I agree and i recently moved to Olympia WA from Europe so I know exactly what you are saying about shooting here when it comes to landscape. I went from one to the other and back again. I love my film prints. I print and frame all of my best and You can just see the difference with film. It is quite dramatic to me. For me, i was never able to replicate film from digital. I could get close in some ways but not near enough for me to give up film. I strictly shoot B&W film and I shoot all the genres of photography I can except for portrait. For me I see digital photography as photography editing. It is what I did and I see it with every digital photographer today. It focuses more on gear and editing in the computer than the actual art of shooting, developing, and printing. I have yet to meet a digital photographer who has said "I never edit my pics, I print straight from camera". They may exist but I have yet to meet one. I have printed numerous prints straight from negative with little to no editing. If I do edit, it is usually just straightening and cropping, maybe a bit of dodging and burning. There is nothing like looking at a negative on the table and knowing you nailed it before you even print it.
The two biggest reasons to shoot film are: it allows for handmade prints, not machine made, and the negative is the witness to the scene. Film has a provenance and the film can testify to what was photographed. Aesthetically digital prints look like they were made by a machine, because they were. But these days very few people have seen silver prints made by anyone who knows what they are doing, so the point is lost on them.
This criticism of the digital world is not a denial of its potential, but a call for greater awareness. Even in digital photography, you can adopt the analog mindset: slow down, be intentional, and treat each image as if it were valuable. The challenge is to maintain the integrity of the path, even when the medium offers shortcuts. This is why companies like Fuji or Leica try to simulate the feeling of being an analog photographer in modern form factors. But in the end, everyone only loves the original. Film.
Film photographers likes film. Other people don’t care what or how you shot an image. Analog is an illusion of superiority. In the end it makes ZERO sense to shoot analog in a digital world, especially when 99% of film photographers digitalise their negatives anyway and take advantage of the same digital tools as every other photographer. And when it comes to storage, I have every single digital file from 15 years ago, in the same exact shape. I find it so insanely cringe hearing someone say they respect a photographer more if they know they shoot analog. It’s like listening to “audiophiles” pretend music played back on a piece of round flat plastic is more “authentic”. I think most film photographers are threatened by the sea of photographers out there and hence attach themselves to analog photography thinking that will separate them from the pack. When in reality nobody cares but other film photographers.
@@laurencewhite4809 I think you didn`t understand it. I highlight the process-the "path"-as central to the creation of meaning, not merely the final product (the photo). This aligns with the Hegelian idea of Becoming: the journey toward understanding is as critical, if not more, than the endpoint. In analogue photography, every step-choosing the film, setting up the shot, developing it-is deliberate and builds a deeper connection to the image. The depth isn't simply in the image but in the process that led to it. The image is not an end in itself but a synthesis of the journey that precedes it. This view challenges both creators and viewers to move beyond the superficial, to understand that every image contains a history, a process, and a framework of thought that cannot be ignored. Only through this lens can the photograph (or any work of art) be truly "seen." You don`t.
@@laurencewhite4809 "When in reality nobody cares but other film photographers." You really could not be more wrong... I go out with a digital camera and no one gives a shit, the moment I take a film camera out to a park somewhere everyone that walks by wants to stop and talk to me about it.
I agree with you 100%, Edward. A female friend who had never seen a film camera was amazed when I took her photo with my Yashica Mat EM. She asked me why I never looked at the back of the camera? So I let her look into the viewfinder and explained how the camera worked. After seeing the prints she fell in love with film. Now she says with a smile that my Yashica Mat EM is her camera.
Dang, that was actually something to think about that nobody shoots film and try to make it look digital, but many try to make digital look like a film. Nice thought, something to think about!
I ran a successful portrait studio from 1987 until 2020 when covid retired me. I was on my way out anyway. I started my career in commercial photography. I have shot with everything from 11 x 14 Deerdorf to Hassies to Bronica to Nikon D800. So I have spanned the gamut. The difference between digital and film is that in digital, everyone I know has to spray and pray and then fix their problems in a computer. In film on 220, it cost me up to 50 cents a frame. I have not owned a camera for almost 5 years now using only my phone. I now have picked up a used Sony 6400 with kit lens and I am back to single frame shooting. If people would just shoot digitally and tell themselves they have film in the camera they would appreciate their images more. Thanks for listening
The 'spray and pray' thing is interesting - it's a pity that the people you know are wasting much of the opportunity. I do have 'spray and pray' loaded on a custom setting set up for BIF - rarely used as BIF are not high on my priority list. Nevertheless - blindingly fast continuous shooting has brought us fabulous sights and remarkable insights into animal behaviour, and for that i'm grateful. I'll just add that most of the photographers I know probably don't know how to set-up their cameras to shoot 60fps electronic - they shoot landscapes, nature, macro, industrial, architectural etc. Cheers.
Not sure about film being better or worse but as a photographer that does both I can firmly state film makes you a better photographer. When you’re paying for 120 film and the cost to develop and scan you think about every shot before you press the cable release. This helps improve your pre-shot routine and compositional skills for sure. I find the more film you shoot your film process carries over to when you shoot digital which is a positive. I find myself shooting less frames even when shooting digital striving for quality over quantity.
The learning curve for digital is much steeper than with film. It took me so much time without a mentor to figure out things. Even to find Ansel Adams was a big thing for me. Nobody a knew was aware of his photography. So to learn and practice , digital is very good> like Polaroid material > instant. But when it come to darkroom , man you need to love it when the image develop infringes of your eyes and they get darker and darker until it’s over …. The red light the smell of the developer the sound of the water …. You need to love this …. It’s an adventure …
I spent many, many hours in various darkrooms throughout my life. It was, at first, magical but without hesitation, I can say I’m happy to be done with the toxicity wet chemical photography. Dodging and burning in the darkroom is an art but I prefer the precision of digital tools to help me achieve precisely the outcome I desire.
The magic remains in the analog. A couple of summers ago I went to the place where Niépce took his first picture with bitumen and lavender oil. Returning to analog after a 18 year hiatus I realised what hard work it is to get a decent print, compared to five sliders in Lightroom resulting in almost perfect images. But still, I go for it. Regarding your neighborhood, last night after watching The Shining I decided to take my F3 with the 24mm to Mount Hood, by coincidence.
For archival purposes the negative can not be beat. With today’s security on laptops drives ect. Most of one’s digital photography will never be recovered when a person moves on.
I have negatives from 1992...and that includes living in 4 different States, with 3000 miles between them. I have a few years worth of digital negs/files from 16 years ago that are long gone.
Totally agree. I've lost loads of digital images, but never lost any film since I started developing my own in 1977. I have just started archiving my digital files onto BluRay disc.
For that person you know who might have been implying that digital is less expensive.....Uhm, well. A 45MP mirrorless body will set you back some $4300. A so-so Lens,, $1100. On average, though, good lenses will set you back $2500 on average. More if you want to do bird photography. Even more f you do sports photography. I have a friend who does mainly bird photography and you can add to her camera equipment 3 45TB external drives at $2 - 3000 each. She does turn out nice artwork (I say that, because she has yet to publish a photograph the way it came out of the camera), but at the same time has thousands of photos shes never looked at! I have $1000 wrapped up in a pair of Mamiya C330s 2 1/4 square TLR cameras. For the remaining price differential, I can shoot A LOT of film and have it developed. (Digital folks are constantly complaining about the high cost of film)
Hasselblad CF lenses in like new condition are $0.10 on the dollar when new in 1995. I just bought a like new CF T* 250mm lens which was $3107.00 in 1995 for $299.00 (Which would be about $75 in 1995 money.).
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography You're the exception not the rule. (Me too) Most people don't want to wait (much less put a used lens on a new camera body). They want what they want and they want it right now and will run up their credit card balance to get it.
I grew up shooting film. Got my first DSLR in 2002. I still occasionally shot film up until around 2015. One of the main reasons I stopped was the cost has gotten ridiculous. When the last CVS near me got rid of their film processing machine, I threw in the towel. I was only having my color film processed by them and did my own scanning. I did all my own black and white processing and scanning. Now, film prices are sky high. I have no interest in shooting film anymore. I'm strictly digital now. My only beef with digital is the over processing by people and making scenes and people look completely different than what they are.
I know where you are coming from, as I have an extensive darkroom history and have a large collection of Blad, Pentax 67, and Pentax M42 mount that I still use for B&W. But I also have an extensive amount of Sony and Olympus OM. You can't make film look like digital....unless you process a scan with Topaz and sometimes it really does look like digital. Conversely, moderately high ISO on say a Sony A1 processed without heavy handed noise reduction can have a very film like structure that pleases me. (I particularly like DxO processing with just moderate noise reduction). Highlight roll off on digital is often too abrupt compared to film. Even when I am enjoying film, my output is a scan with post production....the prints that result on a wide format printer are considerably better than anything I could make in my darkroom days, particularly with color. If I shoot film I am definitely a hybrid user with scanning and post production. The detail with digital is considerably higher and is helpful in a number of scenarios while the grain structure of film benefits other imagery. It is all art so you do what you enjoy. I like all of it myself.
Ralph Gibson, Sebastiao Salgado and Anton Corbijn all went digital then there are people like Tatsuo Suzuki form whom his photography would be impossible without digital. It's not the tool it's how you use it.
Nope. Digital is not film and film is not digital. All those photographers that "went" digital are producing different work then were or could with film. I don't know if it's better or worse, but I do know the outcomes are different. You don't use a screwdriver like you use a pliers, no matter how much you try to use it like a pliers.
Tongue in cheek, Digital photography should be renamed ‘Technography’… especially with AI making all decisions and color science driven by camera manufacturers with jpg’s being the media.. this is a crazy conversation. Take photographs… or learn drawing and painting..
My bottom line is,, for over 30 years I never had to own a computer to be a photographer. I hate that I now have to use a computer to be a photographer. I have always been a hobbyist photographer and shot my first roll of 35mm film in 1977. I quit photography in 2007 after Kodachrome was discontinued and local film labs started closing. 12 years later in 2019 I bought an XT3 and a Nikon D780 to try digital. I also have a GFX50R. I just don't like digital because it ties me to a computer. It has nothing to do with which type of photography is superior. I just purchased a Mamiya 645 pro TL and some Ilford 100. I won't be digitizing my negatives but instead have real silver gelatin prints made. I'm done with social media etc. I'm going to think of photography as oil painting. I won't be sitting in front of a computer. Digital and film do not live in the same world or lifestyle, again it's not about superiority. This is about freedom from the computer and peace away from social media. Time for the madness to stop.
The only electricity I need to make a photograph is an incandescent lightbulb in my enlarger. No electronics anywhere. (When I shoot my 4x5 or 8x10 with a Sekonic 398 meter.) Ironically those are also the highest image quality processes I've used or exist as well.
How about shooting in JPEG only and delivering memory card to a print shop? Or even directly printing at home, some printers can to that! I tried it and it is as close to film as you can get, more intentional, careful, while still maintaining some control on "JPEG development" look with in-camera settings. Though I've regretted that some shots could be cooler if I would edit them from RAWs. Maybe it was my lack of skills.. or just a part of film-like experience.
I shot a very similar image of Punchbowl Falls in 2012 or 2013, wading out with my wooden tripod and 4x5 camera to take it. I felt kind of bad huddled under the cloth with my loupe while other photographers were waiting to take their shot. I remember scanning the negative and being disappointed that my long shutter speed created detail-free patches where the sunlight was dancing on the water, so I ended up cropping in for the sort of look that you achieved. That was when I learned to be careful when photographing glassy water while using long shutter speeds. I have not returned to Punchbowl Falls since then. I think debris from fires and storms might have drastically altered the view. Seeing your image on your book cover brought back memories of me and and my wife hiking back in there over treacherous, icy ground. I don't know if film or digital is better, but I do know that I have seen both color and black and white film work that convinces me that the former will never be inferior. I've concluded it's not so much the choice of the two media that will prevail, but the photographer growing into it in a way that stands out. That said, add to this the suspicion that film has the potential to be more honest in an age in which digital manipulation has run amok.
