4 and ... something else). Contemplating use of a monopod! Note that I shoot mainly photojournalist style with minimal direction (except during formal portraits as they request). Getting Ready (at bride's house) - I'm thinking ISO 400 film. My current pick is kind of a split between Fuji Superia 400 and Fuji Pro 400H. Ceremony - Even though it's day time, some churches are not that well lit or could be a dark ceremony. Thinking of using ISO 400 film, but "pushing" the roll to 800 ISO to achieve usable shots? I can see issues with the couple coming out of the church into bright daylight. Reception - usually very dark or getting dark. Thinking ISO 3200 film like Ilford B&W film, or maybe an 800 film pushed to 1600? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated! I would like to restate that I'm a complete film newb having grown up with digital, but I am open to learning more!!! firstly, sorry to get to this message of yours so late! also sorry this is going to be a very long 'article' not just a 'QUICK RESPONSE', but i'm sure you'll find at least a few useful items in it, so please be patient and read the whole thing ... i used to do a lot of wedding photo / video ages ago (even as old as the Super 8mm movie times, yes, that old!) and having tried digital photography for weddings in present times, i'd say: forget about film no matter how better its looks are, as i agree with you that i prefer films' prints looks too, only, i'd rather use film from the medium format up, at least 645, and not the miniature 135 really, although the latter is also good enough ... (although it fails badly when going for truly large size prints ...) then if film is my choice for covering weddings, i'd rather shoot 120 rolls in the square 6x6 format, using a waist level camera (Rollieflex TLR is probably the best one for that purpose, especially because of its Planar lens, probably the sharpest the world of lenses has ever seen for that format and normal focal length) because it gives the best angle of view for people standing in groupie shots as well as a square format eases out cropping later at the printing stage while also relieving the photographer from having to change the camera holding position from horizontal to vertical repeatedly: you hold the camera in the same upright position all the time! easy! even some old pro photographers i have worked with have simply forgotten all about the ease of use and operation in such cameras, especially for wedding photography ... you can also hold the waist level twin lens camera above your head when having to shoot at rather high angles, without the need for a tall tripod or ladder whatsoever ... low angle photography is also easier with a waist level viewfinder ... (o man, and we thought how better using a digital camera with a rotatable LCD panel is!) all that said however, the resolution of an 8MP digital camera, far surpasses that of a 120 roll these days, and if you have a higher resolution digital, say a Pentax 40MP 645, i guess you could enjoy highest possible resolutions attainable presently alongside the versatility of a fast and light weight medium format camera, and who knows, does Pentax 645 digital come with a waist level viewfinder too? ;-) or a rotatable LCD panel at least? all in all though, if you are going to use film, make sure you'll be using what in the old time we used to call, or it actually came out, as 'Type G' film, which did not have any specific color balance: it was of the "automatic coupler" emulsion type and was the equivalent of the AWB thing on digital cameras today ... i know it's still being produced these days but not under the same old "Type G" or even GPF nomination that Kodak did it in those days ... (maybe the two film types you're talking about are a similar animal?) now, if you're trying to overcome ISO issues in one way or other, and do that with film, i'm trying to tell you be more concerned with film's white balance at first and then think of the film's speed. also, pushing a film beyond its sensitivity limits by applying darkroom techniques, will certainly affect the film emulsion's white balance too ... that's not the case with a good quality digital camera, at least not as badly as it is with film ... again, the more i compare the two, digital wins over film in many ways, at least for wedding photography ... you may as well try film backs and use even tungsten-balanced film too. but the disadvantage of using film backs is losing the 'continuity' of your shooting among other things, namely, the necessity to have to hold the event on wait only because you want to change film backs in the middle of the procession ... not the right thing to do is it? with digital, even if you use more than one camera, later all of your exposures will be chronically in order by just a few clicks of the mouse on the computer screen, simply impossible with film, unless you do scan your negatives first, and then put them in correct date order manually, which is time consuming indeed ... once more, digital wins over film in terms of practicality ... in fact, i'm going to say that film better be left for any kind of job BUT wedding photography ... of course you may want to have a film camera of some format and abilities alongside your digital equipment, as a backup for example, but certainly not as your main equipment if ... and as i have said it already and do stress on it again: either you get the best chemical processing for film, especially when doing push processing, or you better not use it at all! in my own case, either i process the exposed film myself too, or i would prefer not to do film at all: lab stage of film processing is not only 50% of the entire job, but also the 'heavier 50%' as it is so sensitive in determining how your proper