35mm film VS digital

On Thu, 28 Aug 2008 13:47:01 -0700 (PDT), Scott W wrote:

Can you buy film or new film cameras any more?

Costco quit carrying them some time ago. I just checked Wal-Mart,
they list 4 film cameras, they all look like crap and none of them are
in a store within 100 miles of here. My guess is that many stores are
going to sell off their remaining inventory and then not carry them
anymore.

Several months ago a local Rite-Aid wouldn't accept my Kodak 35mm
cassette, saying that they only processed Fuji's and their own
Rite-Aid brand film. I didn't argue, but took the film to another
Rite-Aid about a mile away that had no such problems. The prints
turned out OK, despite having been in the camera for some unknown
amount of time, possibly several on up to 10 years. To rewind and
get the film out of the camera I had to replace its long dead
lithium battery.

John McWilliams wrote:
Floyd L. Davidson wrote:
"danny" wrote:
Film is still better than digital. You can scan film negatives at 9600 DPI.
Most digital cameras only give you 72 DPI.

I ask you... Which would you rather have... 9600 DPI or 72 DPI? The answer
is pretty obvious.
The scanned 9600 DPI image will not have better
resolution than
the negative, and the 35mm negative doesn't have as much
resolution as a modern 35mm sized electronic sensor.
Further, the DPI resolution listed in the Exif data on
digital
cameras has no relationship to image resolution. It only a way
to automatically determine a size for printing (by dividing the
pixel dimensions by the DPI value), but it is usually ignored.
If you would like I can produce an image from a Nikon
D3 (which
natively puts "300" in the Exif data for X and Y resolution)
that has been changed to 100,000 DPI. It will still be exactly
the same image though... and technically (with 4288 pixels
across on a 1.42" wide sensor) is about 3020 DPI, but of course
just as the film negative does not have that much resolution,
neither does the image recorded by the electronic sensor.

You'd have sounded a bit more authoritative if you'd have used the
correct term in the last paragraph, "PPI".

Who cares? (Incidentally, PPI is not correct for the sensor either!)

--
Floyd L. Davidson http://www.apaflo.com/floyd_davidson
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska)

"David J Taylor"
wrote:
danny wrote:

Film is still better than digital. You can scan film negatives at
9600 DPI. Most digital cameras only give you 72 DPI.

I ask you... Which would you rather have... 9600 DPI or 72 DPI? The
answer is pretty obvious.

No dogs here, BTW. Nor humour in the OPs post.

My take is that Danny is joking. It most certainly would be a joke if I said
it. And given the number of people who bit, a superbly effective joke to
boot.

--
David J. Littleboy
Tokyo, Japan

On Thu, 28 Aug 2008 05:58:52 -0700, -hh wrote:

"RoushPhotoOnline.com" wrote:
Stefan Patric wrote:

I guess you've never seen prints from Kodak Ektar 25 color negative
film then. Â*ISO 25. No grain....A difficult film to work with, but if
you knew what you were doing...

That was great film. Â*I shot many rolls of it as a tester for Kodak.
Those days are gone, sad.

*Almost* gone.

There's still a few rolls stashed in cold storage, although it is
becoming questionable as to how well it would be holding up after so
many years on ice.

FWIW, who would you recommend as a trustworthy C41 developer for now-
obscure emulsions such as this?

That's a good question for which I don't have a good answer.

I'd start by trying to find a pro lab in your city. I'm sure, if they no
longer process film, they probably know who still does or they out-lab
the film for processing, then print it locally.

Or you could buy a Jobo ATL-1000 film processor off eBay, and do it
yourself. They're probably very inexpensive by now. ;-)

Scott W wrote:
On Aug 28, 11:55*am, (Floyd L. Davidson) wrote:
that has been changed to 100,000 DPI. *It will still be exactly
the same image though... *and technically (with 4288 pixels
across on a 1.42" wide sensor) is about 3020 DPI, but of course
just as the film negative does not have that much resolution,
neither does the image recorded by the electronic sensor.