Extremely great point! It's not that film is better, film will never be inferior. It is the gold standard. Just like fiber based paper. And the negative doesn't lie. It was a witness to the scene. (By the way, my fear of heights or more specifically my fear of falling will preclude my EVER revisiting Punchbowl Falls... :) )
I totally agree. I never closed my darkroom. Althougt also photographing digital, I still prefer analoge. The reason is - instead of sitting hours and hours in front of my computer, the darkroom is the better option for me. Cheers
Yes, another benefit. Less time in front of a computer. I love the peace of the darkroom. Berlioz or Wagner playing, get an ale from the film fridge... wonderful.
You made a great point about digital photographers trying to get a film look but film photographers not going the other way. This is also true with other art forms. Digital artists are trying to get the look of analog tools, but no traditional media artist is trying to emulate a digital art look. Same thing with music. Digital tools exist to make things easier, but their primary goal is not to replace the real analogue world. CG films are not pixelated so that we know they’re digital. Their goal is to get as close to analogue reality as possible. All of that said, digital tools are advanced enough that they can fake analogue media pretty well given the cost and time saving. But I think you’re mostly correct that convenience is the driving reason to go digital and not for any reason of a better product.
I shoot and develop my own film, then scan it with a digital camera. I'm not sure what that makes me. I do enjoy the film process more than digital but the end product (print) doesn't care how it is made. Great topic
Perhaps, a reasonable balance between the two is to shoot JPG only. That's why Fuji is so great - you get the film "look" via film simulations without the chemicals.
Started shooting 126 Instamatic in the 1980’s. Bought a 35mm and developed probably 50% of what I shot in the 1990’s, when I had access to a darkroom. Still love film, though it is expensive and I have not done any developing in 30 years. Strictly an amateur shooter, but I enjoy the film process (and my film cameras) more. If I had unlimited funds, the only digital I’d shoot is with my phone.
I shot film from being a kid then shot for newspapers on film shit wedding etc finally went digital in 2003 spent next 20 years shooting digitally for newspapers now freelancing sports news anything and everything all digital it's essential for my day job yet all that time I've kept my hand in with film I love the process of shooting film but can't live without the immediacy of digital. For me neither medium is superior both have their place.
@EdwardMartinsPhotography I know a few young folk turning to film photography as it's a retro challenge the same way they are buying vinyl records I think film will always be around and if you get an acceptable shot from a roll you get a sense of delayed gratification which doesn't really happen with digital
@@paultaylorphotography9499 The problem with instant gratification is you never have anything to look forward to. Makes for a life without surprise and hope.
I really don't care what someone shoots. But I'll say this digital is good for practicing. Film is not cheap. I'll admit it when I was a kid I was stupid and did not read photography books. I was also shoot weddings like you on film I use the square format I think it was 2 quarter or something with my Bronica camera and Metz TTL flash. Every photo I took was direct flash maybe a few natural light images. That's how everyone was doing it back in the day and that's how studios wanted you to take photos. Today's cameras have built in spot meters and yes even the old SLR cameras had them like the Nikon N90s and Nikon N8008s. But today you can shoot a few images and see what the image is going to look like. If you using digital as training wheels and then shoot film you will be a better film photographer because when you get really good with losing and learning light and then you decide to put in a roll of film you will make that roll of film count. Its weird how people are just in general and I'm saying this about myself also. Photography and filmmaking is not that hard but we make it hard. For example I remember watch this cellphone review channel and every video test they did they had to walk with shaky footage. Most of the time when you watch a movie the camera is locked down or some what locked down. I worked one some stupid movie that never got released because its so bad even monkey would not watch it. There was this seen in a club and they had the lights on when filming. Every night club in every movie has very little light and spot lights and some jell lights. But out of the 30 people that was on that set not one person said maybe we should turn off the lights and use side lighting.
Without saying one is better than then other, many people getting their first DSLR or Mirrorless digital camera, that actually want to edit and print are often unaware of the costs of digital photography. Some memory cards can cost 100.00 each, you need a good computer with fast processor’s and lots of hard drive space with either external drives or cloud storage and very good sized monitors. Don’t forget there are also costs for editing software and some are subscription based. Basically, I am saying there are costs to both types analog and digital.
To all film romantics: try JPEG only, it will blow your mind. There are even "film recipes" like FUJI X WEEKLY for Fujifilm to achieve certain look. Not fully film look but feeling-wise It certainly was a good experience for me. Expect some crappy shots along the way that would be fixable if it was RAW, but it is the same as with film.
Thanks for the video. I returned to film over six years ago now. I prefer the hybrid workflow though. Shoot film develop myself and then scan and print with an Epson inkjet printer. It works for me. Once again thanks for a thought provoking video
Yes, I can see myself using a hybrid approach as well. If anything, printing a negative digitally might be a good test to see if I want to invest the time in the darkroom to make a wet print of the photo.
The community that truly understands and values a fine print of film work is growing rather scarce now-a-days. Very few any more will actually pick up a read an actual book anymore either. Times are a changing.... I haven't shot film since before 2002. The GFX system brings me closer to that experience more than any digital camera I've used since then, but, you are right, it's still just a digital camera. I think the only reason the GFX reminds me of shooting film is that I have to really slow down and think a little more when using that system. Other than that, it's no different than shooting any other digital camera. Most people shooting film now a days are actually just scanning their negatives and turning them into digital files so they can view them on their computers and phones.....so they are missing the point to, and the meaning of true film work. It's really hard to imagine what it'll be like in another 10 years, or even just in 5 years form now.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Yeah, I made up my mind in 2002 the put the film cameras on the shelf and go completely digital, I'm perfectly fine shooting digital and enjoy ordering prints occasionally. I do love seeing others film work but personally I have no desire to ever shoot film again. The older I get the lazier I get, even when it comes to photography! LOL
You say many try to make digital look like film and can't argue with that. Also agree that nobody try to make film look like digital, but in my opinion, there are many who strive to get as good technical quality as possible and at least for me switching (mostly) to digital made it easier to get high technical quality.
I come from film so when I bought a digital camera, I shot the same way - deliberately, selectively, and if I put the camera to my eye and thought, nah that’s nothing, I didn’t take the picture. That said, I’m shooting almost exclusively film again. After scanning negatives from the 1980s, I was further convinced of film’s longevity. In the fall of 2023, my computer was hacked. I backup my files on an external hard drive and of course have all the SD cards for my digital photos. It took months to get them back where they belong. That’s a longer story but my point is: where are all those digital files going to be 40 years from now at the rate technology advances?
Got my book (and print) two days ago...enjoyed the images and the print is nice as well... I'm 57 and shot my first image at a Amy Grant concert in 1983 on a K1000...now I shoot 95% digital on Fuji cameras, but I still have a few film cameras that I take out once in a while...my take is this... I love driving classic cars and my uncles rebuilt Model A is fantastic to drive and my friends 67 Camaro is tot die for...but I don't want to drive either of them on a trip that's any longer than 30 minutes...I would rather take my modern truck...that's kindof how I feel about film now...
Thank you. Yes, a lot of people feel that way, and for certain types of work I feel the same way. But, your analogy assumes that both digital and film can take you to the same places... and I am saying that you can't get to the places film can take you with digital. On the other hand, many people don't have any desire to go to those places so the point is moot for them and I understand that. But for those of us who do want to go there, digital can't take us there. 🙂
I remember my days shooting film, 35mm and 6x7, fondly. The workflow and time involved is something im unable to do today. My thinking is that film and digital are just a little different and that's ok. I think its important to do your composition and storytelling the best you can regardless of the medium you use.
According to me the bottleneck of digital photography is the bayer matrix: cmos sensors did not developed a lot in the years if not with megapixels. All brands tend to push only on auto focus and frame rate. Instead they should implement other sensor technology as the Foveon that try to emulate the film with very good colours rendition. I look forward to see innovation in that sense.
I don't disagree that photography with film deserves more respect than digital; it is more work, it takes more skill. One thing digital has that film doesn't - you can adjust the gradation of luminance in the photo for a color photograph. With film, you can only do the Zone System in black and white.
For sure, I would not shoot color with film again. In this video I am speaking about a very specific niche of photography, which just happens to be the one I'm most interested in.
I think this question is similar to the analog vs. digital and tube vs. solid state components debates in audio. I always found digital (CD) to be better until I finally had a reasonably high-end analog setup. Then I was able to compare an album against the CD, and I was able to hear the positive aspects of analog that were missing from the CD. In discussions of vintage lenses, people keep talking about "character". In audio, components said to sound better usually show excessive distortion when measured. Is the "film-like" character that people value just a set of distortions that digital camera systems lack? Beats me.
I shot film exclusively from 1988 through 2002, when I began a slow, grudging transition to digital. As of 2008, digital left film in the dust. As of 2008, I no longer feel the need to have a film camera around. When you understand how to photograph on digital, you can accomplish anything with it-including mimicking film. And, of course, nobody tries to make film look like digital-film is like a JPEG in that its value is in its limitations: The color is what it is, the brightness is what it is. I do, however, think that digital encourages laziness in the photographer whereas film requires discipline. I believe that is why, overall, you find higher quality work produced on film.
I've spent 20 years trying to get digital to look as good as film, I know what I'm doing, and I officially give up. It is not capable of accomplishing what I want to do with it.
From a technological standpoint, I think digital is better than film. But digital photography didn’t add value to photography. In a way, it cheapened the craft of photography.
In black and white prints, which is the standard of measure of success or failure, digital is not as good. So is it really better technologically? It is a lot more complicated, with less photographer input to creative decisions.
Hmmm, my 2 pennath, digital is different to film, film for one thing is more involving if you develope yourself which is to me a joy, scan a film and print on a printer doesn't to me get the same results as printing in a darkroom, black and white shot on digital is nothing like shot on film, i shoot both and print on a printer, develope my own film cos sadly have no room for a darkroom again, i can get close but it's not the same especially black and white
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography What I meant by technologically was about the image resolution and time it takes produce & edit an image. I prefer the look of film and enjoy the process involved with producing an image. I totally agree that black and while darkroom prints look better than digital b&w no matter the resolution. I restarted darkroom printing this fall. Hoping you share your darkroom rebuilding and all the best to an analog 2025.
@@vin424242 👍🏼 Agree with everything you said. I’m still working on my film scanning game. I love the look and process of film developing and darkroom printing.
Old film shooter here. The closest I have gotten to the look of film with Digitals, are the Fujifilm early X-Trans sensors. I use an X-T2 and a X-100T and an X-T20. The later X-Trans sensors lost a lot of the Mojo. I post process with an older version of Lightroom. Version 6.2 The old stand-alone version. I have developed my own "recipes" and such. But yeah, nothing like the look of real film.
The XPro 1 was something special for sure. Not sure how they managed to ruin it? but even the newest Fuji's are still more film like than the competition. DXO Photon is worth your looking into as well if you haven't does a marvelous job making digital palatable somewhat.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Yes, I have been blown away by the Fuji X system. Been mostly using them since 2013. I wish they were full frame but I live with them because of the film-like look they can produce. Plus they have the aperture rings, and all the dials on top.
