I dumped digital and now I'm all film, it's stressful (rant)

[Sirius Glass]

I think I've done a damn good job of convincing myself, let alone the work others have done, but since coming back to film from digital I have:

Bought a 4x5 camera
Learned I want more extension so I bought another one
Bought a slight wide angle
Needed a longer lens for portrait and still life, so bought one
Bought a bigger enlarger
Timer for said enlarger
Gralab clock
Densitometer
4x5 hangers and tanks (albeit Rubbermaid type)
8x10 hangers and tanks (just in case) with 4-up 4x5 hangers for large batches
2 different film developers
Two paper developers
Various papers
Van Dyke chemicals I have yet to use
Film holders
Oodles of film
Easel
Trays in 8x10 and 11x14 sizes (4 each size)
Sepia toner
A durst MF enlarger and boxes of stuff to pick through, most of which I will sell
Currently in the process of moving to 5x7 for larger contact prints and have the Arentz book on Pt/Pd coming on Tuesday.

I know an even larger camera will come when I can afford lenses and film for it. And God forbid I decide to do colour, then I'll need a JOBO, colour densitometer, colour analyzer, dichroic enlarger, tri-colour light meter, lens filters. Oh, I forgot I need a contact printing frame for my Van Dyke and Pt/Pd... at least a UV bulb if I don't spring for a whole exposure unit. I was also thinking about wet-plate so there's a workshop, plate holders, silver bath, developer and fixer trays, lots o' bottles, ether, collodion, silver nitrate, various bromide, chloride, and iodide salts, lavender varnish.........

*runs from the men in white coats*

And your point is????

I brought a similar set up and STILL spent less that a good D-camera and color photo quality printer!

Stve

 

[DanielOB]

Snegron
Seems to me you are still not aware of CD-trouble...
Daniel OB
www.Leica-R.com

 

[keithwms]

Andrey, congrats on your venture, enjoy it! There are still many good reasons to do what you did. You will discover more reasons as you go.

I won't jump into the archival debate- I'm afraid it's all been said before, and more than once.

 

[ricksplace]

Lighter fluid evaporates, but leaves a residue. Carb cleaner (now called throttle body cleaner) is a much cleaner solvent and I've used it on two gummed up leaf shutters with spectacular results. A little off topic, but I thought I'd mention it.

Just my .02 here...
Be careful with carb cleaner. I have used a great deal of it (I'm a bit of a gear head) and I never use it on cameras. Most carb cleaner has an oil lubricant in the solvent, which tends to gum up shutters after a while. I have found that brake cleaner works best. Get the one with hexane as the solvent rather than perchloroethane(sp?) (dry cleaning fluid). The hexane is more volatile, dries faster, and leaves no residue. Make sure there is lots of ventilation, and no open flames. Better still, do it outside.

Rick.

 

[snegron]

I would not call a burnt DVD an archival format!! I can assure you that my employer still backs up all its archive records to film. Hell manufacturers state that burnt DVD's are only good for about 10-15 years. What will happen if your wedding customer wants a reprint in 20-30 years time? Then you are running the real risk that either the file format or disk format can no longer be read. Sorry, I the informed consumer don't want to take that risk for your convenience today. And that's why I want my wedding in a few months time to be done on film. I always like the argument that digi photographers put up that their work is worth $$$ and then I ask what are you backing your photo's up to with the response oh just a CD/DVD and my reply back is so by backing your data up to an unstable media you have just valued your work at the price of a blank cd/dvd which when I last looked was around $A 0.25-2.50 for CD/DVD. Unfortunately when people seem to shoot digi the ideas of data security and value of that data which are key concepts in enterprise computing, seem to go out the window.

I have color negatives that I shot 20 years ago that have lost most of their contrast and color! I have negatives that are only a few weeks old that have scratches on them. I still have image files saved as JPEG's that are 7 years old and the colors and contrast are the same as they were the day I shot them! As for longevity, color film is not that great compared to black and white. I can see your point with black and white negatives, but color negatives will die at about the same time digital date will "allegedly" become corrupt or invalid.

Negative longevity depends almost entirely on proper storage. I'm sure that color negatives will last a century if they are kept in a climate controlled vault. With DVD's or CD's, all I have to do is copy them every 5 years. No big deal. As for accidents and scratches, Celluloid melts at the same rate that plastic does, so if a fire were to occur both would be destroyed. Both are ruined if they are scratched (advantage goes to digital if you store them on a hard drive).

