Ultimate Film vs Digital Dynamic Range Challenge. 21 stop test!
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- Опубликовано: 26 июл 2024
- In this video, I compare the "dynamic range" or "exposure latitude" of film and digital. I shoot 10 stops overexposed and 10 stops underexposed to see how far away from proper exposure you can go before the image is unrecoverable. I use TMax 100 film. And a Nikon D750 digital camera set to ISO 100.
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This is also a great example as to why you should almost always expose for the highlights on digital. Look at how quickly digital falls apart when you overexpose.
Yeah, in general digital's crisp sharpness, higher iso ranges, and the way that it gets more saturated when underexposed means that I've always seen it as the tool for gritty and or low light situations where you want a color photo. However, digital still struggles immensely to handle noon Sun, and where a bright film photo on color neg can store a beautiful photo with shadows that look true to life, I've never had nearly as flattering or realistic results with digital in that setting.
Basically, even though people act like film is just a gimmick for nostalgia, i think color negative just easily handles a niche that digital can't quite, while digital handles another situation much better. The thing that digital really competes one to one with is, imo, color reversal film. It's a similar exposure range, similar focus on minimal grain and absolute sharpness and contrasty colors.
Correct!!! Just as you would using slide-film. For 'negative' film it's the 'shadows' where exposure readings are taken.
@@lefteyereport6354just crank the shutter speed or use an ND filter. You can always get rid of extra light, but you can't add light that doesn't exist
I’ve only ever shot on digital and I used to wonder how people managed to get the correct exposure on film, but this video shows how forgiving film really is!
Film suffered a great loss here because an underexposed or overexposed film you do not scan on 0EV and then digitally manipulate, you actually need a decent scanner and then scan it with adequate EV compensation so the the scanner itself can see better. Anyway, we love both film and digital and all the joy they both bring, at least I do. Still the film can do much better than this.
why not make your own test and video then?
@@matthewphillips5483 I guess this kind of comment comes after all these years exactly now because the dislike number is not visible anymore.
Bill, excellent video! I appreciate you taking the time to put this together!
Thanks, I thought this was an important thing to put on RUclips.
Really great job on this test. Thanks for taking the time and effort to shoot and edit this. Respect
Amazing work! Thanks for taking the time to do this. If I was going to keep only one thing out of this it would be that analog is better with highlights while digital is better with shadows.
That was an interesting comparison Bill - and not what I expected. I always shoot 1/3 or 1/2 stop under with digital but didn't realize the degradation when over-exposing. Much more latitude when film is over exposed and... I quite like the resulting look when shooting 9 or 10 stops over. You're right, it's got a bit of an abstract/pictorial look. I like it. Thanks for posting.
I shoot both film and digital. I have heard, more or less as "conventional wisdom" with film, never underexpose more than one stop. (Unless of course you want that washed out look for some artistic purpose or endeavor) And with film, it can tolerate 3 stops of O.E. Although this test shows it was much higher, but could also be based on film stock used. Like you, with digital I usually shoot .5 stops U.E. on purpose, as I don't like harsh/bright/blinding highlights.
Thanks for doing the test and sharing it with us. To me, the result was very intresting and it enlightend me for my workshop. I believe that you solved the concept of dynamic range comparisons for many inluding me. Again, I admire the effort
Very intresting review. You can see clearly in this test the behaviour of light between film and digital in this type of filmrol. Well done.
Very glad that @curiousdroid directed me to this short and informative comparison.
Nice that you edited this down to the essentials. This generally matches my experience of black-and-white photography… back in the day when I had a darkroom. And my work, printing in commercial labs. Also my observations about digital when underexposed, still yielding usable results using Photoshop. Thank you very much for producing it and doing it soooo well. : )
Thanks, appreciate it!
Facinating results, would love to see further tests!
I'm planning on further tests. Researching models and equipment right now. So we'll see if my budget will allow it.
Very interesting tests. Thank you.
To the author of this video: you are a saint. We desperately need such clear, simple experiments.
This is an awesome resource. Thank you.
Excellent video. Well done!