It's difficult to argue with your logic. I have as many, perhaps more white hairs than you and I have fond memories of many nights spent in my makeshift darkroom. But now 50+ years later, it is just too difficult. If I could wave a magic wand and have an instant darkroom, sure I would use it ...... but
It's taken me years to get to the point where I wanted to make the investment in time, space and building another serious darkroom. So I completely understand. We all do the best we can. If I didn't have the time and space, I'd be very happy shooting nothing but digital.
Interesting thought that nobody is shooting film and trying to make it look like digital. Based on what I saw in your excellent book, silver gelatin prints have a quality about them which digital doesn't match, in terms of emotional appeal. I think "better" has more to do with a couple of things; 1)sensor format, 4x5.6x6, 6x7, etc. capture detail 35mm doesn't and can't. The prints of yesteryear that I like anyway are generally from a large format camera. 2) experientially the film capturing process creates emotions and is thus more rewarding than the digital process doesn't replicate, because you have to know what you are doing, to a greater extent. I experience a little bit of this when I shoot with an OVF vs a mirrorless. Much prefer the OVF experience. There is a genuineness about the process that mirrorless doesn't replicate. IMO, "better" has an experience or enjoyability component to it.
Hi. I agree with you if you are an hard core professional landscape photographer selling prints. I shot film (35)mm in the early seventies and developed and printed it my self. But if you are talking superior quality it would have to be large format, or maybe 6 x 7. Setting up a darkroom would be expensive and require a dedicated area. Also the convenience of digital is not just by shooting 1000s of pictures its also the size of the equipment. Andy Mumford loves his Fujis' for their image quality and their small size. He produces beautiful images. But I agree seeing an image you have developed and printed you self give you great satisfaction. Cheers Andy
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography you've done well for $500. I looked into it starting from new. Intrepid 10 x 8 plus lens as camera and enlarger plus stand. All the accessories to develop the film plus chemicals and film. All the accessories to develop the print plus chemicals and paper. Not much change out of two grand, UK pounds. Buying used can save money obviously. Also a solid foundation (table), any vibration and its all wasted. I would love to have a large format darkroom, regardless of price, it's just not practical for an hobbyist like me. I'll leave it to the professionals. Cheers Andy
@@andrewkerr-fl4de Ahhh... you didn't specify an 8x10 negative capable darkroom. Yes, that would be a lot more money and you'd need a lot more space. I can enlarge 4x5 (and smaller) up to 16x20 reasonably) and contact print 8x10.
I find that the biggest problem with digital photography is the photographer is themselves. Most photographers who learned on digital, wind up being technical "snap shooters". Nice photographs that have no soul to them. Regardless of the film process you used you're still forced to make a photograph in a way that digital kind of takes from you...
The problem with digital is people over shoot to the point that they are not focus on composition and lighting. If you can stay focus on composition and lighting I feel digital photos you take will be just as good as film. But people are kind of playing the lottery with digital photography trying to get a great photo. I'm not saying don't shoot a lot if that's something you have to do maybe you are a wedding photographer and the clients today they want a lot of photos so it comes down to this is what the market is today. And I'm not saying to over shoot like a nut just to get a lot of photos. When I shoot a wedding I try my best to take great photos. Is every photo great NO. But at least I gave it 110%. Also the electronic shutter makes people over shoot now because there is no feed back unless you turn on the fake shutter sound. But there is no feed back from a real shutter going off.
In 1995 I shot $2000 weddings for the studios in Portland Oregon as a sub contractor usually on 5 rolls of 220 - 150 photos per wedding with flash for 98% of the shots and all manual focus and usually about 149 images were perfect with 1-2 blinks that were duplicated because I saw it and the studios were very happy with my work as were the brides. And people complain about Fuji's AF because it only tracks fast moving subjects 99% of the time...
Interesting video, I’ve had a film then digital photo journey, and still shoot with both. BUT I think enough already with the film vs digital debate. They are different tools for different jobs. We are all different, and enjoy different things, but it’s time to celebrate our differences but acknowledge that as it is the photographer who has the skill not the medium.
On the film vs digital debate I am in the "daguerreotype or you are amateur" camp. For me it is just the medium. I shot both film and digital, but I do and appreciate photography not as art (never really got into photographic art) but as a way to document and preserve stuff, be it buildings, people, machinery etc. so maybe that's why from "look" POV film vs digital does not matter to me. It is the same. What I actually appreciate film for its archival values.
It’s not an either/or debate. Both are wonderful, so it depends on the requirements of the job. A new electric vehicle is slick but I love my10 year old Honda. Looks new, has 167,000 miles and I just enjoy driving it. Like a comfortable pair of shoes.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography however, I don't understand why you're talking only about BW film photography. Color film photos also look different (and better in my opinion). And I talk about film scans as well. I've figured out a formula: digital photos look natural but not true and film photos look unnatural but true. P.S. there's one thing that puzzles me a bit. Somehow inkjet prints from digital cameras usually look better than from film scans. Maybe it's because when looking digital and film photos on a monitor (in full screen mode), they share a similar amount of details. But on paper 'digital' photos look surprisinglly hyperreal.
Is oil painting better than water color painting? Is art done with water colors less than art done in oils? I think Film Photography is better than Digital Photography when it is better. And vise Versa.
Ahh, but your point is watercolor is not oil. Digital is not film. But nobody tries to make watercolors look like oil paintings, do they? That's a clue.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Actually, my point is art is in the eye of the beholder. And as for nobody tries to make film look like digital, my reply might be why? Why try to make film look like digital, or digital look like film? Many would like to make either look like how they remember the scene. So if duplication of God's beauty is the goal, oils, water colors, film, digital, all are legitimate avenues. If it has to be film to be art, then I humbly disagree. If film is your chosen medium, you must chose whichever baked in characteristics the film stock has. Go with that, or fight with it in the darkroom, or convert it to digital, and fight with it in post. Or, shoot digital, and fight with it in post. Time and money spent to arrive at the desired destination IMHO is not a factor in the judgement of is it art or is it not art. If you like it, it is art to you. I which case you have pleased at least one art critic. I hope so many more come to agree that you can sell your work for big dollars!
@@HamiltonSRink So anything a viewer sees and thinks is art is art? Exactly, nobody tries to make film look like digital, but many people and even a few camera companies try to make digital look like film. I'm not qualifying what is art and what mediums are necessary to make legitimate art. The only point I'm making is that digital is not film, and in my opinion is something completely different and that the people claiming digital can replace film on a 1:1 basis are wrong. I know I was and it's taken me a long time to realize that. I never claimed film was better because it's harder. Film is better IMHO because the final product, the print, is aesthetically better in a number of ways that I can visually see, and I've seen it many many times. Everything I like is not art and most would agree. Some things I'm not so fond of people have told me they like as art. There is a degree of subjectivity to the whole pursuit, but there is also objective standard that can be somewhat applied as well. Just like pornography, I know fine art when I see it. And very few things/photographs fall into that category. Many people have bought my "art" over the years. I assume they liked it. At the end of the day, I can look at my body of work and know where I've been and where I want to go. Digital was a 20 year distraction at this point, for me.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotographyIf you can see the difference, then does that make one or the other not Art? In your case it might. I suppose we will have to agree to disagree on this point.
@@HamiltonSRink It's not about one being art and one not being art. So I don't agree or disagree with you on that point. It's only about that I personally with 40 years of experience making and looking at b&w landscape photographs can see an aesthetic difference in the final prints made digitally vs those made with silver gelatin.
Large format film is still king, due to physics. I need camera movements for my work. There is no such thing as a true digital 4x5, and never will be, because film would always be cheaper and easier.
Is digital better than film? I would say no, just different. I cut my teeth on film in the 70's on 35mm and 645. I personally do not want to go back to the wet darkroom and for me I am producing much better work now than I ever did. This is nothing to do with film vs digital, just more experience gained over time. Personally, I don't see that film imparts any special magic to an image just because it's been shot on film. Film has certain characteristics that are not present in digital and vice versa, it's down to the photographer to maximise the benefits of their respective medium. Let's be honest, film itself is an advance over the earlier forms of image capture such as daguerreotypes, and digital being an 'advance' over film. We can always look back and think what once was is the true medium. I think it all still comes down to the photographers vision and how they choose to interpret their vision. B&W Digital can be just as effective as film, and Michael Kenna's approach can still be made with digital
Michael Kenna can't do what he does with digital. He said so. My point really is, digital is not an "advancement" of the photographic process, it's a different process entirely yielding different results for better or for worse, and is worse in my opinion for certain types of photography.
it may sound strange but it seems to me that analog photos have some kind of soul. And I would give an example, if Rembrandt was alive today and you wanted to have a portrait of your daughter. What would you choose to hang on the wall his painting or the best photo print?
Fujifilm made a name of themself by selling a camera which can emulate film. I see it differently, with today's digital cameras it has become too perfect. I mean, our eyes are not perfect and we see do not see perfectly. Now when I look at photo which was done with one of the new +60 mega pixel cameras then it's too perfect. Which is why I like film, but I still use digital for where it's useful.
James Popsys is a photographer who is successfully producing work which transcends above the question of "digital or film?" But for the sake of argument, I believe his work looks better than 95% of film photography. And that's mostly with a "boring" A7RV. He proves the adage that gear, format, and medium doesn't practically matter to the end result. Having said that, film still has plenty of benefits for the creatively hungry photographers. The tactility of it, the slow work flow, and the "ease" of producing a desirable look. But again, if your last name is Popsys, or you've figured out his secret sauce, none of that matters.
Really? If his work was submitted in a Photography 101 class I was teaching he'd get a B. Technically proficient, compositionally cliche, somewhat disorganized, and possibly not much better than snapshot material. And how can you say his work looks better than 95% of film photography if you have never seen a paper print of his in person? Or have you? The proof of the photograph is the print. Not what it looks like on a screen. Gear, format, and medium directly contribute to the characteristics of the finished art work. Particularly in photography.
@EdwardMartinsPhotography but that is you teaching, what about someone else ? I live near a local watercolour artist and his shop, namely Ashley Jackson and i love his watercolours and they depict our local hills nicely to me and others, my mum however who paints doesn't like them at all, a dreary mess are her words, i like James photographs as do many others, but i also l8ke other people's work, James photography style is not something i would do but i like them
@@vin424242 The philosophy of aesthetics falls into two categories: subjective (which is actually meaningless in reality and is used for justification mostly, but is the prevalent dogma of the modern era,) and objective which allows us to understand and communicate to each other what we are talking about. As an adherent of objective based aesthetics, "my teaching" is not just my "whim" or "opinion." But should be based on an objective set of criterion, that we can ponder, discuss and debate about. However, if Subjectivism is the accepted basis of aesthetics, then whatever you think is as right as whatever anyone else thinks even if both viewpoint are mutually exclusive and/or contradictory.
I posted a comment, or at least I thought I did, which included a link to another photographer and his treatment of digital to produce a film-like appearance. It seems to have disappeared, was this an inappropriate comment?
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Sorry, my mistake. Google: Jeff Ascough LFI Gallery. He is a contemporary British photographer who uses film and digital, I think he does a credible job of converting digital to a film-like appearance. Interested in your thoughts
They are complementary unless you want to go back in time.. the only way you can share your film images is by digitizing it.. For commercial (real estate, sports etc .. ), no no to film
Is digital better? No it is not. Err, unless it's a 907X - that is better. Perhaps the Pentax K3iii Mono with a 31mm Limited, that may be better. The rest, bin'em. I think the bigger point is, film forces intent in a way that is absent in most digital work. I think that's what you were reaching for - the considered, planned, dedicated intent to get the shot *every* time, because you have a finite number of shots. That doesn't exist on digital.
