continued from the "moving sensors" thread.....

[sey]

so in continuation:

I mentioned before that photographers try to emulate traditional photographic techniques digitally.

I feel that there are certain things that cannot be done digitally that can be done on film.

The following are 2 photographs that are part of a set that was commissioned by the Bat Dor Dance Company. They didn't want the usual studio lit set-up shoot with frozen dancers in mid-air and photos that were technically perfect, that would look good in the dancers portfolio but were sterile and said nothing about the dance.
So after much 'practise' the set was shot at an actual performance using the available stage lighting, which is in effect, part of the whole 'tableau' of the dance. The film was Fuji Press 1600 ISO negative film pushed to 6400 ISO shot with an 80mm lens and hand held. Technically, obviously there are many no-no's but the Company was ecstatic because the photographs captured the mood of the dance perfectly. I don't think this would have worked digitally. the pushing of the film to it's limits produced a grain and feeling that could not be achieved with square pixels.
The dance was a salute to Magritte and the photographs are very "Magritte".





the set includes Mono photographs shot on XP2 Super 400 ISO pushed to 6400 ISO.
The negs are scanned and except for a little cloning of dust and small scratches are au naturel and not Photoshopped in any way.

[Manofolympus]

And they look brilliant! Even my technophile wife admits there is a quality to silver prints that cannot be reproduced digitally however much the "appearance" is copied.

[alanS]

Would it really not be possible to produce these results digitally? You can add noise digitally. I would have thought that it would be possible to recreate any film effect digitally given enough time and PS skill?

[sey]

Would it really not be possible to produce these results digitally? You can add noise digitally. I would have thought that it would be possible to recreate any film effect digitally given enough time and PS skill?

grain is roundish and of different sizes and densities, pixels are square and of uniform size........can't fit a round peg into a square hole.

There are pseudo digital grain effects but blown up to 16" x 20" prints and larger, it's not the most successful solution, to put it mildly.

[Manofolympus]

Would it really not be possible to produce these results digitally? You can add noise digitally. I would have thought that it would be possible to recreate any film effect digitally given enough time and PS skill?

it is the random nature of the grain which creates the "feel" of the image-digital effects to produce this are simply not potent enough to do this-at least not on a pc.

[beejaybee]

it is the random nature of the grain which creates the "feel" of the image-digital effects to produce this are simply not potent enough to do this

I'm sorry but it is perfectly feasible to replicate the "random" grain structure of a film in digital imaging. However it would take a very high resolution "raw" image, quite a lot of processing time & the results still wouldn't look exactly like film for a number of other reasons (the toe and shoulder of the response curve for one thing).

As for what's possible on a PC - really that only depends on your patience, I had a 7 hour processing run on a 1.3 megapixel image recently, to me as an astrophotographer using massive amounts of advanced image processing is not at all unusual.

[Manofolympus]

it is the random nature of the grain which creates the "feel" of the image-digital effects to produce this are simply not potent enough to do this

I'm sorry but it is perfectly feasible to replicate the "random" grain structure of a film in digital imaging. However it would take a very high resolution "raw" image, quite a lot of processing time & the results still wouldn't look exactly like film for a number of other reasons (the toe and shoulder of the response curve for one thing).

As for what's possible on a PC - really that only depends on your patience, I had a 7 hour processing run on a 1.3 megapixel image recently, to me as an astrophotographer using massive amounts of advanced image processing is not at all unusual.

Which, I believe, is precisely the point being made-whatever digital jiggerypokery you perform on an image and however long you are prepared to wait (or are permitted to wait by the rest of the family!) it will never quite look like film. And if it requires hours of processing to prepare one image (which doesn't look quite right) surely it would be quicker to shoot it on film in the first place-and get what you want?