Very interesting. Have always tried to "shot to the left" on digital cameras, but never made a proper test. It just seemed way easier to go with a slightly shorter exposure time in tricky situations and just correct it in post than to shot the way the camera wanted and finding myself with blown highlights.
this is a great demonstration of how its okay to overexpose film and okay to underexpose digital but not so much the other way around
An amazing demonstration, I had no idea! (I was sent here from CuriousDroid's video:)
Beautiful explanation.....love ur channel..❤
Really interesting, Bill.
Very interesting and thanks for doing the tests. Definitely your results echo the adage to expose for the shadows on film and for the highlights with digital. I know that there are different developers that can extend the range of the film and of course one could change development times and temps as well (push and pull), wonder what tricks there are for digital?
Great video!
Film is really good at overexposing. But only for negative films.
Slide film is another story.
Fair enough!
5:08 thumb up for mentioning pictorialism 🙏
Interesting! Well Done!
Very cool, thanks for putting in the time and effort! I was aware that film (generally) has great highlight retention and sucks underexposed and for digital it’s the opposite, but I had no idea you could go that extreme with (at least this BNW) film. Color casts with color negative film make it a whole nother debate, but you got some great examples nontheless.
Thank you. This video was really needed for people to know how both formats deal with exposure, since film fans say film is better, digital fans say digital is better, so this puts the record straight and this is exactly what ive seen also in Arri Alexa vs Film Cameras, the same issues.
The one sided people are just being a******s, this is a true and neutral comparison, thanks!
You're welcome!! I was glad to do it
Great experiment really interesting and well done! Proves that negatives like exposure :-)
Seem you did not calculate the reciprocity failure of the film. According to your video the ideal exposure was close to the point where the Schwarzschild effect start to appear. So the underexposure test only shows how the film punishes you for your mistakes. The level of punishment can be demonstrated with a parabolic curve. :)
PM me if you wanna discuss it any further.
The difference between ISO standards is why some of these comparisons exist. At least for black and white negative film, ISO is based on a certain minimum shadow density, whereas development time changes the gamma, or contrast. For digital, ISO is based on saturation of the pixels. It's set at 18% grey being only 11.7% of saturation, so it gives you 100% reflectance and an extra 41% reflectance for specular highlights. Overall, this would be about 3⅓ stops, and most cameras err on the side of underexposing it by another ⅓ from that, getting you about 3⅔ stops from grey to white clipping in the raw. Movie cameras, like the Arri Alexa, shoot at an EI of 800 nominally, even though the photographic base iso would only be 100. It underexposed the images in order to bring that 3⅓ stops overexposure latitude up to 6 or 7, so that under and overexposure latitude are more equal. You can do this on photographic cameras by using DR 200/400% modes, or any highlight tone priority settings will do this under the hood. I wish digital cameras went more for cinema style ISO settings which preserve Dynamic range at all ISOs instead of losing a stop every doubling.
excellent video
thank you
I shoot 100% B&W film. I expose to bring up the shadows knowing it is darn near impossible to lose the high lights and when you do the roll off is so gradual it looks good. Then in the darkroom i use a split contrast technique to get both on the print. Digital is kind of the opposite. I am more interested in color and protecting my highlights. I can bring the the shadows up easily in post
Thank you for showing the comparison of film vs digital in terms of exposure. An analogy would be like raw corn kernels as unexposed grains in film: each kernel store a variable amount of water but too little water and it won't pop. When you heat kernels, not all will pop at once but with enough time and heat, the majority of them will pop - they are "exposed." But as we all know, some of them just won't pop no matter how long you heat it. I suspect, but cannot prove, that it's the same idea with grains in film - some grains on negatives just won't 'pop' despite overexposing several stops so you end up with an image that looks "pictorialism."
very interesting! I started back in 81 so i did many things during the film era. one thing that's keep surprising me is the similarities between a good 35mm film quality compare with a digicam full frame 20mp enlarged up to A3 on paper. on screen the digi quality is overwhelming but not on paper. you should also run the same experiment with color slides and negs. i believe the results will be different.
Great idea!
Cool, it was really interistin to watch!