I'd have to see results from a 907x myself before I accepted that it was better. I've shot the K33M with the 31mm LTD, it's still digital. You can force yourself to employ the discipline film requires with digital, but the final prints won't look the same. And ultimately it's the "it" factor of the final prints that I've NEVER seen reproduced digitally. The highlights "glow" and the mids are always 1/2 to a stop shifted down in digital B&W images. The mid shift can be fixed in PP but the ink prints never glow like the silver prints do.
Back in the early days of the 20th century, photography was made to look like paintings. Eventually, that largely went away. The same will happen for people trying to make digital look like film. It doesn't work anyway. However, I do it all the time simply because I like the look of film. Digital will eventually transcend its misgivings just like film did for paintings. It's about the content, not the medium.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography If digital isn't photography, what is it? Essentially, your dislike of digital is largely due to the barrier of entry being to low. Remember that for your whole career in film, digital had already existed.
@@imagenatura Nope. My dislike of digital is largely due to the silver gelatin prints looking much better to my eye than anything I have ever seen printed digitally. Even scans of film in peoples videos look better than their digital captures. For me, the proof is in the printing. And for only half of my career in film digital existed. I shot film starting in 1978 and professionally starting in 1984. Digital didn't become a thing until really around 2004, and I bought Canon 20D's.
Yes, but working photographers other than a few agency reporter guys were't using them or switching to them until about the Nikon D100 or Canon 20D came around in 2005. The Nikon 1Dx was so slow it was barely usable for anything.
What if you openly admit that you suck at film photography? I personally think that modern cameras are a bit too perfect in their recording of information, when it comes to artistic style. An interesting point about the unnamed individual tending towards mediocrity since transitioning to digital. Perhaps they were exceptional at getting the most out of a limited medium, and now don't need to try as hard to get good technical results?
It is simply not possible to shoot film like digital. So no one suggests shooting film like digital, because it is preposterous (and I really like my analogue photos).
Thank God for digital. Film is a chemical hands on process. Digital is a software process. You do the same thing, but film is more limited. More challenging. It’s not better or purer. Art is a fake business. There is no relationship between the value of a piece and the piece. It is determined by snob value only. The digital camera has almost no impact on how you render the image. If you think that statement is wrong, you don’t know anything about developing digital raw files. You cant make film look like a clean digital image because it is impossible. The tone curve is baked in - you can only manipulate it marginally. I grew up on film. Don’t miss it. I do lean towards shooting film in real medium format and then scanning using a digital camera. Because it is affordable to an amateur. I think it is easier to become lazy in digital. And most images are developed in Photoshop/Lightroom which is in my opinion not a great solution for RAW and leads to fake looking colours quite easily
I've never seem a digital print that in any way compares to a top level darkroom print from film. Film and digital are in no way the same thing. If you think the digital camera process has no impact on how you render an image then you don't understand that you can't make a digital file print like a film negative in a darkroom. Anyone can paint with broad brush and say nothing...
No idea why people feel the need to invest in this digital / film 'divide'. There are clearly strengths and weaknesses in both, clearly differences in costs and benefits. Important areas of photography - and the social and political roles that photography perform - have been greatly strengthened by the advent of digital, other areas of photography, not so much or not at all. Both film and digital have continued to teach us new things about the world we live in - a capacity that anyway predates film by half a century. And there's a thought... along came film, and the same types of criticisms that are today levelled at digital were propagated by the Keepers of the One True Flame - men with big wooden boxes shooting wet or dry plates (and again when along came the travesty of... 'Colour'). I think that it's remarkable what digital has enabled and achieved in not much more than twenty years - most people now have (at least) a camera in their pocket that can achieve a reasonable representation of the outside world at zero added cost; something almost inconceivable thirty years ago. Now anyone who wants to take things further can do so without being burdened by the financial penalties that went with starting out in film - shoot a few frames a week... curse... buy more film... a few more frames... rinse and repeat. I'm not romanticizing digital, but i see no need to cast around looking for a way to represent it as being somehow inferior to film - it's different, and i'd argue that we're better off now in having the ability to choose the most suitable medium for any given task than we were when many of those tasks where, quite simply, completely out of reach.
In the specific scope of my video, in my opinion, there is an aesthetic difference between the final output of a digital process and silver based process. And for all the wonderfulness of digital, it's also devalued imagery to a huge extent. So as with everything there's good and bad aspects.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography I absolutely agree with both your points. To the first - i do love the 'look' of film and i appreciate 'imperfections' (digital 'standards applied here) as they seem to imbue the image with a character that i value. My only point would be that aesthetic difference always resolves into personal preferences - there is no objective standard (although there may be widespread agreement that something looks... 'nice'). The second point regarding the 'devaluing of imagery' is a nightmare. If it were 'only' imagery that is affected, that would be bad enough. I think it applies to pretty much every cultural phenomenon, and the malaise is about far more than just the advent of digital technologies (in pics, music, the written word et al). The volume of product produced is part of the problem... the acceleration of production is another... the appetite for novelty... spectacularisation... consuming over doing... the modes of consumption (scrolling through media feeds that never end, chucking out cursory 'Likes' along the way) - there's a lot in here that bodes ill for The Brain. My best (photography) friend creates stunning wet-plate images that i can meditate on for hours (he's kind about my photography too, bless him). His work reminds me of 19thC portraits of Native North American Chiefs, taken by my G-G-Grandfather (images that i grew up with and that the family still has). I think of my friends work as being craft that borders on Art - my own work as photography with no desire to be Art. I believe that there is justification for both - that there is value in both and that they exist for very different, but equally valid, purposes. I'd love to do what he does, but it would mean not doing what i do - a sacrifice (a failure) that i'm not willing to make. Enjoyed listening to and thinking about your perspective - thank you. All the best from a cabin in a swamp in a rainforest in Aotearoa- New Zealand. Cheers.
I think it’s a false dichotomy, the only thing that matters is the final image, an artist extracts the best from their tools, that’s all a camera, film, developer, dark room and software are, they are tools for you to build an image. Judge the image not the tool. Take care, Toby
They are all tools, and I see an aesthetic difference in the final outputs of both processes. So choose wisely. 🙂 (But that's what validates the dichotomy.)
I don’t think the method of creating photographs means very much. If you’re an artist you create art. If you’re not so much an artist then you probably put a lot of attention on methodology. You put a film camera in the hands of an artist and he will create photographic art; you put a digital camera in the hands of an artist and he will create photographic art. It’s all about the person wielding the camera, not whether the camera uses film or uses a sensor.
The art you make is based on many choices. The quality of that art is the direct result of those choices. It is wrong to think that the same art can be made with any tools because of the artist making the art. The choice of the medium, process or tools direct affects the creation. If you want to make watercolors, you don't paint with oil paints.
@ It’s kind of like recording a great song analog with tube amps on tape versus a digital recording. Either way if the song is great it will still be great either way. A bad song will suck either way, but what’s important is the song. Any great song can sound great recorded analog or digital since a great song transcends the methodology. The same with photography.
@@jeffrey3498 I play an American Tele through a tube Deluxe Reverb RI in my band.... The digital Tonemaster DR sounds like crap. A great b&w landscape photograph will not be as great if it is made digitally.
Then what is the gold standard? And if not, why do most people try to get their digital images to look like film? But it doesn't really matter, other than the lack of any standards is the main problem with digital.
@EdwardMartinsPhotography i don't know that there are no standards in digital photography, and even if there in fact were none i would not understand it to be some sort of problem or deficiency. I am also unaware as to that apparently most people, as you state, seek to achieve a filmic look with digital. Personally, i refused to become involved in digital until around 2005. Upon trying digital i have yet to shoot another role of film. For many years i, probably subsconsciously, viewed the filmic look as the ambience to achieve. In recent years, perhaps having become consciously aware of my bias to the filmic look, and in concert with great tech advances in digital cameras, i no longer view the filmic look as the gold standard. I enjoy trying to achieve various looks, ranging from perfect reproduction (e.g. using 36mp sony a7r) to the filmic look (e.g. using 10mp ccd camera), to now-classic looks associated with certain cameras (e.g. canon 5d, canon 5d2, nikon d700). I don't operate on any standards nor would i want to be constrained by them.
@@Mme.Swisstella Without knowing or acknowledging standards, any human pursuit is meaningless. I think we are having a discussion on 2 different levels, and not making any sense to each other.
I more or less get his point, although I think his presentation confuses the competence of the photographer using film or digital with the technical capacities of the two mediums. Looking at the technical side of the discussion, the trend over the last 75 years has been to replace the better quality with lessor quality in trade for more ease of use. This has enabled more people of lessor abilities to enter the realm and do more and better work than otherwise possible, i.e., quantity over quality. For example, a dye transfer print has a wider and more subtle range of colors and densities than a chromogenic color print, and a inkjet print even less so.The dye transfer is (was) terribly complex and time-consuming to do, the RA-4 is quicker, far easier, and vastly less costly. Inkjet? Almost any moron with a flat butt, a computer, and the right software can structure a workflow to crank out dozens of prints which are impressive if not viewed in comparison, and which cost relatively little. The difference in B&W prints is even more apparent. What's truly amazing to me is the use of film, which is then itself digitally photographed to get a digital image to then inkjet print, thereby achieving (at least in B&W) the worst of both worlds. The convenience is apparent, but that hypocrisy over the quality of results would make a shrink spin in the grave. I'd like to point out to those practitioners that they can achieve a better print quality (or media posting) by just using the digital camera to shoot the original image. Inserting the use of film between original subject and final print/posting/whatever becomes just some sort of psycho-babble which wastes a lot of time and money of nothing.
"Photographing with a digital camera is like playing guitar with garage band... (Guitar Hero)" - Michael Kenna
100%
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography 🤣
I agree and i recently moved to Olympia WA from Europe so I know exactly what you are saying about shooting here when it comes to landscape. I went from one to the other and back again. I love my film prints. I print and frame all of my best and You can just see the difference with film. It is quite dramatic to me. For me, i was never able to replicate film from digital. I could get close in some ways but not near enough for me to give up film. I strictly shoot B&W film and I shoot all the genres of photography I can except for portrait. For me I see digital photography as photography editing. It is what I did and I see it with every digital photographer today. It focuses more on gear and editing in the computer than the actual art of shooting, developing, and printing. I have yet to meet a digital photographer who has said "I never edit my pics, I print straight from camera". They may exist but I have yet to meet one. I have printed numerous prints straight from negative with little to no editing. If I do edit, it is usually just straightening and cropping, maybe a bit of dodging and burning. There is nothing like looking at a negative on the table and knowing you nailed it before you even print it.
The two biggest reasons to shoot film are: it allows for handmade prints, not machine made, and the negative is the witness to the scene. Film has a provenance and the film can testify to what was photographed. Aesthetically digital prints look like they were made by a machine, because they were. But these days very few people have seen silver prints made by anyone who knows what they are doing, so the point is lost on them.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Very true!
This criticism of the digital world is not a denial of its potential, but a call for greater awareness. Even in digital photography, you can adopt the analog mindset: slow down, be intentional, and treat each image as if it were valuable. The challenge is to maintain the integrity of the path, even when the medium offers shortcuts. This is why companies like Fuji or Leica try to simulate the feeling of being an analog photographer in modern form factors. But in the end, everyone only loves the original. Film.
Exceptionally well said! And exactly where I am coming from! 👍👍
Film photographers likes film. Other people don’t care what or how you shot an image. Analog is an illusion of superiority. In the end it makes ZERO sense to shoot analog in a digital world, especially when 99% of film photographers digitalise their negatives anyway and take advantage of the same digital tools as every other photographer. And when it comes to storage, I have every single digital file from 15 years ago, in the same exact shape. I find it so insanely cringe hearing someone say they respect a photographer more if they know they shoot analog. It’s like listening to “audiophiles” pretend music played back on a piece of round flat plastic is more “authentic”. I think most film photographers are threatened by the sea of photographers out there and hence attach themselves to analog photography thinking that will separate them from the pack. When in reality nobody cares but other film photographers.
