Motivation Behind Shooting Color Film and Scanning

Eric Rose · Aug 30, 2018

I shot some candids of my daughter and grand daughter a few weeks ago. Used my M5 and Ektar. I gave her a 4x6 drugstore photo and she almost broke down in tears. She just looked and looked at it and then clutched it to her chest. You don't get that kind of reaction by showing someone the back screen on your digicam.

MattKing · Aug 30, 2018

FWIW, I can take a jpeg straight out of my digital camera, send it digitally to a relatively local Costco, and about two hours later pick up a more than half decent RA-4 12"x16" print that costs me less than $10.00 CDN.
I can do the same with a scanned from file - I just have to work a bit more on the file.

jim10219 · Aug 30, 2018

The real question is why do film and wet prints at all? In the modern, digital age, you can do so much more with a digital camera than you ever could with film and a wet print. The quality is higher. It’s cheaper. It’s much more versatile.

And while I’m at it, why do I shoot instant film? It’s expensive. The quality is really poor. You still have to scan them to post them online. You can’t easily make a second print.

And why on earth would I ever consider alternative process? They’re difficult. They’re expensive. And the colors and resolution is much worse than even a bad inkjet print.

And the answer is because I enjoy the process. I enjoy the difficulty. I enjoy the connection to the past. I enjoy making things by hand. I just enjoy it all. And that’s the point of any hobby. Hobbies never make sense from a practice standpoint, and they’re not supposed to.

Sometimes I do photography for money. Mostly product photography, weddings, or photos of businesses for websites and print displays. In those situations, I stick strictly to digital. The reason is cost and convenience. I have to know I got it right the first time and have to be able to manipulate it to the clients liking with as little time involved as possibly to maximize profit.

They’re different tools for different jobs.

RPC · Aug 30, 2018

jim10219 said:
The quality is higher. It’s cheaper. It’s much more versatile.

Could you explain how you arrive at such opinions.

Eric Rose · Aug 30, 2018

RPC said:
Could you explain how you arrive at such opinions.

Oh lets not go down that road AGAIN. Let the deluded have their little corner in peace. As mentioned it's about what you prefer as a hobbiest.

RPC · Aug 31, 2018

Eric Rose said:
Oh lets not go down that road AGAIN. Let the deluded have their little corner in peace.

Okay, it's a deal. I withdraw the question.

Richard Man · Aug 31, 2018

I don't understand why not everybody eat Chinese food, and with chopsticks, and heck, speak Cantonese ~_o, but it's OK. We are all different.

TonyB65 · Aug 31, 2018

faberryman said:
So if all that it true, why are they shooting film to begin with.

I'm sure lots of people have a variety of different reasons, I've given mine, I can't speak for everyone else. However, on Emulsive.org they have a regular slot on people who have gone back to film or started shooting it, their reasons are very much in accord with mine. Many of them don't have the time to wet print, or even develop it, but they love the cameras, the look of film and the way you shoot it, that's almost universal.

TonyB65 · Aug 31, 2018

Eric Rose said:
Why? For new people shooting film, because it's cool and different. For us oldsters, because it's cool and familiar.

I'm not young, I never had much time to shoot film and was never interested in photography when I was younger, but now is different, I came back to film after getting interested in digital photography, it was a natural evolution for me, there are plenty like me. There are also some advantages to shooting film, digital isn't perfect by any means.

Bob Carnie · Aug 31, 2018

Richard Man said:
I don't understand why not everybody eat Chinese food, and with chopsticks, and heck, speak Cantonese ~_o, but it's OK. We are all different.

LOL nice one Richard

Luckless · Aug 31, 2018

I currently shoot on film to scan for a rather simple reason: I don't have the money, space, or time to dedicate to a darkroom.

Most of the gear I use for processing my film shots into a final print was gear that I already had, or that I have since used for other projects as well. (Such as scanning old existing photos to more easily share with friends and family. I have a very large extended family, so that 'one photo we found of Grandpa as a kid' doesn't go very far. Plus with how often myself and my cousins have ended up moving around the country for work, shoe boxes of photos aren't exactly the greatest thing to have when you're hoping on a plane to move for work on two week's notice.)
Other than a small plastic wash bin sitting on a shelf in my closet, paterson tank development hasn't taken up a lot of space.