You'd have sounded a bit more authoritative if you'd have used the
correct term in the last paragraph, "PPI".

Who cares? *(Incidentally, PPI is not correct for the sensor either!)

Ok, I will bite, why not? It seems to me the sensor is sampling
pixels, so
why would it not be in PPI.

The data from each sensor site does not uniquely determine a
"pixel" value, and more than it is what determines a "dot".
Each image pixel is made up from the combination of at least 9
sensors.

In any case the idea is to communicate the concept, and any
attempt at sounding "authoritative" is somebody's ego getting in
the way of effective communications.

--
Floyd L. Davidson http://www.apaflo.com/floyd_davidson
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska)

Scott W wrote:
On Aug 28, 3:12*pm, (Floyd L. Davidson) wrote:
Scott W wrote:
On Aug 28, 11:55*am, (Floyd L. Davidson) wrote:
that has been changed to 100,000 DPI. *It will still be exactly
the same image though... *and technically (with 4288 pixels
across on a 1.42" wide sensor) is about 3020 DPI, but of course
just as the film negative does not have that much resolution,
neither does the image recorded by the electronic sensor.

You'd have sounded a bit more authoritative if you'd have used the
correct term in the last paragraph, "PPI".

Who cares? *(Incidentally, PPI is not correct for the sensor either!)

Ok, I will bite, why not? *It seems to me the sensor is sampling
pixels, so
why would it not be in PPI.

The data from each sensor site does not uniquely determine a
"pixel" value, and more than it is what determines a "dot".
Each image pixel is made up from the combination of at least 9
sensors.
The way I look at it is there are sensor pixels and, color filter on

What is a "sensor pixel" though? It certainly is not an image
pixel!

And that was the point, particularly in light of trivial
persuits like DPI vs. PPI distinctions.

top of the sensor pixels and then output pixels. The point is the
camera does have pixels, even if you don't tend to view them directly.

If you can't view it, it can't be a pixel. A pixel is the basic
unit of a "picture element".

An electronic sensor has no pixels, and the output signal/data
is not pixel data until it is converted to an image format.

One term for it is "sensel".

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Transwiki:Sensel

--
Floyd L. Davidson http://www.apaflo.com/floyd_davidson
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska)

Floyd L. Davidson wrote:
John McWilliams wrote:
Floyd L. Davidson wrote:
"danny" wrote:
Film is still better than digital. You can scan film negatives at 9600 DPI.
Most digital cameras only give you 72 DPI.

I ask you... Which would you rather have... 9600 DPI or 72 DPI? The answer
is pretty obvious.
The scanned 9600 DPI image will not have better
resolution than
the negative, and the 35mm negative doesn't have as much
resolution as a modern 35mm sized electronic sensor.
Further, the DPI resolution listed in the Exif data on
digital
cameras has no relationship to image resolution. It only a way
to automatically determine a size for printing (by dividing the
pixel dimensions by the DPI value), but it is usually ignored.
If you would like I can produce an image from a Nikon
D3 (which
natively puts "300" in the Exif data for X and Y resolution)
that has been changed to 100,000 DPI. It will still be exactly
the same image though... and technically (with 4288 pixels
across on a 1.42" wide sensor) is about 3020 DPI, but of course
just as the film negative does not have that much resolution,
neither does the image recorded by the electronic sensor.
You'd have sounded a bit more authoritative if you'd have used the
correct term in the last paragraph, "PPI".

Who cares? (Incidentally, PPI is not correct for the sensor either!)

Nice, sideways take on your admitting- as close as you can- to being
wrong. And I didn't mention sensels or sensors.

--
lsmft

On Thu, 28 Aug 2008 13:00:48 +0100, Dave wrote:

Steve wrote:
On Wed, 27 Aug 2008 19:25:25 +0100, Chris H
wrote:

In message , Jürgen Exner
writes
"RoushPhotoOnline.com" wrote:
Digital Images have allowed us to view first generation files,
I repectfully disagree.