@@laurencewhite4809 Clearly you don't understand, or care to. That's ok, don't worry, be happy.
@@laurencewhite4809 I think you didn`t understand it. I highlight the process-the "path"-as central to the creation of meaning, not merely the final product (the photo). This aligns with the Hegelian idea of Becoming: the journey toward understanding is as critical, if not more, than the endpoint. In analogue photography, every step-choosing the film, setting up the shot, developing it-is deliberate and builds a deeper connection to the image. The depth isn't simply in the image but in the process that led to it. The image is not an end in itself but a synthesis of the journey that precedes it. This view challenges both creators and viewers to move beyond the superficial, to understand that every image contains a history, a process, and a framework of thought that cannot be ignored. Only through this lens can the photograph (or any work of art) be truly "seen." You don`t.
@@laurencewhite4809 "When in reality nobody cares but other film photographers."
You really could not be more wrong... I go out with a digital camera and no one gives a shit, the moment I take a film camera out to a park somewhere everyone that walks by wants to stop and talk to me about it.
I agree with you 100%, Edward. A female friend who had never seen a film camera was amazed when I took her photo with my Yashica Mat EM. She asked me why I never looked at the back of the camera? So I let her look into the viewfinder and explained how the camera worked. After seeing the prints she fell in love with film. Now she says with a smile that my Yashica Mat EM is her camera.
Dang, that was actually something to think about that nobody shoots film and try to make it look digital, but many try to make digital look like a film. Nice thought, something to think about!
I ran a successful portrait studio from 1987 until 2020 when covid retired me. I was on my way out anyway. I started my career in commercial photography. I have shot with everything from 11 x 14 Deerdorf to Hassies to Bronica to Nikon D800. So I have spanned the gamut. The difference between digital and film is that in digital, everyone I know has to spray and pray and then fix their problems in a computer. In film on 220, it cost me up to 50 cents a frame. I have not owned a camera for almost 5 years now using only my phone. I now have picked up a used Sony 6400 with kit lens and I am back to single frame shooting. If people would just shoot digitally and tell themselves they have film in the camera they would appreciate their images more. Thanks for listening
The 'spray and pray' thing is interesting - it's a pity that the people you know are wasting much of the opportunity. I do have 'spray and pray' loaded on a custom setting set up for BIF - rarely used as BIF are not high on my priority list. Nevertheless - blindingly fast continuous shooting has brought us fabulous sights and remarkable insights into animal behaviour, and for that i'm grateful. I'll just add that most of the photographers I know probably don't know how to set-up their cameras to shoot 60fps electronic - they shoot landscapes, nature, macro, industrial, architectural etc. Cheers.
Not sure about film being better or worse but as a photographer that does both I can firmly state film makes you a better photographer. When you’re paying for 120 film and the cost to develop and scan you think about every shot before you press the cable release. This helps improve your pre-shot routine and compositional skills for sure. I find the more film you shoot your film process carries over to when you shoot digital which is a positive. I find myself shooting less frames even when shooting digital striving for quality over quantity.
I've had the same experience.
The learning curve for digital is much steeper than with film. It took me so much time without a mentor to figure out things. Even to find Ansel Adams was a big thing for me. Nobody a knew was aware of his photography. So to learn and practice , digital is very good> like Polaroid material > instant. But when it come to darkroom , man you need to love it when the image develop infringes of your eyes and they get darker and darker until it’s over …. The red light the smell of the developer the sound of the water …. You need to love this …. It’s an adventure …
I spent many, many hours in various darkrooms throughout my life. It was, at first, magical but without hesitation, I can say I’m happy to be done with the toxicity wet chemical photography. Dodging and burning in the darkroom is an art but I prefer the precision of digital tools to help me achieve precisely the outcome I desire.
The magic remains in the analog. A couple of summers ago I went to the place where Niépce took his first picture with bitumen and lavender oil. Returning to analog after a 18 year hiatus I realised what hard work it is to get a decent print, compared to five sliders in Lightroom resulting in almost perfect images. But still, I go for it. Regarding your neighborhood, last night after watching The Shining I decided to take my F3 with the 24mm to Mount Hood, by coincidence.
I don't think the 5 sliders in Lightroom can actually make an optimal print... 🙂
For archival purposes the negative can not be beat. With today’s security on laptops drives ect. Most of one’s digital photography will never be recovered when a person moves on.
I have negatives from 1992...and that includes living in 4 different States, with 3000 miles between them. I have a few years worth of digital negs/files from 16 years ago that are long gone.
Totally agree. I've lost loads of digital images, but never lost any film since I started developing my own in 1977. I have just started archiving my digital files onto BluRay disc.
For that person you know who might have been implying that digital is less expensive.....Uhm, well. A 45MP mirrorless body will set you back some $4300. A so-so Lens,, $1100. On average, though, good lenses will set you back $2500 on average. More if you want to do bird photography. Even more f you do sports photography. I have a friend who does mainly bird photography and you can add to her camera equipment 3 45TB external drives at $2 - 3000 each. She does turn out nice artwork (I say that, because she has yet to publish a photograph the way it came out of the camera), but at the same time has thousands of photos shes never looked at! I have $1000 wrapped up in a pair of Mamiya C330s 2 1/4 square TLR cameras. For the remaining price differential, I can shoot A LOT of film and have it developed. (Digital folks are constantly complaining about the high cost of film)
Hasselblad CF lenses in like new condition are $0.10 on the dollar when new in 1995. I just bought a like new CF T* 250mm lens which was $3107.00 in 1995 for $299.00 (Which would be about $75 in 1995 money.).
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography You're the exception not the rule. (Me too) Most people don't want to wait (much less put a used lens on a new camera body). They want what they want and they want it right now and will run up their credit card balance to get it.
I grew up shooting film. Got my first DSLR in 2002. I still occasionally shot film up until around 2015. One of the main reasons I stopped was the cost has gotten ridiculous. When the last CVS near me got rid of their film processing machine, I threw in the towel. I was only having my color film processed by them and did my own scanning. I did all my own black and white processing and scanning. Now, film prices are sky high. I have no interest in shooting film anymore. I'm strictly digital now. My only beef with digital is the over processing by people and making scenes and people look completely different than what they are.
I know where you are coming from, as I have an extensive darkroom history and have a large collection of Blad, Pentax 67, and Pentax M42 mount that I still use for B&W. But I also have an extensive amount of Sony and Olympus OM. You can't make film look like digital....unless you process a scan with Topaz and sometimes it really does look like digital. Conversely, moderately high ISO on say a Sony A1 processed without heavy handed noise reduction can have a very film like structure that pleases me. (I particularly like DxO processing with just moderate noise reduction). Highlight roll off on digital is often too abrupt compared to film. Even when I am enjoying film, my output is a scan with post production....the prints that result on a wide format printer are considerably better than anything I could make in my darkroom days, particularly with color. If I shoot film I am definitely a hybrid user with scanning and post production. The detail with digital is considerably higher and is helpful in a number of scenarios while the grain structure of film benefits other imagery. It is all art so you do what you enjoy. I like all of it myself.
Ralph Gibson, Sebastiao Salgado and Anton Corbijn all went digital then there are people like Tatsuo Suzuki form whom his photography would be impossible without digital. It's not the tool it's how you use it.
Nope. Digital is not film and film is not digital. All those photographers that "went" digital are producing different work then were or could with film. I don't know if it's better or worse, but I do know the outcomes are different. You don't use a screwdriver like you use a pliers, no matter how much you try to use it like a pliers.
Tongue in cheek, Digital photography should be renamed ‘Technography’… especially with AI making all decisions and color science driven by camera manufacturers with jpg’s being the media.. this is a crazy conversation. Take photographs… or learn drawing and painting..
Many of my favorite cameras are 60 years old and haven't failed me yet. I also use my Nikon D850, but my film cameras still get the job done.
My bottom line is,, for over 30 years I never had to own a computer to be a photographer. I hate that I now have to use a computer to be a photographer. I have always been a hobbyist photographer and shot my first roll of 35mm film in 1977. I quit photography in 2007 after Kodachrome was discontinued and local film labs started closing. 12 years later in 2019 I bought an XT3 and a Nikon D780 to try digital. I also have a GFX50R. I just don't like digital because it ties me to a computer. It has nothing to do with which type of photography is superior. I just purchased a Mamiya 645 pro TL and some Ilford 100. I won't be digitizing my negatives but instead have real silver gelatin prints made. I'm done with social media etc. I'm going to think of photography as oil painting. I won't be sitting in front of a computer. Digital and film do not live in the same world or lifestyle, again it's not about superiority. This is about freedom from the computer and peace away from social media. Time for the madness to stop.
The only electricity I need to make a photograph is an incandescent lightbulb in my enlarger. No electronics anywhere. (When I shoot my 4x5 or 8x10 with a Sekonic 398 meter.) Ironically those are also the highest image quality processes I've used or exist as well.
How about shooting in JPEG only and delivering memory card to a print shop? Or even directly printing at home, some printers can to that!
I tried it and it is as close to film as you can get, more intentional, careful, while still maintaining some control on "JPEG development" look with in-camera settings.
Though I've regretted that some shots could be cooler if I would edit them from RAWs.
Maybe it was my lack of skills.. or just a part of film-like experience.
I shot a very similar image of Punchbowl Falls in 2012 or 2013, wading out with my wooden tripod and 4x5 camera to take it. I felt kind of bad huddled under the cloth with my loupe while other photographers were waiting to take their shot. I remember scanning the negative and being disappointed that my long shutter speed created detail-free patches where the sunlight was dancing on the water, so I ended up cropping in for the sort of look that you achieved. That was when I learned to be careful when photographing glassy water while using long shutter speeds. I have not returned to Punchbowl Falls since then. I think debris from fires and storms might have drastically altered the view. Seeing your image on your book cover brought back memories of me and and my wife hiking back in there over treacherous, icy ground.
I don't know if film or digital is better, but I do know that I have seen both color and black and white film work that convinces me that the former will never be inferior. I've concluded it's not so much the choice of the two media that will prevail, but the photographer growing into it in a way that stands out. That said, add to this the suspicion that film has the potential to be more honest in an age in which digital manipulation has run amok.
Extremely great point! It's not that film is better, film will never be inferior. It is the gold standard. Just like fiber based paper. And the negative doesn't lie. It was a witness to the scene. (By the way, my fear of heights or more specifically my fear of falling will preclude my EVER revisiting Punchbowl Falls... :) )
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Yes, my wife took a couple of falls on the icy trail on that trip. Very unnerving.
@@CP23798 Very scary!!!
I totally agree. I never closed my darkroom. Althougt also photographing digital, I still prefer analoge. The reason is - instead of sitting hours and hours in front of my computer, the darkroom is the better option for me.
Cheers
Yes, another benefit. Less time in front of a computer. I love the peace of the darkroom. Berlioz or Wagner playing, get an ale from the film fridge... wonderful.
You made a great point about digital photographers trying to get a film look but film photographers not going the other way. This is also true with other art forms. Digital artists are trying to get the look of analog tools, but no traditional media artist is trying to emulate a digital art look. Same thing with music. Digital tools exist to make things easier, but their primary goal is not to replace the real analogue world. CG films are not pixelated so that we know they’re digital. Their goal is to get as close to analogue reality as possible.
All of that said, digital tools are advanced enough that they can fake analogue media pretty well given the cost and time saving. But I think you’re mostly correct that convenience is the driving reason to go digital and not for any reason of a better product.
And why fake it when with a little skill and effort you can practice the actual craft? Party like Ansel!