From here I can comfortably adjust and edit the images, and 'hire out' the printing process cheaply and easily, and most importantly I can do so without risking my original negatives! They're safely stored at my home, and can't go missing at a lab or in the post. And I don't have to find time out of my day to drop in to a printers or have discussions with them that may or may not be correctly understood, it is simply "Take this file, and print it on your standard paper with your usual profile" - All of the adjustments, all the dodging, burning, and spotting is already done. (And all the spotting I did for the first copy is already done for the 1000th copy too...)

And the best part is: Nothing says I can't go back in a few years and reprint all of these images that I decided I really liked when I finally do get a darkroom setup going.

Chan Tran · Aug 31, 2018

I shoot film then scan even when I was still doing color darkroom printing myself. But I must do the scan myself. It doesn't make sense for me to have someone else do the scanning. I scan so I can see what my negatives look like and then make darkroom prints of the ones that I like. Before scanning became available I had the lab make 4x6 then pick the ones I like an printed myself. Scanning also helps me in getting the color balance and density right when I print.

Luckless · Aug 31, 2018

Chan Tran said:
Scanning also helps me in getting the color balance and density right when I print.

That is an interesting point that I hadn't really thought of yet. I'm still in my research stages of getting into working with colour films, but I expect I will be sticking with my 'scan for now, wet print later' work flow.

The other point I forgot about why scans are useful to me: Archive and documentation. I like to have digital copies, with keywords, of all my images. It is easy enough for me to flip through my current collections of negatives to both see what is there and to find the one I want, but I expect this to slowly stop being the case. So if I want to find a photo I took 'years ago' of a horse, then I like the idea of opening my collection catalogue on my phone or computer, typing in 'horse', and then scrolling through just those images rather than trying to remember if I took a photo in 2016 or 2017, and only being 'pretty sure' it wasn't actually 2018...

Les Sarile · Aug 31, 2018

To date, I have over 35K frames of various film sizes/types/brands that I have scanned over the years using many scanners from various labs/flatbeds/dedicated/digicams. I continue to use film and scan them on my Coolscan even though I have a great variety of digicams. I am fully aware of the convenience of digicams but I still like film/scanned results better.

David T T · Sep 2, 2018

I shoot film because I always have. My thought process begins with "what film should I use?"... Its the starting point for the look of a photo or shoot. And a scan of Portra 400 does not look like digital, especially at night.

I scan because I share my photos online, of course. Like most modern people, I enjoy viewing and sharing photos online. Oh and I live for Instagram.

macfred · Sep 2, 2018

Les Sarile said:
... I am fully aware of the convenience of digicams but I still like film/scanned results better.

This !

Luckless said:
...And the best part is: Nothing says I can't go back in a few years and reprint all of these images that I decided I really liked when I finally do get a darkroom setup going.

and that !

---

These days I only have a 'non permanent' darkroom setup for b/w-work / wet printing , so I usually tend to do scanning. I'm happy about this option.
I will do more darkroom work in future -like I did 25 years before- when there is more space and time (probably after retirement and the kids have left the house).

Richard Man · Sep 2, 2018

I suppose I should give a non-flippant answer. Why do I shoot color film and scan? Two words: Xpan, and 4x5. Photography is about the image and also about the process. While many digital cameras can produce more detailed images than the Xpan or 4x5, the experience of the image making is totally different, plus "the looks" cannot be duplicated.

Why scan and print? 24" is the normal size for me. I often print even larger.

Alan Edward Klein · Sep 2, 2018

I find when I shoot MF, the process and thinking slows down. I'm more deliberate in framing the shot, spending time with different views, waiting for the light, trying to find a quality that digital tends to diminish due to its quick operation. Also, MF shooting tends to be for individual shots. Each stands on it's own.
Here are examples. https://www.flickr.com/photos/alanklein2000/albums/72157625476289859

However, when I go on a excursion locally or on vacation with my wife, I want to create a "movie" slide show at the end that I can show on my HDTV. So digital including video clips and stills shot and framed in 16:9 makes more sense. Here's an example of a trip our men's club took to a fire academy last week. I shot it on my cellphone as I didn;t have my regular digital camera at the time.

faberryman · Sep 2, 2018

Alan Edward Klein said:
I find when I shoot MF, the process and thinking slows down. I'm more deliberate in framing the shot, spending time with different views, waiting for the light, trying to find a quality that digital tends to diminish due to its quick operation. Also, MF shooting tends to be for individual shots. Each stands on it's own.