[parisian]

I have had the priviledge of seeing the whole Magritte set.
Go and look at it here.
With no more adjustment in Photoshop than could have been given in wet darkroom these shots show several things.
Mastery of hand holding in low light,
Thorough understanding of ISO useage and how to push the capability of film,
Thorough understanding of aperture and shutter speed,
Thorough understanding of focus, depth of field and composition.
They are a lesson in basic photography that anyone of us should be proud to present.
Relatively simple cameras can produce magnificent photographs in any situation. Not one of even the highest level DSLR's could have done better at reproducing the 'mood' of that dance sequence.
Our digital cameras and Photoshop are indeed wonderful tools technically but, they are not better than what we had before. Spending many hours before a computer attempting to rescue a poor shot seems like purgatory to me (BJB, I am not talking about your very specialised field here which does require a huge amount of post-capture processing) and I tend to simply scrap it and move on, trying to learn from the mistake that gave me such a poor shot.
I was teaching basic clinical photography to a group of junior doctors recently and the usual discussion came about that, 'any old rubbish can be rescued by the computer'. My answer to them was simply to imagine the computer as a glass crutch. Lean on it too much and it will let you down.
This assumption, that the computer can do anything you want it too I find to be the most frightening of the modern advances. In teaching and in club competition one of the most frequent failure points is that of poor focus. Over reliance on autofocus (which is still the weakest point of digital capture to me) and the generally poor provision for manual focus on DSLRs can be blamed but whatever the mechanical issue it cannot be rescued by software. To the general public standing in the queue in Jessops waiting for help on the print machines this comes as a huge shock and has led to many a heated discussion with the hapless salesman who had failed to mention this in his blurb.
How many of us on close examination of a loved one's portrait have been disappointed that while the background is beautifully blurred it is only the tip of the nose that is in sharp focus while the eye (the key point) is not. Handholding for portraits can really upset autofocus. So, why not focus manually? once set it will stay where it is not hunt up and down trying to lock on to a tiny target. It has been said many times on here that manual focus with DSLRs is not the easiest for several reasons and this is but one of the potential let-downs of multi-automated equipment.
A camera is a tool that needs to be used. A good practitioner can change the various settings by instinct and very often without removing the camera from his eye. He knows which way the dials move and knows by feel, focus and zoom rings. His eye need never leave the subject. That is with simple cameras of course. It takes a little longer to scroll through menu systems.
For me, at my age and with my photographic history underpinned by practice from the 50's a more staid, traditional approach is necessary for me to feel that I have control over the capture process. My digital cameras are only ever set to 'one shot', manual exposure and manual focus. All in-camera processing is turned off and I very rarely review before I get home or over lunch. It is admittedly then pleasant to pop the card into a reader and prepare what I want for print on the computer but that to me is the only advantage that my DSLRs have.

[Manofolympus]

Hear, hear-and far more eloquent than I can manage

[parisian]

Hear, hear-and far more eloquent than I can manage

I rather doubt that Nigel

[beejaybee]

Well said, Parisian!

Spending many hours before a computer attempting to rescue a poor shot seems like purgatory to me (BJB, I am not talking about your very specialised field here which does require a huge amount of post-capture processing)

It is purgatory ... but it's the difference between being able to make a non artistic, record shot and not being able to make it, so it's sometimes worthwhile. It's not a question of "rescuing a poor shot", it's a question of getting the shot at all.

My impression is that the people who do best at digital SLR photography (a) already have a solid grounding in film & (b) use the digital camera just like a film camera, rarely if ever using the review screen during a shoot. Whether that's because we're dinosaurs or whether it's because the digital cameras haven't "advanced" from the film based design is an interesting argument. There may well be changes that could be made that would liberate creativity, but IMHO loading the cameras with ever more automation whilst making basic functions like manual focus ever harder to use is not the way forward.

[parisian]

Sorry, I didn't mean to intimate that your shots were poor, just that ALL your shots require massive post processing because of the subject matter NOT because of your skills.
Apologies once more.

[sey]

...Mastery of hand holding in low light...

you really are a blabbermouth aren't you!

[zx9]

I have had the priviledge of seeing the whole Magritte set.
Go and look at it here.
With no more adjustment in Photoshop than could have been given in wet darkroom these shots show several things.
.........

Thank you for that link Peter, stunning set Sey I thoroughly enjoyed looking at them.

[Benchista]

Y'see I like using the computer, but it's simply another tool, as you say, and although you can do many wonderful things with it, it certainly can't correct focus errors or such things. You need to know the limitations of any tool you use, and of your usage of it. One of the reasons I'm loving playing with my IR camera is that I'm having to learn what the limits are all over again - for some, that's a horrific prospect, but for me it's fun - getting to grips with something very different. I guess what I like more than anything about digital in general is that if you approach it that way, it's a great way to test your knowledge, and to find out new and different ways of doing things. Certainly I've felt hugely more creative, and it's as though a door I've been banging up against for ages has been unlocked. And it's not Photoshop that's allowed that, simply the ability to learn more quickly and the freedom just to experiment, always having been a tightwad in those areas for film use, tending to stay within the bounds of what I knew would work - know, I'm testing the limitations of my tool.