Glad you liked it
An interesting trial but to compare these two mediums it is necessary to observe the correct use of them... Anyone experienced in film photography will know that the exposure reading should be in a "shadow" area of the subject while digital reading are taken in a mid to high illuminated area (as also with slide or positive film stock). Film has a greater dynamic range than digital due to its ability to deal with greater range of highlights, which is demonstrated in this clip.. A very interesting demonstration of the variances of the two mediums.
Negative film forgives overexposure, but you're punished for underexposure. Digital is the other way around. In a digital RAW file, there is still a lot of information in the depths. That's why you should never overexpose with digital cameras and never underexpose film. With film, the sensitivity flattens out in the highlights. This is a very thankful feature.
Brilliant, brilliant experiment. Never knew this much tolerance and latitude of digital in underexposure and Film in Overexposure sides.
Tony Northop must see this clip.
Hahaha, I doubt Tony Northrop would want to see this.
@@lawsonpix He had an episode on fakeness (!) of ISO as an industry trick that encountered a lot of opposition.
I think it was about 3 years back and the original title was:
_ISO is totally FAKE. Seriously_
That was followed up by updates and then several other YTbers reactions to this that lasted a long time.
Your clip is perfect proof of what he wanted to state, only in a more scientifically oriented path (Especially the Film's real comparison).
I'm pretty sure he will credit you, should he see your experience.
Anyways, I enjoyed intensely and admired all that you did here, so brilliantly and so patiently.
Keep up the excellent job. 👍👍
really nice experiment....
Nice video
Thanks for the testing, but as another comment said, you should scan with EV compensation, and your result for film would be better in the underexposed film images. Your conclusion on the usability of film even overexposed is true, if you consider using the images for artistic use (I often shoot severely underexposed on purpose for artistic images), for precision documentary work they were unusable even from around +7 IMHO
this is brilliant! !!!!
Thanks. I try to push envelope a little to see what happens.
@@lawsonpix Best way to get results you didn't expect. So much more fun that way as well.
A great test confirming what I had always suspected. Thank you for the work on this.
Overexposed film reminds me of those artsy and hip album covers of alternative and indie rock records from the 80s.
so great picture
Thanks !
+10 stops on 100iso is like treating the film as if it has iso of 0.1. I'm not sure if I see huge value in that - say an exposure of 1/5th second at f/1.4 in bright sunlight. Certainly I think having 10 stops of under exposure tolerance is of more use to me.
Maybe it is just nostalgia, but I really like those unusable film over and under exposed images. :)
This is an eye-opener. I would like to see this same experiment done with color negative and color transparency vs digital. I believe color negative would show some positive results in overexposure. Possible color transparencies would favor on underexposure.
Slide film would fair much worse than either. At best you’d have 5 stops total. Place the exposure exactly where you want it because there is no recovery.
Purposeful under or overexposure is used all the time when shooting b&w film with intent. In a modern hybrid workflow, the goal is to maximize density range captured on the negative to maximize tonal resolution on the subsequent scan. Purposefully overexposed frames would be pulled developed. Purposefully underexposed frames would be push developed.
Interesting test - one question though; did you perform shadow and highlight recovery during the scanning process?
Yes, a little. For both film and digital.
cool stuff, but you didn't consider the tmax 100 exposure curve, which is balanced more for the highlights, there are films that work better in lowlights, of course, i think that overall digital is better in lowlights.
Would be interesting to compare with reversal slide film,
also BW film should have a wider range vs color(??), vs digital sensor which is always color.
THANK VERY MUCH FOR VIDEO
With reversal film you get bad results with just 1 or 2 stops of under or overexposure
Fab little video Bill. I enjoy these types of experiments - I'm going to drop you a mail.
Hi, did you try to take RAW 12 bit pictures and check, maybe highlights are preserved after level tuning? I think there is 8 bit data problem, where adding up values (0-255 per color) max out quickly to 255 and you get white
I shot this in RAW
I'm pretty sure such professional would shoot in 14 bit raw
Excellent! This is my kind of test. Super interesting. Well done. Color next? :) //Andrew
Color would be great. I have not tried any color developing yet. So we'll see.
Def your style D&A!
