[Frogfish]

So we've seen that the K5 and others using the same sensor can pull up underexposed parts of the image quite well.

35mm Film has a larger DR than Digital 35mm or Crop, correct? I've seen scans of film turned into jpg that then show a larger DR than digital is capable. At what level of DR will out of camera digital files start to capture the range seen in film at a SINGLE ev?

The ability to recover is nice, but wouldn't it be nice not to have to recover at all?

For example the other evening I took a shot of a church with some houses in front and a sunset behind the church. With my eye, I could clearly see detail in the houses and in the sky. Yet with digital I get to pick which one I want to see. The current working theory seems to be expose for the bright one and pull up the dark. I'm left thinking film would have had less of a problem capturing a scene like that. Am I wrong?

Thanks

I was reading up on just this subject the other day (forget where). Seems the DR of the current crop of cameras (APS-C and FF of course) have surpassed even the best film money could buy.

[Pål Jensen]

I was reading up on just this subject the other day (forget where). Seems the DR of the current crop of cameras (APS-C and FF of course) have surpassed even the best film money could buy.

The K-7 has a dynamic range beyond any film I've ever used.....

[Winder]

I was working with a musician friend a few weeks ago. I had shot his first CD cover and promotional material 12 years ago with T-Max 3200. He is working on a compilation of his older work and putting together a new CD. both my (now ancient) Canon 5D and the K-7 produce cleaner images with more DR. I have been adding grain and increasing the black level to match the older work.

[RyanW]

I was reading up on just this subject the other day (forget where). Seems the DR of the current crop of cameras (APS-C and FF of course) have surpassed even the best film money could buy.

Thanks. I think I mixed up the DR of the human eye with film perhaps.

This article helped me sort it out
Understanding Dynamic Range in Digital Photography

[Ash]

Exactly Pal, Ryan and Wheatfield.
There's a lot of expectation put on the K-5 to somehow pull out detail from the most blown out shadows and highlights in the most backlit or harshly sunlit scenes.
A little knowledge of lighting and how it works (and doesn't work) in photography goes a long way.

[jstevewhite]

So we've seen that the K5 and others using the same sensor can pull up underexposed parts of the image quite well.

35mm Film has a larger DR than Digital 35mm or Crop, correct? I've seen scans of film turned into jpg that then show a larger DR than digital is capable. At what level of DR will out of camera digital files start to capture the range seen in film at a SINGLE ev?

This hasn't been strictly true for some time. DSLRs exceed the dynamic range of slide films hands down. Many modern sensors exceed the DR of most negative films of equivalent ISO shot and developed according to manufacturer's instructions. If you start talking about specialty stuff - like shooting tech pan and developing it in a low-contrast solution - then I think it only fair to include HDR imaging in the mix, in which case DSLRs still "win".

That said, I believe one can still choose a film-sensor pairing to show film has higher DR still.

[Eruditass]

Also, the grain on DSLRs was fugly with hard pattern noise up until recently.

[Torphoto]

Wow this thread is filled with alot of miss information.

The film vs digital thing is missing one critical factor, latitude! Film ( print ) can handle 4 stops over exposing and not just get detail but very good detail, the DR of Print film is alot greater than you give it credit for, more so B&W but it takes a printer with good experience to dodge and burn the scene together, an art that will soon be lost to time.

Next as much as I like the k5 it can't replace my 5d MKII for my commercial use, maybe the K-3 can

The K-5 has closed the gap with FF significantly but remember your looking at a 2+ yr old design with a brand new one. When similar new tech is applied to the future FF sensors things will go back to advantage FF over aps-C again.

Oh and BTW if you need to correct for +/- 4 stops of exposure in images you really need to rethink photography on a whole as a hobby, let alone a career. We all know the 5d MKII sensor has serious banding issues, but correctly exposed the advantage still goes to the MKII right up to 6400 iso.

[filorp]

Film ( print ) can handle 4 stops over exposing

yes thats right but once you develop it with apropriate time and chemicals you dont have the possibility to pull out of the tiff file as much as you can do with raw file - the fact is you get the picture with much greater DR than jpg or tiff file from digital camera, i mean, to be precise if one take underexposed photo with digital and with film one get much more from digital to pull out - unless one develop film in chemicals with adjusted time accordingly to underexposure...

the DR of Print film is alot greater than you give it credit for

yes but doesnt contain as many information as raw file from k5 for example at least according to my expierience from before 15 years when i was using film.... digital is much more flexible thanx to photoshop and computers

When similar new tech is applied to the future FF sensors things will go back to advantage FF over aps-C again.

fully agree unless sensor makers will not put as much money into FF as they do with apsc......