exposures at the time of shooting will now come out after the film comes into direct contact with those nasty chemicals and water ... and if not done well enough, it can ruin the whole initial stage of taking pictures! the slightest mistake and your film roll(s) maybe just garbage ... it's not after all just an accident why digital photography and video were invented to almost entirely replace film, especially these days ... most experienced wedding photographers who have done film too will tell you how more comfortable they are with digital, if not for all things, at least for the fact that you can see your shot was indeed made and recorded right at the time of shooting ... not quite so with film, where you're always worried until you see the results out of the lab at least a day later ... and handling / storage of film is also much trickier than digital, no matter how uncertain digital storage is for itself of course ... (as soon as you back up digital photos on CD or similar storage material, you're almost quite sure that the pictures are preserved 'forever' ... not quite so with film, unless you scan film for storage on digital material too. again, digital wins over film in here yet once more ...) film can get scratches and is always having at least a few specks of dust and dirt (and finger prints too!) on it, not the case with digital! anyway, what i'd prefer now for weddings personally is like having a digital camera in a 'square "crop-free" format' with a waist level viewfinder (or a rotatable LCD panel or whatever giving the same option) and in the highest resolution possible. (we need both though: clear and bright prism viewfinders as well as large and hi-res LCD panels!) take it this way: theoretically speaking, if you have a square or near square (crop-free) sensor with a very high resolution, you don't even need to change lenses midway, and a really sharp / high quality medium wide angle to normal 'prime' lens would be all you need, as cropping out detailed images later would be quite easy, well, again, as i said it already, that is "theoretically speaking" of course and not yet doable, but it IS possible ... (i'm sure a day will come soon that the resolution of digital camera sensors --to reach Gigapixel measures in just a few years!-- will be so high that not even the best of lenses or mirror-ed optics will barely be able to deliver and match the quality of the new sensors ... that will probably be a day we'll have to find a way for making use of some kind of an ultra fast 'scanner beam' or a similar method rather than lenses to capture images ...) also, don't be so scared of AWB as it's giving really fine results these days in most digital cameras i've been testing. have this in mind: no matter how you balance your camera's WB with the color of the light from your flash for example (something you better do anyway and btw!), you'd still have to deal with so many regular tungsten or fluorescent or candle lights and so on whose light are also captured in the scene as well as the reflections of all kinds and color from the bride's gown and jewelry etc ... so, there is practically no 'perfect white balance' there, is there? not even with film, hence the 'G' emulsion ... (unless you can afford a Hollywood studio set up? no kidding: i once had a plan for that actually! a dedicated salon where the wedding's ceremony is going to be held, with all the lighting and things readily set up for the photographer AS WELL AS for the film crew ... i know some people have even tried that but it's not always the case in all weddings everywhere to take place inside a salon alone, is it?)in the old times, it was such a nasty business to balance normally daylight photographic material's color balance suited more for flashlight, with that of the 'indoor' film or video "artificial" lighting ... man, we had to come up with certain tricks together with the film crew, if they were friendly enough to cooperate that was, to avoid having too much 'yellow' that the daylight balanced photographic material recorded off their tungsten light sources ... again, Type G film was the best solution to the rescue, so is AWB on digital cameras these days ... yes, as you can see, unlike yourself, i'm more concerned with color balance here rather than film or digital ISO ... besides, in case of wedding pictures at least, i have noticed most people like to agree with 'colorful' images, as long as, 1. skin tones on the bride's face are 'true' and look nice and natural enough, and, 2. the bride's gown is also a 'true' white (if she's wearing a white gown that is of course) with enough details of its intricate texture and / or decorations to be visible in the final image and the rest is not that important even if the groom's black suite comes out like charcoal or worse, it shows like a boorish dark garment ... (always have wedding photography's number one rule in mind: bride is the first and foremost topic of a wedding; for the groom, for her own as well as 'his' family, and certainly for the photographer!) ;-) i would set / adjust the camera's WB for my flashes in use first, and then try to find a second 'auto' adjustment to balance that 'flash WB' with the surrounding ... (which is again not quite possible with film, unless you use filters, which is going to give you even more trouble in other respects ...) now, if that is such an almost impossible feat to achieve (which in my own views it rather is!) then why not just accept the 'Digital AWB Truth' and use that all the time, or most of the time, especially in situations where changing the settings on the camera is not practical because the photographer has to be focusing his / her attention fully and entirely and only on the subject matter that are constantly in motion: bride and groom