Happened on your channel (and website), and glad I did. You are exhibiting amazing work, and it is an inspiration. Have subscribed!
Thank you!
I shoot and develop my own film, then scan it with a digital camera. I'm not sure what that makes me. I do enjoy the film process more than digital but the end product (print) doesn't care how it is made. Great topic
Perhaps, a reasonable balance between the two is to shoot JPG only. That's why Fuji is so great - you get the film "look" via film simulations without the chemicals.
Or shoot film and scan it and print it digitally...
Congratulations on your book! Books are the ultimate expression of ones photography, greater than prints for the wall. 🌟👍✨
Thank you! (But the final silver print framed and hanging on the wall is still my ultimate goal. 🙂👍)
Film photography is artisanal. It creates a physical artefact that was manipulated by the craft person into something beautiful and unique.
Started shooting 126 Instamatic in the 1980’s. Bought a 35mm and developed probably 50% of what I shot in the 1990’s, when I had access to a darkroom.
Still love film, though it is expensive and I have not done any developing in 30 years.
Strictly an amateur shooter, but I enjoy the film process (and my film cameras) more. If I had unlimited funds, the only digital I’d shoot is with my phone.
I shot film from being a kid then shot for newspapers on film shit wedding etc finally went digital in 2003 spent next 20 years shooting digitally for newspapers now freelancing sports news anything and everything all digital it's essential for my day job yet all that time I've kept my hand in with film I love the process of shooting film but can't live without the immediacy of digital. For me neither medium is superior both have their place.
Both do have their place but a lot of digital photographers dismiss any thoughts of film as an obsolete medium.
@EdwardMartinsPhotography I know a few young folk turning to film photography as it's a retro challenge the same way they are buying vinyl records I think film will always be around and if you get an acceptable shot from a roll you get a sense of delayed gratification which doesn't really happen with digital
@@paultaylorphotography9499 The problem with instant gratification is you never have anything to look forward to. Makes for a life without surprise and hope.
@EdwardMartinsPhotography I guess that's why young uns are trying film
I really don't care what someone shoots. But I'll say this digital is good for practicing. Film is not cheap. I'll admit it when I was a kid I was stupid and did not read photography books.
I was also shoot weddings like you on film I use the square format I think it was 2 quarter or something with my Bronica camera and Metz TTL flash. Every photo I took was direct flash maybe a few natural light images. That's how everyone was doing it back in the day and that's how studios wanted you to take photos.
Today's cameras have built in spot meters and yes even the old SLR cameras had them like the Nikon N90s and Nikon N8008s. But today you can shoot a few images and see what the image is going to look like.
If you using digital as training wheels and then shoot film you will be a better film photographer because when you get really good with losing and learning light and then you decide to put in a roll of film you will make that roll of film count.
Its weird how people are just in general and I'm saying this about myself also. Photography and filmmaking is not that hard but we make it hard. For example I remember watch this cellphone review channel and every video test they did they had to walk with shaky footage. Most of the time when you watch a movie the camera is locked down or some what locked down.
I worked one some stupid movie that never got released because its so bad even monkey would not watch it. There was this seen in a club and they had the lights on when filming. Every night club in every movie has very little light and spot lights and some jell lights. But out of the 30 people that was on that set not one person said maybe we should turn off the lights and use side lighting.
Without saying one is better than then other, many people getting their first DSLR or Mirrorless digital camera, that actually want to edit and print are often unaware of the costs of digital photography. Some memory cards can cost 100.00 each, you need a good computer with fast processor’s and lots of hard drive space with either external drives or cloud storage and very good sized monitors. Don’t forget there are also costs for editing software and some are subscription based. Basically, I am saying there are costs to both types analog and digital.
To all film romantics: try JPEG only, it will blow your mind.
There are even "film recipes" like FUJI X WEEKLY for Fujifilm to achieve certain look.
Not fully film look but feeling-wise It certainly was a good experience for me.
Expect some crappy shots along the way that would be fixable if it was RAW, but it is the same as with film.
Film is special. Absolutely. I loved this video and agree wholeheartedly. I only shoot film. 🎞️ ❤
Thanks for the video. I returned to film over six years ago now. I prefer the hybrid workflow though. Shoot film develop myself and then scan and print with an Epson inkjet printer. It works for me. Once again thanks for a thought provoking video
Yes, I can see myself using a hybrid approach as well. If anything, printing a negative digitally might be a good test to see if I want to invest the time in the darkroom to make a wet print of the photo.
I shoot digital and print in a darkroom with a digital enlarger. The printing is the most important part of the whole endeavor.
very interesting. Who makes such a thing?
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography there are people on photrio building them with high resolution 3d printing screens
The community that truly understands and values a fine print of film work is growing rather scarce now-a-days. Very few any more will actually pick up a read an actual book anymore either. Times are a changing....
I haven't shot film since before 2002. The GFX system brings me closer to that experience more than any digital camera I've used since then, but, you are right, it's still just a digital camera.
I think the only reason the GFX reminds me of shooting film is that I have to really slow down and think a little more when using that system. Other than that, it's no different than shooting any other digital camera.
Most people shooting film now a days are actually just scanning their negatives and turning them into digital files so they can view them on their computers and phones.....so they are missing the point to, and the meaning of true film work.
It's really hard to imagine what it'll be like in another 10 years, or even just in 5 years form now.
It is what it is. John Cleese said Monty Python wouldn't work today. You can't ridicule straight with bent if everything is curved.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Yeah, I made up my mind in 2002 the put the film cameras on the shelf and go completely digital, I'm perfectly fine shooting digital and enjoy ordering prints occasionally.
I do love seeing others film work but personally I have no desire to ever shoot film again. The older I get the lazier I get, even when it comes to photography! LOL
You say many try to make digital look like film and can't argue with that. Also agree that nobody try to make film look like digital, but in my opinion, there are many who strive to get as good technical quality as possible and at least for me switching (mostly) to digital made it easier to get high technical quality.
I come from film so when I bought a digital camera, I shot the same way - deliberately, selectively, and if I put the camera to my eye and thought, nah that’s nothing, I didn’t take the picture. That said, I’m shooting almost exclusively film again. After scanning negatives from the 1980s, I was further convinced of film’s longevity. In the fall of 2023, my computer was hacked. I backup my files on an external hard drive and of course have all the SD cards for my digital photos. It took months to get them back where they belong. That’s a longer story but my point is: where are all those digital files going to be 40 years from now at the rate technology advances?
Agreed.
I agree with every single word! TOP!
Got my book (and print) two days ago...enjoyed the images and the print is nice as well... I'm 57 and shot my first image at a Amy Grant concert in 1983 on a K1000...now I shoot 95% digital on Fuji cameras, but I still have a few film cameras that I take out once in a while...my take is this... I love driving classic cars and my uncles rebuilt Model A is fantastic to drive and my friends 67 Camaro is tot die for...but I don't want to drive either of them on a trip that's any longer than 30 minutes...I would rather take my modern truck...that's kindof how I feel about film now...
Thank you. Yes, a lot of people feel that way, and for certain types of work I feel the same way. But, your analogy assumes that both digital and film can take you to the same places... and I am saying that you can't get to the places film can take you with digital. On the other hand, many people don't have any desire to go to those places so the point is moot for them and I understand that. But for those of us who do want to go there, digital can't take us there. 🙂
I remember my days shooting film, 35mm and 6x7, fondly. The workflow and time involved is something im unable to do today. My thinking is that film and digital are just a little different and that's ok. I think its important to do your composition and storytelling the best you can regardless of the medium you use.
Film does require a time investment for sure.
According to me the bottleneck of digital photography is the bayer matrix: cmos sensors did not developed a lot in the years if not with megapixels. All brands tend to push only on auto focus and frame rate. Instead they should implement other sensor technology as the Foveon that try to emulate the film with very good colours rendition. I look forward to see innovation in that sense.
maybe some day digital will look less digital. It's totally possible.
I don't disagree that photography with film deserves more respect than digital; it is more work, it takes more skill. One thing digital has that film doesn't - you can adjust the gradation of luminance in the photo for a color photograph. With film, you can only do the Zone System in black and white.
For sure, I would not shoot color with film again. In this video I am speaking about a very specific niche of photography, which just happens to be the one I'm most interested in.
I think this question is similar to the analog vs. digital and tube vs. solid state components debates in audio. I always found digital (CD) to be better until I finally had a reasonably high-end analog setup. Then I was able to compare an album against the CD, and I was able to hear the positive aspects of analog that were missing from the CD.
In discussions of vintage lenses, people keep talking about "character". In audio, components said to sound better usually show excessive distortion when measured. Is the "film-like" character that people value just a set of distortions that digital camera systems lack? Beats me.
I shot film exclusively from 1988 through 2002, when I began a slow, grudging transition to digital. As of 2008, digital left film in the dust. As of 2008, I no longer feel the need to have a film camera around. When you understand how to photograph on digital, you can accomplish anything with it-including mimicking film. And, of course, nobody tries to make film look like digital-film is like a JPEG in that its value is in its limitations: The color is what it is, the brightness is what it is. I do, however, think that digital encourages laziness in the photographer whereas film requires discipline. I believe that is why, overall, you find higher quality work produced on film.
I've spent 20 years trying to get digital to look as good as film, I know what I'm doing, and I officially give up. It is not capable of accomplishing what I want to do with it.
From a technological standpoint, I think digital is better than film. But digital photography didn’t add value to photography. In a way, it cheapened the craft of photography.
In black and white prints, which is the standard of measure of success or failure, digital is not as good. So is it really better technologically? It is a lot more complicated, with less photographer input to creative decisions.
Hmmm, my 2 pennath, digital is different to film, film for one thing is more involving if you develope yourself which is to me a joy, scan a film and print on a printer doesn't to me get the same results as printing in a darkroom, black and white shot on digital is nothing like shot on film, i shoot both and print on a printer, develope my own film cos sadly have no room for a darkroom again, i can get close but it's not the same especially black and white
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography What I meant by technologically was about the image resolution and time it takes produce & edit an image. I prefer the look of film and enjoy the process involved with producing an image. I totally agree that black and while darkroom prints look better than digital b&w no matter the resolution. I restarted darkroom printing this fall. Hoping you share your darkroom rebuilding and all the best to an analog 2025.
@@vin424242 👍🏼 Agree with everything you said. I’m still working on my film scanning game. I love the look and process of film developing and darkroom printing.
Edward, have you had a chance to shoot landscapes in Washington?
Yes. I've been to the Palouse, Mt. St Helens and quite a few other locations.
Old film shooter here. The closest I have gotten to the look of film with Digitals, are the Fujifilm early X-Trans sensors. I use an X-T2 and a X-100T and an X-T20. The later X-Trans sensors lost a lot of the Mojo. I post process with an older version of Lightroom. Version 6.2 The old stand-alone version. I have developed my own "recipes" and such. But yeah, nothing like the look of real film.
The XPro 1 was something special for sure. Not sure how they managed to ruin it? but even the newest Fuji's are still more film like than the competition. DXO Photon is worth your looking into as well if you haven't does a marvelous job making digital palatable somewhat.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Yes, I have been blown away by the Fuji X system. Been mostly using them since 2013. I wish they were full frame but I live with them because of the film-like look they can produce. Plus they have the aperture rings, and all the dials on top.
It's difficult to argue with your logic. I have as many, perhaps more white hairs than you and I have fond memories of many nights spent in my makeshift darkroom. But now 50+ years later, it is just too difficult. If I could wave a magic wand and have an instant darkroom, sure I would use it ...... but
It's taken me years to get to the point where I wanted to make the investment in time, space and building another serious darkroom. So I completely understand. We all do the best we can. If I didn't have the time and space, I'd be very happy shooting nothing but digital.