I shoot film and digital the same way. One shot at a time. Digital is a different capture medium not a different way of shooting, at least for me.

Alan Edward Klein · Sep 2, 2018

faberryman said:
I shoot film and digital the same way. One shot at a time. Digital is a different capture medium not a different way of shooting, at least for me.

I agree. But the process is different between shooting let's say landscapes one at a time and travel vacation or a party photos where you are trying to tell a story using many photos. In the latter, you of course frame etc., but often you don;t have time to wait around. You're shooting more "from the hip". You're also thinking about telling a story. Capturing signs showing location, mixing people and environmental shots, all part of a story. There's a cadence to the shoot, it's a form of essay. With landscapes, you're taking one shot and looking for it to jump out. The next shot may have nothing to do with the first shot at all. So the process is different. Of course you can do both in either film or digital. It's just easier for me to do a story in digital and landscapes in film although I could slow down in digital for landscapes but prefer going the film approach. In the end, you do what you like.

It's like fishing. Some people like live bait and others like artificial lures. As long as you're catching fish, that's all that matters. And having fun.

Cholentpot · Sep 2, 2018

I'm used to the exposure and latitude of film. I DSLR scan and get pretty nice resolution out of my 135. I can also shoot 120 format which is unavailable in digital.

The look of film, even when scanned is pretty hard to replicate. The filters and other patches just don't look the same.

Patrick Robert James · Sep 2, 2018

I shoot digital and I shoot film. For black and white it is a no brainer. Film.

Color is a different story where the choice isn't really clear. The trade off is in convenience and your perspective. For family photographs I vastly prefer film. I know they will be around no matter what. Aesthetics of film also can't be reproduced digitally, which can be an important factor. Digital is of course far better when it comes to consumption.

Even though I shoot a lot of digital, I have opinions about it that wouldn't be popular and if I expressed them. People would think I am starting a film/digital thing so I keep them to myself.

wyofilm · Sep 2, 2018

My digital cameras just crap out and are too expensive to replace or repair (ha, ha, ha). Strangely, my film cameras just keep going and going and going. Do I have a sub-concious desire to destroy digital cameras? I don't thinks so, but maybe I need to visit a therapist.

Helge · Sep 14, 2018

The first assumption in the tread, that digital has surpassed analog, is wrong as wrong can be.

It’s maddening that ninety percent of the time you’ll get touchy-feely, wishy-washy, handwavy answers to the question “why film”?
Some of the reasons are of course true, but only of primary importance for naive, easily distracted people.
These common reasons given, being secondary or further down the list for people actually concerned with images.

Very few people will repeatedly participate in an artistic process where the main attraction and reward is the process and tools themselves.
Films future is bleak in the long term, if that kind of rethoric is allowed to reverberate and become gospel.

Analog photography is superior where it counts. And that’s goes for C41, B&W as well as E6.

Resolution in quality and kind is better on film, dynamic range is incomparably better and colour depth and microcontrast is just on a whole other level.
Have look at the direct output of a sensor before Bayer Interpolation to get an idea of how much is “guesswork”.

Sensitivity or more generally quantum efficiency is lower for film, but for good reason and not as a fundamental of the technology.
Portra and Cinestill will let us work in almost any kind of environment you would reasonably want to.
What’s more, well implemented flash looks great on film and is relatively easy to use, due to the DR characteristics of film.

The primary trouble is a desperate lack of good scanners that are affordable to own. All of the good ones either being rare, worn down, or insanely expensive.
Scanning with a DSLR is a very good option but will never be smooth, convenient and as trouble free as a dedicated setup.

We need great, cheap scanners more than we need anything else, including new film stock or new cameras.

Lachlan Young · Sep 14, 2018

Digital sensors' colour handling is pretty poor from almost all the sensors out there, unless you spend some serious time on post production. And even the handful of better ones fail to understand that 'accurate' does not really equal 'good'.

Then again, very few people have seen first class colour printing (either direct from neg/ transparency or scanned) from colour film origination, so to many digital looks 'better'.

Motivation Behind Shooting Color Film and Scanning

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