[Winder]

Next as much as I like the k5 it can't replace my 5d MKII for my commercial use, maybe the K-3 can

The K-5 has closed the gap with FF significantly but remember your looking at a 2+ yr old design with a brand new one. When similar new tech is applied to the future FF sensors things will go back to advantage FF over aps-C again.

This is true, but there is a point of diminishing returns, and as APS-C improves it will be meeting the needs of a larger percentage of users. As the needs of more people are met by APS-C, fewer people will need to spend an extra $1,000 (+glass) on a FF body to get the results the desire. FF will drop in price to make it competitive (which is has been doing).

Most people don't "need" FF. A lot of people want it.

[vladimiroltean]

yes thats right but once you develop it with apropriate time and chemicals you dont have the possibility to pull out of the tiff file as much as you can do with raw file - the fact is you get the picture with much greater DR than jpg or tiff file from digital camera, i mean, to be precise if one take underexposed photo with digital and with film one get much more from digital to pull out - unless one develop film in chemicals with adjusted time accordingly to underexposure...

yes but doesnt contain as many information as raw file from k5 for example at least according to my expierience from before 15 years when i was using film.... digital is much more flexible thanx to photoshop and computers

I think that what you said about detail in the shadows stands true only for negative film. Digital images should rather compare to reversal film, for that matter. I mean, the amount of detail that you can get out of the dark parts of a raw file is roughly equal to the detail in the highlights of negative film.

[filorp]

Digital images should rather compare to reversal film

yeah you're right i dint take "reversal" into account....

[jstevewhite]

Wow this thread is filled with alot of miss information.

The film vs digital thing is missing one critical factor, latitude! Film ( print ) can handle 4 stops over exposing and not just get detail but very good detail, the DR of Print film is alot greater than you give it credit for, more so B&W but it takes a printer with good experience to dodge and burn the scene together, an art that will soon be lost to time.

This is only true in specific instances (a very select group of three or four special-purpose, low contrast films), or with special processing. If you're allowed to use "special processing", then a digital camera far exceeds the latitude of print film with HDR processing.

Furthermore, in film, the vast majority of commercial work was done with positive film like Ektachrome and Velvia. These films have FAR less latitude(~7 stops) than the K-5 (~12-15 stops, depending on whom you believe). The only subjects art directors ever wanted print film for were portraits, to make retouching easier; the rest of the time it was Chrome, chrome, and more chrome.

That said, the insistance on chromes was due to workflow, not any absolute measure of quality; all the drum scanners and printing systems were set up to use positives, and dammit, that's what they wanted. Of course, before digital, chromes gave that "look" that National Geographic created a market for. But the vast majority of print work wouldn't have looked much different with print film for an origin.

Next as much as I like the k5 it can't replace my 5d MKII for my commercial use, maybe the K-3 can

The K-5 has closed the gap with FF significantly but remember your looking at a 2+ yr old design with a brand new one. When similar new tech is applied to the future FF sensors things will go back to advantage FF over aps-C again.

This is fundamentally true - that is, once the Sony sensor tech (or their competitor's response) moves to full frame, it will once again return the DR crown to the FF platform - assuming that it scales appropriately.

Still, I look through images from FF and APS-C, and I still see nothing like the difference I saw between medium format images and 35mm images. The difference between FF and APS-C is marginal in all but the most extreme cases. Both formats capture far more dynamic range than any reflective media can reproduce. It's like 4x5 film, back in the 80s and 90s. We'd shoot 4x5 for anyone who wanted it, and charge an arm and a leg for it, but we knew that essentially 2% of those clients actually needed 4x5 instead of medium format, and only 20% of the clients that wanted medium format needed MF instead of 35mm. It's the dirty secret of commercial photography.

I shot a lingerie catalog for a startup company once upon a time, and they *insisted* on 4x5 chromes. They wanted that "look", and my Hasselblad just wasn't going to give it to them. So I got out the Linhof and they paid thru the nose, and were happy, happy campers. I gave up trying to change their mind when the AD said "Money is no object."

Oh and BTW if you need to correct for +/- 4 stops of exposure in images you really need to rethink photography on a whole as a hobby, let alone a career. We all know the 5d MKII sensor has serious banding issues, but correctly exposed the advantage still goes to the MKII right up to 6400 iso.

The shadows in an image can *easily* be four stops down from the main exposure setting. Bringing detail into those shadows is roughly equivalent to underexposing by four stops. If the 5dmk2 sensor bands when recovering -4 stops, it will band when bringing detail out of those shadows, as well. I don't own one, so I don't know; I'm just reasoning with the information you've given me.

[glanglois]

Thanks for that explanation. Rep points for sharing expertise won the hard way.