As for the value of my work, I don't understand why you would tack on an extra 500% just because of archiving images! The clients pay for the images I take. Just because I'm saving money on film and processing doesn't mean that my work is any less valuable to the client.

This really makes me laugh. Judging by all the negative responses here I think we all need to get together and send out a letter to all pros who are currently using digital and tell them to stop immediately! Their 10, 16, 22, or whatever megapixel cameras can not produce any sort of image worth displaying and they will only last a few weeks! We need to send a letter to all wedding photographers who are members of WPPI and tell them to stop shooting digital immediately because there is no way they can produce any sort of acceptable images with their non-film equipment!

You know, I mentioned in all of my posts that I still enjoy using film and digital. After reading so many negative posts here I get more turned off by film every day. Yes, we that are here enjoy using film, but I don't think we should be knocking digital in the process. Instead of coming here to talk about film gear and share/get advice from fellow film users, I find myself having to walk on eggshells everytime I say something or having to defend why I use both mediums. I understand that this is a film forum, but why insult or degrade digital every chance we get? When the topic of film comes up in digital forums (even on DP), no one gets as uptight, hostile, and snobbish as they do here. It is very sad. I used to enjoy visiting here.

 

[Andrey]

You know, I mentioned in all of my posts that I still enjoy using film and digital. After reading so many negative posts here I get more turned off by film every day. Yes, we that are here enjoy using film, but I don't think we should be knocking digital in the process. Instead of coming here to talk about film gear and share/get advice from fellow film users, I find myself having to walk on eggshells everytime I say something or having to defend why I use both mediums. I understand that this is a film forum, but why insult or degrade digital every chance we get? When the topic of film comes up in digital forums (even on DP), no one gets as uptight, hostile, and snobbish as they do here. It is very sad. I used to enjoy visiting here.

I'm not here to argue. All I did was state that I am using and what works for me.

Then you seem to have an impulse to convince that I'm actually wrong, having tried it and digital WILL work better for me.

Why?

 

[CBG]

From a cost stand point I dont see how digital can claim to cost less than Analog. I still have my first camers I got in high school in 1965, a Speed Graphic, and a Kodak Retina IIIC Big, both still work and take good photos, I have my first SLR a Spotmatic from 1966, I would still have my Nikon F3 if had been ripped off at LAX in 2001. My D3 is 35 years old, and I got it used. My newist camera is a SA 9 paid about $400 in 2003.

Digital SD 10, need to replace with a SD 14, my SD 10 it will sell for about $300, the SD 14 is about $1400, I also need a new wide for the SD 10, around $400, need new upgrades for my computer + software, and then a new scanner. And I have ready gotten rumors about a SD 15 due out next year. Not to mention a new printer.

Totaling the cost of equipment, time and materials I figure a 8X10 digital print runs me about $4.50 in house, on R4 from a lab $8.00 to $9.00 black and white or color an analog color 8X10, in house R 4 $1.75. black and white $1.25.

My thoughts too... I've been watching the digital revolution for years hoping for a sort of affordable full frame sensor cameras or larger, but the rate of depreciation and the intial cost combined to be a killer. I'm so glad I didn't buy the Kodak / Nikon full frame camers a few years ago.

I have nikons and tons of various other top end equipment from 15 to 40 years or so that are still top end equipment. The long term total cost of initial purchase and depreciation per year is almost nil. I will eventually have to get a mid end digital camera to send quick images to my gallery, but the depreciation and lack of long term service and parts committment makes a real full fledged plunge into digital unlikely.

Like others say, not a good idea to get into an anti-digital diatribe. But it has been frustrating watching the digital bandwagon take an enormously promising idea and waste it - at least for my purposes and in my opinion. I'd do more with digital if the offerings were better.

C

 

[MikeM1977]

I've been back and forth. Started my interest in photography with a Canon digital back in 2002. But once I held a Minolta SRT-101, I was hooked on analog...plunged deep (35mm, 6x6, darkroom, etc) and then deeper (4x5).