[sey]

Thanks Kieth

Nick, I think I've found the point of our divergence. You have a traditional background and the basics are all there, you don't think about them, you don't need to think about them they're ingrained in you and when you move on to digital you are using it as a tool and simply expanding your basic knowledge with a new tool that has different capabilities. Digital is your photographic Viagra!!!! (sorry about that but all this tool talk opened the door )
Yes, most of us here are in the same boat, and each in our own way is expanding our horizons with the new tools available to us. But , just like old soldiers, we are fading away.
What we, Peter, Huw, myself & others are saying is that the new generation are not getting that basic training, they are not learning about that 'insignificant' subject called light and what to do with it, after all that's what this photography thing is all about and that is what is so appalling to us. When people like Trudy & Rob (photocracy) seriously take an interest in traditional as well as doing digital, it truly is a ray of sunshine for us, because we know that there are a few young 'uns out there that will be photographers and not simply human tripods.

[Benchista]

Yes, you're right about me, but the point I've been trying to make is that your concern shouldn't be related to digital technology, but to people. I learned firstly on an Agfa Silette, an entirely manual camera with no light metering aid or distance setting help, followed shortly by a Zenit E. That's probably the best film camera ever made for learning the technical basics - the meter is basically a built-in external one, so you get the results in the form of aperture/shutter speed couples, and you have to choose one. You quickly learn that the meter reading varies depending on the angle that you point the camera, so you learn how to meter, too. Focusing is without any aid except the screen. There's compulsory depth of field preview, as you have to stop the lens down manually. All a bit of a PIA, but excellent for learning. HOWEVER, the next camera I bought was a Praktica PLC2 when my Zenit died (not a lot later, thanks to my brother. The git.) On the face of it, it's similar to the Zenit, as it's manual exposure, manual focus - but it was responsible for the biggest dumbing down I've ever had in my photography. Why? Firstly, it was match needle metering with no viewfinder info. I started just matching the needle, not bothering to check what settings I was using. And because it metered at full aperture, I wasn't checking depth of field any more. Finally, the focusing aids in the middle, and the meter needle projecting into the side of the picture area became more important than the image itself, and to an extent obscured it. So I ended up being a slave to that technology, and results suffered. In the end, I realised what had happened, and dragged myself back to using it properly, but I was much happier when I bought a camera with aperture priority and both shutter speed and aperture displayed in the viewfinder, as that actually meant making a positive decision on at least one of the parameters. And in fact when I bought my first AF SLR (which works very like my current DSLR in terms of the traditional photographic controls), one of the first things that struck me was that the dreaded P setting gave me pretty much what I had on that Zenit - by moving the main control dial, I was again choosing an aperture/shutter speed couple that suited me. Oh, and the fact that there wasn't a focusing aid that blacked out with a slowish lens, or info in the actual image area, meant that I actually concentrated on what was in the image area more, and less just on the technicalities - with the result that my results improved no end. Now the conclusion I draw from that is that it's not really the technology at all that's the issue, but the attitude of the photographer. Technology can help or hinder you from learning the technical basics, but it's perfectly possible for the oursuit of the technical side to actually get in the way of taking good pictures, whatever the technology. Another boost I got was when I started using rangefinders - by guesstimating exposure in advance, and pre-focusing, all I was left to worry about was the composition, and I had enormous fun. Yes, my technical knowledge was important - without it, I wouldn't have been able to reasonably accurately spot changes in light and adjust accordingly, or set hyperfocal distances, but more important than that was concentrating on the composition. And that's where I think that it doesn't really matter if you know the technicalities or not - getting the composition right is always more important. As for learning the technicalities, I don't really think modern technology is any more of a block to that than my Praktica was - it's all down to the attitude of the individual, and in some ways, it's actually easier to learn with digital, as you can see what you're doing so much more quickly - but equally, yes, you can become slave to it as I did to that swinging needle. It's a people thing more than a technology thing. I think what really hit that home to me was watching Tanya develop (sorry, bad pun!) as a photographer, and yes, Trudy and Rob are further good examples. They all WANTED to learn, so they will, whatever the technology. Yes, there will be many who don't, but there always have been - however, I think they will be getting better technical results now than they would've with older technology. Ultimately, though, the technicalities of it all are only a tool like any other, one that (for me) should always play second fiddle to expressing your vision, but (and forgive me if I'm wrong) I don't believe you, Peter or Huw disagree on that point, and if those people are doing that, that's good enough for me, and if they're getting better results, there's always the chance they'll get hooked.