Interesting thought that nobody is shooting film and trying to make it look like digital. Based on what I saw in your excellent book, silver gelatin prints have a quality about them which digital doesn't match, in terms of emotional appeal. I think "better" has more to do with a couple of things; 1)sensor format, 4x5.6x6, 6x7, etc. capture detail 35mm doesn't and can't. The prints of yesteryear that I like anyway are generally from a large format camera. 2) experientially the film capturing process creates emotions and is thus more rewarding than the digital process doesn't replicate, because you have to know what you are doing, to a greater extent. I experience a little bit of this when I shoot with an OVF vs a mirrorless. Much prefer the OVF experience. There is a genuineness about the process that mirrorless doesn't replicate. IMO, "better" has an experience or enjoyability component to it.
Hi. I agree with you if you are an hard core professional landscape photographer selling prints. I shot film (35)mm in the early seventies and developed and printed it my self. But if you are talking superior quality it would have to be large format, or maybe 6 x 7. Setting up a darkroom would be expensive and require a dedicated area. Also the convenience of digital is not just by shooting 1000s of pictures its also the size of the equipment. Andy Mumford loves his Fujis' for their image quality and their small size. He produces beautiful images. But I agree seeing an image you have developed and printed you self give you great satisfaction.
Cheers
Andy
I am rebuilding my darkroom and it's cost me less than $500. 🙂 But you do have to have the space.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography you've done well for $500. I looked into it starting from new. Intrepid 10 x 8 plus lens as camera and enlarger plus stand. All the accessories to develop the film plus chemicals and film. All the accessories to develop the print plus chemicals and paper. Not much change out of two grand, UK pounds. Buying used can save money obviously. Also a solid foundation (table), any vibration and its all wasted. I would love to have a large format darkroom, regardless of price, it's just not practical for an hobbyist like me. I'll leave it to the professionals.
Cheers
Andy
@@andrewkerr-fl4de Ahhh... you didn't specify an 8x10 negative capable darkroom. Yes, that would be a lot more money and you'd need a lot more space. I can enlarge 4x5 (and smaller) up to 16x20 reasonably) and contact print 8x10.
I find that the biggest problem with digital photography is the photographer is themselves. Most photographers who learned on digital, wind up being technical "snap shooters". Nice photographs that have no soul to them. Regardless of the film process you used you're still forced to make a photograph in a way that digital kind of takes from you...
Digital turned me into a very competent snapshooter for sure. Well said.
The problem with digital is people over shoot to the point that they are not focus on composition and lighting. If you can stay focus on composition and lighting I feel digital photos you take will be just as good as film. But people are kind of playing the lottery with digital photography trying to get a great photo.
I'm not saying don't shoot a lot if that's something you have to do maybe you are a wedding photographer and the clients today they want a lot of photos so it comes down to this is what the market is today. And I'm not saying to over shoot like a nut just to get a lot of photos.
When I shoot a wedding I try my best to take great photos. Is every photo great NO. But at least I gave it 110%.
Also the electronic shutter makes people over shoot now because there is no feed back unless you turn on the fake shutter sound. But there is no feed back from a real shutter going off.
In 1995 I shot $2000 weddings for the studios in Portland Oregon as a sub contractor usually on 5 rolls of 220 - 150 photos per wedding with flash for 98% of the shots and all manual focus and usually about 149 images were perfect with 1-2 blinks that were duplicated because I saw it and the studios were very happy with my work as were the brides. And people complain about Fuji's AF because it only tracks fast moving subjects 99% of the time...
Interesting video, I’ve had a film then digital photo journey, and still shoot with both. BUT I think enough already with the film vs digital debate. They are different tools for different jobs. We are all different, and enjoy different things, but it’s time to celebrate our differences but acknowledge that as it is the photographer who has the skill not the medium.
It's an important choice, though, and one newer people to the craft may not be familiar with. So the discussion is an important one, I think.
On the film vs digital debate I am in the "daguerreotype or you are amateur" camp. For me it is just the medium. I shot both film and digital, but I do and appreciate photography not as art (never really got into photographic art) but as a way to document and preserve stuff, be it buildings, people, machinery etc. so maybe that's why from "look" POV film vs digital does not matter to me. It is the same. What I actually appreciate film for its archival values.
I agree. My points in this video are really on about a very specific use case and are only my opinions.
It's like Cds vs vinyls 🙂
It’s not an either/or debate. Both are wonderful, so it depends on the requirements of the job.
A new electric vehicle is slick but I love my10 year old Honda. Looks new, has 167,000 miles and I just enjoy driving it. Like a comfortable pair of shoes.
That's my point. For my very specific use case, I believe film is superior to digital.
Good stuff. Subscribed.
But could you fix the light banding in your background please?
Thanks for subscribing. I don't see any light banding in my video, but I'll have a closer look... Thanks!
The same corresponds to the Steve McCurry's photographs. His digital photos look just like ordinary photos, nothing near to his film legacy.
Exactly!
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography however, I don't understand why you're talking only about BW film photography. Color film photos also look different (and better in my opinion). And I talk about film scans as well.
I've figured out a formula: digital photos look natural but not true and film photos look unnatural but true.
P.S. there's one thing that puzzles me a bit. Somehow inkjet prints from digital cameras usually look better than from film scans. Maybe it's because when looking digital and film photos on a monitor (in full screen mode), they share a similar amount of details. But on paper 'digital' photos look surprisinglly hyperreal.
Is oil painting better than water color painting? Is art done with water colors less than art done in oils? I think Film Photography is better than Digital Photography when it is better. And vise Versa.
Ahh, but your point is watercolor is not oil. Digital is not film. But nobody tries to make watercolors look like oil paintings, do they? That's a clue.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Actually, my point is art is in the eye of the beholder. And as for nobody tries to make film look like digital, my reply might be why? Why try to make film look like digital, or digital look like film? Many would like to make either look like how they remember the scene. So if duplication of God's beauty is the goal, oils, water colors, film, digital, all are legitimate avenues. If it has to be film to be art, then I humbly disagree.
If film is your chosen medium, you must chose whichever baked in characteristics the film stock has. Go with that, or fight with it in the darkroom, or convert it to digital, and fight with it in post. Or, shoot digital, and fight with it in post. Time and money spent to arrive at the desired destination IMHO is not a factor in the judgement of is it art or is it not art.
If you like it, it is art to you. I which case you have pleased at least one art critic. I hope so many more come to agree that you can sell your work for big dollars!
@@HamiltonSRink So anything a viewer sees and thinks is art is art?
Exactly, nobody tries to make film look like digital, but many people and even a few camera companies try to make digital look like film.
I'm not qualifying what is art and what mediums are necessary to make legitimate art. The only point I'm making is that digital is not film, and in my opinion is something completely different and that the people claiming digital can replace film on a 1:1 basis are wrong. I know I was and it's taken me a long time to realize that.
I never claimed film was better because it's harder. Film is better IMHO because the final product, the print, is aesthetically better in a number of ways that I can visually see, and I've seen it many many times.
Everything I like is not art and most would agree. Some things I'm not so fond of people have told me they like as art. There is a degree of subjectivity to the whole pursuit, but there is also objective standard that can be somewhat applied as well. Just like pornography, I know fine art when I see it. And very few things/photographs fall into that category.
Many people have bought my "art" over the years. I assume they liked it. At the end of the day, I can look at my body of work and know where I've been and where I want to go. Digital was a 20 year distraction at this point, for me.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotographyIf you can see the difference, then does that make one or the other not Art? In your case it might. I suppose we will have to agree to disagree on this point.
@@HamiltonSRink It's not about one being art and one not being art. So I don't agree or disagree with you on that point. It's only about that I personally with 40 years of experience making and looking at b&w landscape photographs can see an aesthetic difference in the final prints made digitally vs those made with silver gelatin.
Large format film is still king, due to physics. I need camera movements for my work. There is no such thing as a true digital 4x5, and never will be, because film would always be cheaper and easier.
You probably could get a digital Sinar for around $100,000 that would do some of what a $1500 film camera can...but not as good.
Is digital better than film? I would say no, just different. I cut my teeth on film in the 70's on 35mm and 645. I personally do not want to go back to the wet darkroom and for me I am producing much better work now than I ever did. This is nothing to do with film vs digital, just more experience gained over time. Personally, I don't see that film imparts any special magic to an image just because it's been shot on film. Film has certain characteristics that are not present in digital and vice versa, it's down to the photographer to maximise the benefits of their respective medium. Let's be honest, film itself is an advance over the earlier forms of image capture such as daguerreotypes, and digital being an 'advance' over film. We can always look back and think what once was is the true medium. I think it all still comes down to the photographers vision and how they choose to interpret their vision. B&W Digital can be just as effective as film, and Michael Kenna's approach can still be made with digital
Michael Kenna can't do what he does with digital. He said so. My point really is, digital is not an "advancement" of the photographic process, it's a different process entirely yielding different results for better or for worse, and is worse in my opinion for certain types of photography.
it may sound strange but it seems to me that analog photos have some kind of soul. And I would give an example, if Rembrandt was alive today and you wanted to have a portrait of your daughter. What would you choose to hang on the wall his painting or the best photo print?
Fujifilm made a name of themself by selling a camera which can emulate film. I see it differently, with today's digital cameras it has become too perfect. I mean, our eyes are not perfect and we see do not see perfectly. Now when I look at photo which was done with one of the new +60 mega pixel cameras then it's too perfect. Which is why I like film, but I still use digital for where it's useful.
I shot B&W in the 60's and 70's on film and shoot digital these days. It's NOT the equipment, its the Operator.....ALWAYS.
Nope. you can't do with digital what you can with film, and you can't do with film what you can with digital. They are not equals.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Your opinion but other Artists will disagree.
I am sure they will. :)
It’s all subjective to which side of the art you would lean.
Except that there's an aesthetic to silver based prints that's easily observable. But other than that it's subjective... :)
James Popsys is a photographer who is successfully producing work which transcends above the question of "digital or film?" But for the sake of argument, I believe his work looks better than 95% of film photography. And that's mostly with a "boring" A7RV.
He proves the adage that gear, format, and medium doesn't practically matter to the end result.
Having said that, film still has plenty of benefits for the creatively hungry photographers. The tactility of it, the slow work flow, and the "ease" of producing a desirable look. But again, if your last name is Popsys, or you've figured out his secret sauce, none of that matters.
Really? If his work was submitted in a Photography 101 class I was teaching he'd get a B. Technically proficient, compositionally cliche, somewhat disorganized, and possibly not much better than snapshot material. And how can you say his work looks better than 95% of film photography if you have never seen a paper print of his in person? Or have you? The proof of the photograph is the print. Not what it looks like on a screen.
Gear, format, and medium directly contribute to the characteristics of the finished art work. Particularly in photography.
@EdwardMartinsPhotography but that is you teaching, what about someone else ? I live near a local watercolour artist and his shop, namely Ashley Jackson and i love his watercolours and they depict our local hills nicely to me and others, my mum however who paints doesn't like them at all, a dreary mess are her words, i like James photographs as do many others, but i also l8ke other people's work, James photography style is not something i would do but i like them
@@vin424242 The philosophy of aesthetics falls into two categories: subjective (which is actually meaningless in reality and is used for justification mostly, but is the prevalent dogma of the modern era,) and objective which allows us to understand and communicate to each other what we are talking about.
As an adherent of objective based aesthetics, "my teaching" is not just my "whim" or "opinion." But should be based on an objective set of criterion, that we can ponder, discuss and debate about. However, if Subjectivism is the accepted basis of aesthetics, then whatever you think is as right as whatever anyone else thinks even if both viewpoint are mutually exclusive and/or contradictory.
