Posted on 09/22/2008 2:58:14 AM PDT by decimon
It is an elaborately crafted photographic film, extolled for its sharpness, vivid colors and archival durability. Yet die-hard fan Alex Webb is convinced the digital age soon will take his Kodachrome away.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsvine.com ...
The main difference is pixel size- with film it's almost at the molecular level. Digital will probably get there but it's still a long way off.
Odd. Most of my records had more ‘Snap! Crackle! Pop!’ than a bowl of Rice Krispies...
I was amazed when CDs came out. I thought ‘hiss’ was just a part of music.
In my childhood, B&W film was still easy to find; by about 1980 (at least around here), it had become something mostly found in shops frequented by pro photographers. Signs at the one-hour processing places said, no same-day for B&W. High-end digital cameras are going to take over, but of course there will be those who still use ‘em, just as there are antique cars, sailboats, and 25 year old computers being used by hobbyists (grin).
:’D
(unless I miss my guess, that was nearly a Linus Van Pelt moment)
Well said.
In the 1980s, when CDs started to hit with ordinary mass-market titles (”Born In The USA” was the first on I noticed, and I’d been buying CDs for a little while before that, even before I had a player), there were old grumblers (including some friends of mine) who said they were a ripoff “because you can’t record on them.” Prior to 8-track and cassette, there was reel to reel, but there was also the record player, which sold far more.
Cassette was nice for building up various artist tapes for the car ride, or capturing stuff off the air, but A) I’ve played a cassette, on average, perhaps once a year since 2000, and B) one of my best friends, who’s only seven years younger, has *never* owned any kind of cassette player or recorder. That one boggles my mind.
Despite the boggling, knocking out various artist CDs for the car ride, or 15 hours of mp3s for the office listening (since they’ve cut our streaming audio, the bastards) is trivial to accomplish. And there’s nothing I want to record off the air. :’)
When I was in Viet Nam I shot several dozen rolls of Kodachrome film and had it all processed into slides. That very same film is now fading and nearly worthless. Mostly the only color left is red. I had them scanned recently before even the red goes away. It’s too bad I didn’t use a nice black-and-white film, at least that would still be clear and sharp.
I love the digital formats. I did read an article recently that tells me where digital is heading. The sharpness and resolution of typical consumer photographic film is limited by the grain size of the slver emulsion on the film and that (for the grade used by the majority of consumers) is equivalent to a 19.6 Megapixel image.
We are almost there with the camers available today.
Has no soul.
But, unless it fades so badly that the zeros turn into ones or vice versa, it doesn't fade at all.
You may have to trade those in for some Linus Torvalds moments.
The test of resolution is how far you can blow up a photo and still see useful new detail.
Check out this view of downtown Boston, shot from atop the Prudential tower. Over on the left side, you can see the band shell on the Charles River Esplanade. See if you can see which FM station was sponsoring the concert.
You can make CDs sound like vinyl by applying noise and altering the frequency response. I would liken the preference for vinyl sound to my personal preference to Bose 901 speakers. I know they aren't accurate, but I like them.
As for Kodachrome, I'm old enough to remember Kodachrome 10 and remember the controversy over the speed increase to 25. I have slide scanner and have scanned some of my old Kodachrome slides in 48 bit depth. (This example is a jpeg, not the original scan.) I agree that a Kodachrome slide has more information than any 35mm digital camera that I have seen. But digital is catching up and given another five years will surpass any film when comparing sensor size to equivalent film size.
I guess I'll stick to the prosumer market for a while.
I think digital will get there within 5 years. And I think we will start seeing medium format sensors hit the pro-sumer market as well. Catching photons isn't nearly as important as the photographer who does it--and film makes for more restrictions and gives less ability to experiment than with digital.
The main remaining problem I see is with the viewing technology. The color gamut and contrast of LCD, CRT, and Plasma are ridiculously tiny compared to what the eye can see. And with the proliferation of cheap LCD "photo frames" we will probably never see the full spectrum of what was captured originally. LED-backlit LCD screens may be the best so far for computer displays, but my hope is that we will see OLED surpass these technologies soon.
I use Fuji pro. I don’t like what it does to blue though.
Maybe some company will continue making film, but I’d expect prices to go up as demand falls.
Now they just photoshop (and yes even National Geographic cuts and pastes and moves animals and monuments around).
Reminds me of some old glass negatives I heard about (probably 8x10) of a city this way. I heard they were zooming in enlarging just portions and seeing identifiable people. I can see people in this zoom (the park near the band shell).
Pretty amazing.
Do you have more details on this shoot?
Professional photographers may use digital SLRs but a large portion of the marketplace used “point and shoots” (that can zoom” but most people are looking at the back of the camera (even some pros) rather than lining up a shot with their own eye through the lens.
And who among the digital realm consider “photoshopping” an image to be cheating? It may be excuseable for the family photo album, but how about for news journalism? It happens every day.
When you read National Geographic are you reading it for an accurate depiction of exotic locales or to see pretty pictures?
Film leaves an unaltered record of what was captured, no matter what you subsequently do to it in a darkroom or computer.
Once the government got you to end your emotional attachment to your car (and car culture) it makes it easier to get you to separate from your car (or your older kind of car).
We are forcing the public to give up their old tvs (and soon radios) as well. I just weathered a hurricane. Digital reception was crap as the receiver has to continue to resync the signal. I may miss a word through analog static, but at least I could still get weather updates on my radio.
Low flow toilets by law? Do these things work with less than 2 flushes?
How about forcing us to switch to mercury laden fluorescent lights?
You may not “see” the difference but it is there in these technologies.
A projected movie strobes (still frames flash in rapid sucession). Projected video is a continous cycle of alternating scanlines. Shoot video or take pictures of the screen and the difference may become apparent. Same way with the green cast and pulse (and hum) of fluourescent lights. It affects different people on a subsconscious level. Shouldn’t the market determine it?
Kodak is a business, no one is tell them to stop making it. Not so with broadcasters and lighting companies.
And with the destruction of all of our major gathering places (stadiums etc) where we witnessed history (not just sporting events or concerts) and regentrification tearing down all the old neighborhoods, we are being forced to break with the past.
Some of it just smells of socialism to me. “it’s for your own good”.
If it is not for a scientific or strategic application, just artistic, then grain is an acceptable conscious decision.
You can get the new Canon EOS 5D with its standard lens for around US$2,500 if you’re willing to find a good discount dealer online.
Oh I agree with you about grain. I wouldn’t shoot most things in the fine grain film, but done right it produced some stunning shots.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
