It's not bogus. Its a comparison of what is accessible to most photographers working with a normal budget. I can get nice drum scans of film images at the local pro lab -- for $150 a pop. Optical prints, on the other hand, are almost extinct. It's hard to find a lab that doesn't work from a scan. Yes, you can probably find them in San Francisco or New York. But even here in Detroit, where a lot of working pros produce a lot of commercial photography, optical printing is pretty much a thing of the past. The results that the typical advanced amateur can achieve with digital are better than the results he or she can achieve with film. And we've only just begun.
Paul
On Apr 30, 2005, at 4:09 PM, Shel Belinkoff wrote:
Methinks this is a bogus comparison. Herb is comparing the results of
scanned film to original digital output. In another post Godfrey is
comparing the results of scanned film to original digital output. Once the
image on a piece of film has been scanned, it's degraded. The pixels react
with the film grain, the quality of the scanner and the quality of the scan
come into play as well. The skill of the person doing the scan enters the
equation, as does the quality of other hardware and software along the
chain to the final print or output. Then there's the conversion of the
scanned image into a JPEG for web use or other use. It's not a realistic
comparison.
How about comparing the digital output that has been adjusted and printed
to a properly exposed and carefully processed original film image that has
been reproduced directly to, for example, an Ilfochrome or a high quality
optical print, or viewed as a slide.
I just makes me smile, and sometimes laugh aloud, to see how many people
degrade their film images by scanning them on mediocre scanners (and the
high end Nikon, Minolta, and other consumer brands generally used here and
by most people who do their own scanning are mediocre and pale in
comparison to the Heidelberg Tango and Imacon scanners) and then compare
the results to what is essentially original digital output.
Shel
On Apr 30, 2005, at 2:40 PM, Herb Chong wrote:
i have found that Velvia scans at 4000dpi, good technique, and top
quality lenses are still better in detail, but that anything less than
the best technique and lenses and the *istD is better, when using the
same lens.
Godfrey wrote:
I find that prints made from digital capture are generally about the
same quality as 35mm film scans when output at 50-75% the density.
2000x3000 pixels produces about the same quality 13x19" print as your
5300x3400 scan. This is due to the lack of grain, grain aliasing, and
other emulsion/analog->digital defects induced by the scanning process.