I posted a comment, or at least I thought I did, which included a link to another photographer and his treatment of digital to produce a film-like appearance. It seems to have disappeared, was this an inappropriate comment?
RUclips has rules about posting links in comment sections. Best to just name the photographer and some of where they can be found.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Sorry, my mistake. Google: Jeff Ascough LFI Gallery. He is a contemporary British photographer who uses film and digital, I think he does a credible job of converting digital to a film-like appearance. Interested in your thoughts
I will check him out, thanks!
They are complementary unless you want to go back in time.. the only way you can share your film images is by digitizing it.. For commercial (real estate, sports etc .. ), no no to film
I share my film images all the time through printing them in the darkroom. That has been the most rewarding work I have done as a photographer...
Is digital better? No it is not. Err, unless it's a 907X - that is better. Perhaps the Pentax K3iii Mono with a 31mm Limited, that may be better. The rest, bin'em. I think the bigger point is, film forces intent in a way that is absent in most digital work. I think that's what you were reaching for - the considered, planned, dedicated intent to get the shot *every* time, because you have a finite number of shots. That doesn't exist on digital.
I'd have to see results from a 907x myself before I accepted that it was better. I've shot the K33M with the 31mm LTD, it's still digital. You can force yourself to employ the discipline film requires with digital, but the final prints won't look the same. And ultimately it's the "it" factor of the final prints that I've NEVER seen reproduced digitally. The highlights "glow" and the mids are always 1/2 to a stop shifted down in digital B&W images. The mid shift can be fixed in PP but the ink prints never glow like the silver prints do.
Back in the early days of the 20th century, photography was made to look like paintings. Eventually, that largely went away. The same will happen for people trying to make digital look like film. It doesn't work anyway. However, I do it all the time simply because I like the look of film. Digital will eventually transcend its misgivings just like film did for paintings. It's about the content, not the medium.
People realized that photography wasn't painting. Just as they will come to realize that digital is not photography... (I couldn't resist, LOL!)
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography If digital isn't photography, what is it? Essentially, your dislike of digital is largely due to the barrier of entry being to low. Remember that for your whole career in film, digital had already existed.
@@imagenatura Nope. My dislike of digital is largely due to the silver gelatin prints looking much better to my eye than anything I have ever seen printed digitally. Even scans of film in peoples videos look better than their digital captures. For me, the proof is in the printing. And for only half of my career in film digital existed. I shot film starting in 1978 and professionally starting in 1984. Digital didn't become a thing until really around 2004, and I bought Canon 20D's.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography Digital was invented in 1975, but didn't get good enough to use surpass film (35mm) until the early 2000s.
Yes, but working photographers other than a few agency reporter guys were't using them or switching to them until about the Nikon D100 or Canon 20D came around in 2005. The Nikon 1Dx was so slow it was barely usable for anything.
What if you openly admit that you suck at film photography? I personally think that modern cameras are a bit too perfect in their recording of information, when it comes to artistic style.
An interesting point about the unnamed individual tending towards mediocrity since transitioning to digital. Perhaps they were exceptional at getting the most out of a limited medium, and now don't need to try as hard to get good technical results?
Sucked at film photography for a few years... it's part of learning the craft. But as I got better, my photography got better as well.
@ I wish I had the time to put into it. Maybe when I pick up my 50,000 subscribers 😆
@@petemellows I'm really glad I came up when film was all there was and you either learned it or took up the guitar... 🙂🙂
It is simply not possible to shoot film like digital. So no one suggests shooting film like digital, because it is preposterous (and I really like my analogue photos).
Nobody would want their film to look like digital...
It's faster and easier...
Thank God for digital. Film is a chemical hands on process. Digital is a software process. You do the same thing, but film is more limited. More challenging. It’s not better or purer. Art is a fake business. There is no relationship between the value of a piece and the piece. It is determined by snob value only. The digital camera has almost no impact on how you render the image. If you think that statement is wrong, you don’t know anything about developing digital raw files. You cant make film look like a clean digital image because it is impossible. The tone curve is baked in - you can only manipulate it marginally. I grew up on film. Don’t miss it. I do lean towards shooting film in real medium format and then scanning using a digital camera. Because it is affordable to an amateur. I think it is easier to become lazy in digital. And most images are developed in Photoshop/Lightroom which is in my opinion not a great solution for RAW and leads to fake looking colours quite easily
I've never seem a digital print that in any way compares to a top level darkroom print from film. Film and digital are in no way the same thing. If you think the digital camera process has no impact on how you render an image then you don't understand that you can't make a digital file print like a film negative in a darkroom. Anyone can paint with broad brush and say nothing...
No idea why people feel the need to invest in this digital / film 'divide'. There are clearly strengths and weaknesses in both, clearly differences in costs and benefits. Important areas of photography - and the social and political roles that photography perform - have been greatly strengthened by the advent of digital, other areas of photography, not so much or not at all. Both film and digital have continued to teach us new things about the world we live in - a capacity that anyway predates film by half a century. And there's a thought... along came film, and the same types of criticisms that are today levelled at digital were propagated by the Keepers of the One True Flame - men with big wooden boxes shooting wet or dry plates (and again when along came the travesty of... 'Colour'). I think that it's remarkable what digital has enabled and achieved in not much more than twenty years - most people now have (at least) a camera in their pocket that can achieve a reasonable representation of the outside world at zero added cost; something almost inconceivable thirty years ago. Now anyone who wants to take things further can do so without being burdened by the financial penalties that went with starting out in film - shoot a few frames a week... curse... buy more film... a few more frames... rinse and repeat. I'm not romanticizing digital, but i see no need to cast around looking for a way to represent it as being somehow inferior to film - it's different, and i'd argue that we're better off now in having the ability to choose the most suitable medium for any given task than we were when many of those tasks where, quite simply, completely out of reach.
In the specific scope of my video, in my opinion, there is an aesthetic difference between the final output of a digital process and silver based process.
And for all the wonderfulness of digital, it's also devalued imagery to a huge extent. So as with everything there's good and bad aspects.
@@EdwardMartinsPhotography I absolutely agree with both your points. To the first - i do love the 'look' of film and i appreciate 'imperfections' (digital 'standards applied here) as they seem to imbue the image with a character that i value. My only point would be that aesthetic difference always resolves into personal preferences - there is no objective standard (although there may be widespread agreement that something looks... 'nice').
The second point regarding the 'devaluing of imagery' is a nightmare. If it were 'only' imagery that is affected, that would be bad enough. I think it applies to pretty much every cultural phenomenon, and the malaise is about far more than just the advent of digital technologies (in pics, music, the written word et al). The volume of product produced is part of the problem... the acceleration of production is another... the appetite for novelty... spectacularisation... consuming over doing... the modes of consumption (scrolling through media feeds that never end, chucking out cursory 'Likes' along the way) - there's a lot in here that bodes ill for The Brain.
My best (photography) friend creates stunning wet-plate images that i can meditate on for hours (he's kind about my photography too, bless him). His work reminds me of 19thC portraits of Native North American Chiefs, taken by my G-G-Grandfather (images that i grew up with and that the family still has). I think of my friends work as being craft that borders on Art - my own work as photography with no desire to be Art. I believe that there is justification for both - that there is value in both and that they exist for very different, but equally valid, purposes. I'd love to do what he does, but it would mean not doing what i do - a sacrifice (a failure) that i'm not willing to make.
Enjoyed listening to and thinking about your perspective - thank you. All the best from a cabin in a swamp in a rainforest in Aotearoa- New Zealand. Cheers.
I think it’s a false dichotomy, the only thing that matters is the final image, an artist extracts the best from their tools, that’s all a camera, film, developer, dark room and software are, they are tools for you to build an image. Judge the image not the tool. Take care, Toby
They are all tools, and I see an aesthetic difference in the final outputs of both processes. So choose wisely. 🙂 (But that's what validates the dichotomy.)
I don’t think the method of creating photographs means very much. If you’re an artist you create art. If you’re not so much an artist then you probably put a lot of attention on methodology. You put a film camera in the hands of an artist and he will create photographic art; you put a digital camera in the hands of an artist and he will create photographic art. It’s all about the person wielding the camera, not whether the camera uses film or uses a sensor.
The art you make is based on many choices. The quality of that art is the direct result of those choices. It is wrong to think that the same art can be made with any tools because of the artist making the art. The choice of the medium, process or tools direct affects the creation. If you want to make watercolors, you don't paint with oil paints.
@ It’s kind of like recording a great song analog with tube amps on tape versus a digital recording. Either way if the song is great it will still be great either way. A bad song will suck either way, but what’s important is the song. Any great song can sound great recorded analog or digital since a great song transcends the methodology. The same with photography.
@@jeffrey3498 I play an American Tele through a tube Deluxe Reverb RI in my band.... The digital Tonemaster DR sounds like crap. A great b&w landscape photograph will not be as great if it is made digitally.
@ It depends on the musician and the photographer. I don’t think blanket statements can be made. There are so many variables. Anyway, . . . .
Maybe digital is for those that have a short attention span.???🤣🤣🤣🤣
That would be all of modern society today.
I disagree that film is the gold standard.
I do agree that shooting film is much more requiring of skill.
Then what is the gold standard? And if not, why do most people try to get their digital images to look like film? But it doesn't really matter, other than the lack of any standards is the main problem with digital.
@EdwardMartinsPhotography i don't know that there are no standards in digital photography, and even if there in fact were none i would not understand it to be some sort of problem or deficiency.
I am also unaware as to that apparently most people, as you state, seek to achieve a filmic look with digital.
Personally, i refused to become involved in digital until around 2005. Upon trying digital i have yet to shoot another role of film.
For many years i, probably subsconsciously, viewed the filmic look as the ambience to achieve.
In recent years, perhaps having become consciously aware of my bias to the filmic look, and in concert with great tech advances in digital cameras, i no longer view the filmic look as the gold standard.
I enjoy trying to achieve various looks, ranging from perfect reproduction (e.g. using 36mp sony a7r) to the filmic look (e.g. using 10mp ccd camera), to now-classic looks associated with certain cameras (e.g. canon 5d, canon 5d2, nikon d700).
I don't operate on any standards nor would i want to be constrained by them.
@@Mme.Swisstella Without knowing or acknowledging standards, any human pursuit is meaningless. I think we are having a discussion on 2 different levels, and not making any sense to each other.
I more or less get his point, although I think his presentation confuses the competence of the photographer using film or digital with the technical capacities of the two mediums. Looking at the technical side of the discussion, the trend over the last 75 years has been to replace the better quality with lessor quality in trade for more ease of use. This has enabled more people of lessor abilities to enter the realm and do more and better work than otherwise possible, i.e., quantity over quality. For example, a dye transfer print has a wider and more subtle range of colors and densities than a chromogenic color print, and a inkjet print even less so.The dye transfer is (was) terribly complex and time-consuming to do, the RA-4 is quicker, far easier, and vastly less costly. Inkjet? Almost any moron with a flat butt, a computer, and the right software can structure a workflow to crank out dozens of prints which are impressive if not viewed in comparison, and which cost relatively little. The difference in B&W prints is even more apparent. What's truly amazing to me is the use of film, which is then itself digitally photographed to get a digital image to then inkjet print, thereby achieving (at least in B&W) the worst of both worlds. The convenience is apparent, but that hypocrisy over the quality of results would make a shrink spin in the grave. I'd like to point out to those practitioners that they can achieve a better print quality (or media posting) by just using the digital camera to shoot the original image. Inserting the use of film between original subject and final print/posting/whatever becomes just some sort of psycho-babble which wastes a lot of time and money of nothing.
Printing a b&w negatives in a darkroom is still the gold standard.
Digital is flat and more clinical.