First of all you cannot view RAW sensor data.
Yes you can,. I use my RAW processor for that. I can view the RAW data
in the RAW processor. Then after I have made changes I can process it
into a JPG, TIFF PNG etc at various standards of resolution, size etc.

You're right, you can view the RAW sensor data. But it won't look
like a picture you're used to seeing. Probably the best way to view
it is just hex data. If you try to visualize it without converting it
into somethine else, you'll be very dissapointed. Your RAW processor
converts the RAW sensor data into something you can see that looks
like a picture. *THAT* is 2nd generation and different RAW processors
might make different looking images from the RAW sensor data.

One could argue a 35 mm slide is second generation, as the data is first
recorded on the film, but then has to be processed (developed) to
produce an image. You could take that argument back further and consider
the lens does processing. Hence talking of first or second generation in
this context is a bit pointless IMHO

I don't think so. To me, it's pretty clear and while you may not
agree, that's irrelavent to me.

What I think of first generation is the earliest "thing" that gets
archived for making subsequent prints. You don't archive the photons
going through a lens. You don't archive undeveloped film. But you do
archive negatives so you can make further prints from them. Same with
slides, but not for prints, for direct viewing.

I archive RAW files so I can make subsequent prints and the RAW file
is the earliest "thing" that can get archived, so that's what I
consider first generation. But unlike a 35mm slide, you can't "see" a
RAW file. You have to do further processing on it to be able to see
an image. So what you're seeing when you view a RAW file on the
screen or a print is 2nd generation. Just like what you're seeing
when you view a print enlarged from a negative is 2nd generation.

If your camera outputs only JPEG, then that's 1st generation even
though the quality might not be as good as something you can
post-process from RAW data. And that's only because it's the earliest
thing you can archive.

You can use the same analogy in other media also. For instance,
recording. The multitrack recording is something like a "pre 1st
generation" because it's not what you use to make copies of. But when
you mix it down and then master it, the master recording is a 1st
generation because that's what's used to make further copies from.

Steve

David J. Littleboy wrote:
"David J Taylor"
wrote:
danny wrote:

Film is still better than digital. You can scan film negatives at
9600 DPI. Most digital cameras only give you 72 DPI.

I ask you... Which would you rather have... 9600 DPI or 72 DPI?
The answer is pretty obvious.

No dogs here, BTW. Nor humour in the OPs post.

My take is that Danny is joking. It most certainly would be a joke if
I said it. And given the number of people who bit, a superbly
effective joke to boot.

Perhaps a joke, but I'm sure we've all had to field similar questions from
novices and the ill-informed. Even the well-informed are not agreed on
"sensor-crop" or "multiplication factor" applied to smaller-sensor "35mm"
cameras!

Cheers,
David

In message
,
Scott W writes
On Aug 27, 2:59*pm, "James Silverton"
wrote:
*Bob *wrote *on Wed, 27 Aug 2008 10:03:29 -0400:

Just curious what people think about this comparison. IMHO,
the current crop of digital cameras blow away 35mm film, at
least color print film. (Remember grain? I was never satisfied
with 8x10s blown up from 35mm film.)

Can you buy film or new film cameras any more?

Costco quit carrying them some time ago. I just checked Wal-Mart,
they list 4 film cameras, they all look like crap and none of them are
in a store within 100 miles of here. My guess is that many stores are
going to sell off their remaining inventory and then not carry them
anymore.

B&H a few film SLRs, they have more MF cameras for sale then 35mm
SLRs, in fact it looks like they have more LF cameras for sale them
35mm SLRs.

B&H also has some really bad P&S cameras, like the Barbie 35mm fixed
focus camera.

Calumet, Jessops and Boots still stock small amounts film but AFAIK
only Calumet still has film cameras... at least they list them but I am
not sure they actually have them in stock in the shops

--
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\/\/\/\/\ Chris Hills Staffs England /\/\/\/\/
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