Now I just ordered my first dSLR. Feels like gimicky plastic compared to my 35mm gear. But I see it supplementing (not replacing) my photographic toolset that consists of 4x5, 6x6, and 35mm. Our first baby is coming next month and I forsee a need/desire to provide immediate images transferred digitally. Film scanning is not my cup of tea. Instead of being threatened by digital, I am taking the approach of embracing its unique characteristics. I still plan on doing plenty of 35mm B&W, 6x6, and 4x5.

Now about that Sigma lens...could be interested...PM me!

 

[gregrudd]

I have color negatives that I shot 20 years ago that have lost most of their contrast and color! I have negatives that are only a few weeks old that have scratches on them. I still have image files saved as JPEG's that are 7 years old and the colors and contrast are the same as they were the day I shot them! As for longevity, color film is not that great compared to black and white. I can see your point with black and white negatives, but color negatives will die at about the same time digital date will "allegedly" become corrupt or invalid.

If colour shifts occur they still can be corrected, data corruption or CD/DVD de-lamination occurs arr oops!! Garbage bin time.

Negative longevity depends almost entirely on proper storage. I'm sure that color negatives will last a century if they are kept in a climate controlled vault. With DVD's or CD's, all I have to do is copy them every 5 years. No big deal.

That is of course if the media is still avail and the file format still can be read! I remember hearing at work a story were a research group were trying to read data from an experiment recorded on tape in the late 1970's and were having all sorts of probs trying to get the stuff read.

As for accidents and scratches, Celluloid melts at the same rate that plastic does, so if a fire were to occur both would be destroyed. Both are ruined if they are scratched (advantage goes to digital if you store them on a hard drive).

If a neg has a scratch at least you can still do some manipulation if your data is corrupted then its game over man, game over pro! With hard drive I would be like to think you are using another technology other than IDE/SATA No doubt you are aware MTBF between the various disk types. And I hope you are using at least RAID5 on your disk array? If not, you are not making a very good advertisement for your business.

As for the value of my work, I don't understand why you would tack on an extra 500% just because of archiving images! The clients pay for the images I take. Just because I'm saving money on film and processing doesn't mean that my work is any less valuable to the client.

For the sake of this discussion we will call these photo's "data".

If this data was worth so much $$$ to your business then you would be taking more care with its preservation than backing it up in such a cheap and hap hazzard way. No IT sysadmin worth his boot lace would suggest such a back up strategy. Have you priced decent industrial standard disk arrays using fibre channel/sas and tape drives using LTO3 etc. And remember all your computing equipment will need to be replaced every 3-4 years. As a professional IT sysadmin I hate to burst your bubble, you have vastly underestimated your computing requirements.

This really makes me laugh. Judging by all the negative responses here I think we all need to get together and send out a letter to all pros who are currently using digital and tell them to stop immediately! Their 10, 16, 22, or whatever megapixel cameras can not produce any sort of image worth displaying and they will only last a few weeks! We need to send a letter to all wedding photographers who are members of WPPI and tell them to stop shooting digital immediately because there is no way they can produce any sort of acceptable images with their non-film equipment!

Just cut the theatrics and the neurotic self involvement and start looking at things rationally. Everyone here is quite well aware of the vices of film.

You know, I mentioned in all of my posts that I still enjoy using film and digital. After reading so many negative posts here I get more turned off by film every day. Yes, we that are here enjoy using film, but I don't think we should be knocking digital in the process. Instead of coming here to talk about film gear and share/get advice from fellow film users, I find myself having to walk on eggshells everytime I say something or having to defend why I use both mediums. I understand that this is a film forum, but why insult or degrade digital every chance we get? When the topic of film comes up in digital forums (even on DP), no one gets as uptight, hostile, and snobbish as they do here. It is very sad. I used to enjoy visiting here.

If pointing out its "digital's" vices upsets you then that's your problem not mine or anyone else's for that matter.

Tally pip.

 

[middy]

The JPEG format is not going to just disappear. That's ludicrous. It's not an undocumented proprietary format. Any comp-sci grad student (and many undergrads) could write a new implementation from scratch from the publicly available specifications.

I back up all my digital data online, on Amazon.com's world-class server farms for 15 cents per GB per month. Check out Jungle Disk.

That being said, too many people will lose lots of photos due to hard-drive crashes and decomposing CDs, just as too many negatives are lost to poor storage. However, negatives do have a better chance of having at least some usable image after suffering neglect. A corrupted JPEG is often unusable.