[sey]

Of course we agree that technology plays second fiddle to vision. That to me is the whole crux of this discussion. What we are saying, speaking for myself but assuming the others are on the same wavelength, is that for the vast majority technology has become the vision. Technology controls the people and not the people using the tools , but the tools using the people. This is due to the marketing ploys of the high tech industries. the younger generations have been conditioned to the acceptance of less "hands/brains-on" and more automatic operation is what it's all about. The jam-packing of unnecessary gadgets/gimmicks and automation under the guise of progress is developing future generations who simply won't know that there is a very important basic photographic knowledge base that needs to be acquired to enable original, creative work. The camera will sort everything according to one of the zillions of pre-chosen by someone else's in-built examples.
I really fear and despair the loss of natural creative skills and talents. The Tanyas, Trudys and Robs are getting fewer and fewer, whilst the 'photographic' enthusiasts are growing in number because of the automation progress, but true creative skill and talent are harder to spot.

The fact of the matter is that you, Peter, Huw, me and others are really in agreement here. The only difference is you have more more faith in humanity than we do, to put it mildly!

[parisian]

Nick and Sey, you are both correct, it is about people and at the same time it is about their response to technology. My first camera was also an Agfa but of a generation before Nick. The Karat was pre-war but had distance scales, aperture and shutter speed. I discovered ISO through buying different film and finding that the 'recommended settings' printed inside the box gave different shutter/aperture combinations according to the stated ASA/ISO. That led to a trip to the library to find more.
I am not knocking the new snapper who depends on the idiot mode on the camera - quite the opposite in fact. I feel sorry in my heart that they will not discover (unless they REALLY get into the journals or places like this) the impossibly vast range of options that are open to them with this wonderful pastime/obsession.
After retiring from the Uni. I spent a year working part time in Jessies and on the whole enjoyed it but what surprised me most about our customers was the belief that their new camera really would make them great photographers or that the captured image really did not matter as Photoshop would work it's magic and produce exhibition level shots at the press of a button.
I am not stretching a point there, this was the perception of the majority of DSLR and high end bridge camera buyers.
This is where Sey's assertion comes to the fore. That group of buyers had been seduced by the technology in advertising or word of mouth and they were also the group who expressed the greatest disappointment when bringing their cameras in for checking as they weren't producing the goods.
One chap had bought a Canon 20D on the Saturday morning and gone off to photograph a wedding. His shots were predictably poor but he had shot on the default jpeg setting, done all editing on the master images, saved them for Web, burnt them onto CD and bought them in for printing the following week. We couldn't get them above 6x4 and even then they were poor. He went Ape, phoned and wrote to Head Office, threatened us with legal action as we had sold him duff equipment and wanted all of us sacked as 'refusing' to print his work as he wanted.
If he hadn't been so aggressive I would have felt really sorry for him.
However he was a prime example from many i could quote.
The user manuals years gone by contained mini explanations of the basics (probably to fill them out) I would like the manufacturers to do the same again but as a separate booklet - not buried inside a 400 page confusion manual.
Watching new photographers 'grow' is a true joy and Tanya was indeed a great find - not only for us but for photography in general. Oops sorry I've just seen the clock I HAVE to go to work - I'll be back......

[beejaybee]

The user manuals years gone by contained mini explanations of the basics (probably to fill them out) I would like the manufacturers to do the same again but as a separate booklet - not buried inside a 400 page confusion manual.

And so we're back to unnecessary complexity again ... even the 400 page "confusion manual" (great term) is totally inadequate for a lump of technology which has more options than a jumbo jet. Not a bad analogy, actually, in flying there is no substitute for the basic stick/rudder/throttle skills, just as there in no substitute in photography for the basic skills (or discipline) of aperture, exposure time & focus.