Interesting. I'm not surprised that film performs well while being overexposed, it is a well known fact that b&w negative film is very forgiving regarding over exposure, but I did not think that it would perform _that_ well. On the other hand I did not expect film to perform that bad underexposed and that digital performed that good with underexposing and that bad with overexposing.
With b&w I usually meter for exposure in the shadows, what consequently leads to overexposure of the brighter areas in the picture. This test shows, that this is exactly the correct way to do. Obviously, with a digital camera one should do it just the other way around, meter the highlights and accept vast underexposure of the shadows.
Yes, that seems to be true
The video is interesting. It's really is a "scanner/software test," and not so much a comparison between how much contrast a film photo and digital photo have.
So great to see a very great experiment ever so far, thank you Bill, haha
I love the juxtaposition of film and digital.
It’s something I have seen in film but but not digital. Both have their strengths, weaknesses and limitations.
Thank you for doing this experiment. It is something I would have done, and I took notes.
Since you did this at speed for film and developed it normally. Film has a lot of range being pushed. I wonder if you pushed the film two stops to ISO 400 how much dynamic range you get bracketing. With pushed development. I know with pushing film you lose shadow detail, but will still give -2 stops?
That's a good question, have you seen this video? ruclips.net/video/idepJM8iHpY/видео.html
@@lawsonpix yes
Wonderfullllllll
Sunrises and sunsets always look best on film. Try and prove me wrong. For every thing else digital is just as good, if not better (technically)
i think u should shoot RAW mode of digital and the best exposure of film, then put them in computer to test which one has more details on highlight and shadow~~~i personally think film only got 12stops DR, but the most current cameras got 15stops DR on raw photo and 14stops DR on video
Does your friend in the video have a public social media page? She has a great look.
Yes, she has a great look. Sorry no social media
Depending on camera and situation, you could multi-expose the same frame of film 2-3 times when it is underexposed and have a lot of details in picture. I've seen one doing this on a landscape photo getting fantastic results, but although my Nikon has this ability, i never tried it myself.
Maybe I'm wrong, but shouldn't you over/under develop photos that are too dark/light?
That's a good point
Kyle McDougall does some detailed over/under exposure comparisons for a handful of negative films. Here's one. ruclips.net/video/jp4eJvTBjKU/видео.html
Film can't really handle underexposure, so of course it doesn't look good underexposed.
I don’t get it, why don’t digital cameras use -1 or -2 exp compensation by default and hide this fact from the user. You only need to compensate it back while processing, again, do it by default. And yes, such cameras would lose ISO100 capabilities, starting from 200, but that would protect from 95% cases of overexposure.
Cell phones do that.
Hello , What is this You are great Man , great great great
Thank you 👍
Great experiment but PLEASE stop fading every cut. It's okay to jump cut
Thanks you for the effort, but I couldn't help noticing there's something very inconsistent in these tests. Film picture is clearly brighter at 1/15 4:30 than 1/8 4:35 (?). At 1/15 the highlights in the chair are blown out while they're retained at 1/8. Also, shadows at 1/15 are much more visible, at 1/8, instead, her shirt is almost pitch black. I'm not saying you did something wrong, this could be faulty mechanisms in the analog cam, but it completely defeats the purpose of the video.
I did my best to balance out the brightness in each photo. So maybe you're seeing that?
@@lawsonpix Hi. Thanks for the response. What I mean is that, while the digital photos are very consistent with each doubling of exposure, the film ones present an obvious incoherence. One just can't have blown out highlights (chair the most noticeable) at 1/15 and then have information there when the exposure doubles. Same for the shadows (conversely). Am I wrong on this?
I believe there's a hidden variable you didn't account for. Nevertheless, thanks for the time making this video. I'm a huge admirer of film photography and I know the effort that goes into it.
You manipulate a scan of film negative, over an already digital maybe raw file to determinate dynamic range. Not a fair comparasion
it's very interesting, but you're not working on digital vs film, but on digital vs digitalized film. absolutely nothing to do with the real meaning of dynamic range IMHO. I think a good test could be to make a photo in a very high contrast scene, 15 or 16ev from dark to light and then with a proper good job in post processing digital process, and in developing and darkroom printing process , you can analize wich is the system with the bigger dynamic range, ad of course film will win with no doubt if well processed.