and the event ... however, cameras like Pentax K-7 do also give user customizable settings, (as many as 37?) which means you can also tackle the so much varied WB instances in a wedding's various stages by configuring the camera in so many different ways and just calling a particularly desired setting at the touch of a button. if you're into that kind of mind bugling approach and feel comfortable with that, then there you are, go ahead and use it at its best since the K-7 is reportedly the only DSLR camera at this moment giving the user so many programmable options, but if you're an old man like me whose mind can no longer memorize all those different settings, then my first, best, and last advice to you or anyone would be: stick with the AWB thing, focus on shooting the event and capturing those precious never to reoccur moments, and then retouch / readjust color and things later in your image editing software and at the private comfort of your studio or bedroom depending on where your computer is situated! no wonder wedding photographers these days require *at least a month* for delivering the photos to their clients. in the good old film times, i remember a week or two was the latest it took for most average wedding photographers to finish off their assignment, with all small to medium to even huge size prints, in albums or framed, to be given to the bride and groom and their families and friends ... i remember i even met and heard of a few photographers who would have their assistant ready, to take a few of the first exposed rolls in the middle of the ceremonies and rush to the lab, get them developed and print some of the pictures, with even a few of the best shots enlarged to say 10 by 12, nicely framed even, and brought back as a 'free gift' for the clients before the party ended ... go figure that with latest / fastest modern times computer and digital technology! ;-) these days though, i have seen some photographers take a video projector and a screen with them to display some of their pictures or video footage at some point near the end of the ceremonies ... (i am planning to add a decent printer to such a set up just as well, and maybe do some prints there right on the spot, who knows ...)long lecture! hope it helped you in some ways at least ... to sum it all up: don't sacrifice the correct and on time capturing of a wedding's moments -- an event that can simply NOT be repeated in the same way a feature movie's shot may be retaken -- for just the supposedly better looks of film material over digital! digital photography at this moment is really good, a lot more than enough, and a lot more reliable to work with than film too! as an experienced old times film photographer and cameraman, i'm glad i have such a great facility available to me now, especially for an *extremely high responsibility job* like wedding photography ... best wishes for you and good luck. PR Last edited by penties rider; 09-02-2010 at 10:14 AM. Reason: typo / content | |
| 09-04-2010, 01:59 PM | #20 |
| Originally posted by penties rider ... all that said however, the resolution of an 8MP digital camera, far surpasses that of a 120 roll these days... Last edited by tuco; 09-04-2010 at 02:43 PM. | |
| 09-04-2010, 09:28 PM | #21 |
| Originally posted by tuco No, I don't think so. I see the results between my MF and my K-7 all the time... Steve | |
| 09-10-2010, 05:14 AM | #22 |
| Originally posted by dugrant153 One of the main advantages I've found with digital has been the ability to change ISO "mid roll" ...er... "mid SD card" and just keeping shooting like there's no tomorrow  .... So, why is this so? Because no setting you make on a film camera will affect the ISO of the film. It is going to collect exactly the light that you give it... no more, no less, and there is no way to tell it to become more or less "light sensitive" inside of the camera. If you change the ISO all you are doing is telling the camera how much light the film inside needs for a "proper" exposure. Film is, afterall, a "dumb" plastic medium that only does what it was engineered to do. The only practical thing you can do to "change the film's ISO" is to adjust your developing process to enhance the light it did collect. As others have said, this is highly dependant upon the film itself as some are more readily susceptible to variations in processing times/temps/agitation/etc than others. Of course, there are other ways to do what you really want to do, ie; change ISO mid-shoot. One is to use a camera (typically medium format cameras such as the Hassys, Bronicas or most of the Mamiyas) with an interchangable back or film inserts each loaded with different film. You'll normally need a dark bag for the ones with film inserts.Mike Last edited by MRRiley; 09-10-2010 at 05:54 AM. Reason: clarification | |
| 09-10-2010, 09:49 AM | #23 |
|
True that. I've been doing more experimenting and shooting and finding that to be true. While most negative films I've tried are okay for overexposing (the picture looks more punchy or "fuller"), underexposing makes it seem cloudy. However, I think some films (especially the B&W films) can be shot overexposed and underexposed and still get very reasonable pictures - even if processed at rated speed. | |
| 09-10-2010, 11:42 AM | #24 |
| Originally posted by dugrant153 True that. I've been doing more experimenting and shooting and finding that to be true. While most negative films I've tried are okay for overexposing (the picture looks more punchy or "fuller"), underexposing makes it seem cloudy. However, I think some films (especially the B&W films) can be shot overexposed and underexposed and still get very reasonable pictures - even if processed at rated speed. | |
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