stunned by film

[studiocygnet]

I just had to share this with y'all. I got together with the San Antonio folks at the capitol here in Austin last Saturday. I mostly shot with a 12.1 megapixel Pentax that I got last summer. I've been using it the most lately, along with my old Olympus OM1 a couple times. I hadn't pulled my Mamiya 6 out of the pack for a while, probably since the last Austin GTG sometime last year. I brought it along last week and ran one roll of expired film that I've kept in the refrigerator through it, along with using the digital. So I've spent the last few days processing the digital files, and I thought some of them looked pretty good. They are posted on the results page of the San Antonio GTG site, if you want to see.
Well, I got the negatives back yesterday evening from that one roll of 220, and scanned the first one a little while ago. It was just an architectural study of the interior of one the capitol hallways. I scanned them at 360dpi and 12" square, basically 4320x4320 pixels. It's a 106 megabite scan. I import into Photoshop, and bump the view up to "actual pixels" to clone a couple of hairs out (the hazards of scanning negatives). I was stunned - literally. I mean, this thing is as sharp at actual pixels as it is print size. The detail and grain is amazing. Here it is, straight from the scan, no sharpening, dodging, fading, nothing was done but cloning the hairs and spots. I realize that y'all can't share my view, since I had to shrink it down to jpeg to get here, but let's just say that I need to shoot medium format more often. If you've got an old MF camera hanging around that you haven't used in a while, I'd recommend pulling it out and playing. Surprised me with the results.

[Shane Jennings]

Very nice. Analog is awesome.

Kinda like the guitar equivalent of a good old tube amp (analog) that is full of life versus a solid state transistor (digital) amp that is very lifeless and cold sounding.

Those little digital pixels just aren't the same as the free-flowing naturalness of film. But maybe someday.....

[J Eddington]

And that is why I need to get my camera fixed!!!

[brad]

I keep thinking that I want to pull out the film camera again... only to shoot B&W... process it myself... I dunno if I even still have all the development equipment... but the idea has..... appeal.

[CobyPhoto]

Pretty much the reason I still shoot so much film for Commercial Clients.

CJ

[iCe]

Film rocks... I just wish I had the time to shoot some...

[laawaaris]

what kind of film did you use?

[vettenfun]

Long life the "Dynamic Range"

[venchka]

I guess you should! Ude MF that is. Or any film based gear. The Mamiya 6 is a great tool.

What scanner did you use? That's half the battle when dealing with film. The other half is knowing how to scan. I'm learning, but it's a slow process. I don't know how to scan well, but my old 6x7 negatives look really nice all blown up HUGE!

Get out there and use up some film.

[LEATHERNECK]

Love that film....sold my Pentax 2 1/4 but still have a Mamiya 645 Pro and pulled it out this week to use this weekend. Chromes are kick butt......

[TXhummer2]

That sinks it! I was just going to take my Fuji digicam tomorrow, but now my Canon F-1 is calling me (Take me! Take me!). Tomorrow is my great aunt's 100th birthday party! The only film I have on hand is Kodak Porta 400NC, a film I have never used.

[LEATHERNECK]

The only film I have on hand is Kodak Porta 400NC, a film I have never used.

You'll like this film. I prefer the VC but each to his own taste. The NC is a fine film. Happy shooting.

[studiocygnet]

Originally Posted by laawaaris

what kind of film did you use?

I was using some Fuji NPH 400. I bought 10 rolls for $10 from someone off craigslist. At a dollar a roll, I figured why not check it out. And even though I prefer black and white, now I can shoot in color and open it up in Adobe camera raw and mess around with the color channels on the black and white conversion.

[studiocygnet]

Originally Posted by venchka

What scanner did you use? That's half the battle when dealing with film. The other half is knowing how to scan. I'm learning, but it's a slow process. I don't know how to scan well, but my old 6x7 negatives look really nice all blown up HUGE!

Get out there and use up some film.

I'm just using an Epson Perfection 2450 Photo flatbed scanner for the big negatives. I've got a Nikon Coolscan V for the small stuff. And it's true, I'm still playing with scanning techniques. I'm undecided whether to sharpen in the scan or in CS3. Sometimes it seems better to scan sharpen, but then some negatives end up looking too grainy. It almost depends on the individual neg.

[TXhummer2]

No excuse, I just didn't get the Canon F-1 out of the car. Worked out though. The 28mm on my Fuji zoom came in handy. And my wife wonders how I got 101 out of a "Century of Life" announcement, so I corrected my post. Oh, and my Fuji's video mode came in handy too. I'll have to try the film on something else.