This is just cheating

Mainecoonmaniac · Oct 31, 2014

Take a look at this film emulation software. To me, shooting film is well...shooting film.

http://petapixel.com/2014/10/31/vsc...late-look-pushed-pulled-cross-processed-film/

benjiboy · Oct 31, 2014

Digital photography is "cheating" per say, it's bad enough it has all but destroyed film photography but now it's trying to emulate it,

Jim Noel · Oct 31, 2014

It has always tried unsuccessfully to emulate it.

darkosaric · Oct 31, 2014

This reminds me on DxO plugin that is popular (Salgado is using it).

Today I saw some billboard commercial where one couple was making "selfie" with SX-70 model 1. People want to feel special, and they want it without effort. There are millions of Iphones and instagrams - it is not special any more.
But the truth is simple - not for this only, but for many stuff: you get what you put in to.
If you put 2 minutes of work - you will get 2 minutes of thrills and some online "likes". If you invest more time and more effort (in this case I am speaking about shooting film) - you will get more, much more.

Thomas Bertilsson · Oct 31, 2014

I always chuckle at these attempts. If digital was so superior, how come they can't stop trying to emulate film? Cracks me up to the point my sides hurt.

Slixtiesix · Oct 31, 2014

I had a look on the examples and must admit that the colours come quite close to the original at times. The designers of the software did a pretty good job in this regard, much better than other film emulation software I have seen so far. However: Applying these to a picture that was created by the use of a sensor that is 1/1,8" or so and therefore lacks any depth just looks strange.
Anyway, I do not see it as a bad thing at all. Maybe some people who only know digital may be tempted to try the "real thing" once they start to like these emulations...
On the other hand I doubt that any serious film shooter will abandon film simply because he can have a look-a-like digital image now.

frank · Oct 31, 2014

Film: the real deal.

Mainecoonmaniac · Oct 31, 2014

I remember assisting photographers almost 20 years ago and they had experimented with pushing and cross processing film. They worked really hard to refine their processes and took a lot of notes. The looks they achieved was hard earned. They also took great risks by shooting high paid jobs by not processing film to manufacturer's specifications. With this digital application, there's no risk at all. This is just playing it safe. Not in the spirit of the taking chances. How is art is going to grow by not taking risks?

ic-racer · Oct 31, 2014

This type of digital manipulation will never go away, just like fake wood will never go away. And just like fake wood, 90% of the population doesn't know or care.

Mainecoonmaniac · Oct 31, 2014

Andy Warhol said..

ic-racer said:
This type of digital manipulation will never go away, just like fake wood will never go away. And just like fake wood, 90% of the population doesn't know or care.

Andy Warhol said That's not fake. It's real plastic.

pdeeh · Oct 31, 2014

"cheating".

It's almost as if some people think that film photography is "real" and digital photography is "fake" ...

Siompa · Oct 31, 2014

It's kind of fun that it costs 119$. You can get a working canon slr for that price and some film

andrew.roos · Oct 31, 2014

Digital emulation of film is no more cheating than was the pictorialists' emulation of fine art paintings in their photography. And I've never been inclined to call Stieglitz, Steichen or the early Ed Weston "cheats". Film emulation is, however, open to the same criticism that the Group f/64 had of the Pictorialists: that in their quest to elevate photography to an art form by emulating painting, they were denying the artistic nature of pure photography, "possessing no qualities of technique, composition or idea, derivative of any other art form". In this context, the critique would be that emulating film denies the artistic possibilities of the new, digital medium in its own right.

aRolleiBrujo · Oct 31, 2014

You can pick up Film 06 over in the VSCO store for $119. 119$ can buy a decent amount of film and camera! hell I couldn't master DSLR's and i could barely master film, but, I try, and i enjoy film's cool hands on approach! I mean who doesn't have fun attempting to develop their own negative!!!

see i damaged my 120 but i still love it! that's my boy first in the second frame!

this was beautiful Kodak TRI-X 400!! All developed in Caffenol!

Americo J Rodriguez-10 by a.rodriguezpix, on Flickr

my son once more!

Americo J Rodriguez-15 by a.rodriguezpix, on Flickr

666.img673 by a.rodriguezpix, on Flickr

I used my Pentacon Six TL with the lovely

Ilford Delta-400 Professional 120 Black & White Negative (Print) Film (ISO-400)

20140822_111033-1 by a.rodriguezpix, on Flickr

Old-N-Feeble · Oct 31, 2014

I was introduced to digital photography while working for the Air Force way back when Photoshop v2.0 was brand new. We had those crappy bulky heavy Nikon/Kodak 2MP cameras... and though they were the coolest thing in the world (except for the image quality, of course). I have nothing against digital. What I do have issues with are doing things the easy/lazy way. Plug-ins are fine for certain effects but for things such as emulation of simple analog film techniques that's just ignorant and lazy. The most basic controls that have always been a part of PS are all that's needed to accomplish that.

railwayman3 · Oct 31, 2014

It's really not different to using Photoshop or Gimp to emulate drawings, watercolors, cartoons, etc. It won't stop people from drawing and painting, their interest being in producing artworks by the artist's skill, brushes, pencils and paints. Just as we produce our photos by our skill, cameras, film, paper and chemicals.

removed account4 · Oct 31, 2014

who cares

NB23 · Oct 31, 2014

Film is absolutely superior.
Some people simply can't afford film, a darkroom, and time.
Digital is like cyber-sex: simply unsatisfying.

pdeeh · Oct 31, 2014

When someone spends hours in the darkroom producing a perfectly grainless print, spotting and retouching until it is "perfect" and then posts a scan of it on the internet somewhere ... I wonder if digital photographers pick it up and ridicule it as "cheating", at length, in vacuous threads on their forums?

Oh ... let me guess ... no

MDR · Oct 31, 2014

It's not cheating it's also nothing new.

moose10101 · Oct 31, 2014

andrew.roos said:
Digital emulation of film is no more cheating than was the pictorialists' emulation of fine art paintings in their photography. And I've never been inclined to call Stieglitz, Steichen or the early Ed Weston "cheats". Film emulation is, however, open to the same criticism that the Group f/64 had of the Pictorialists: that in their quest to elevate photography to an art form by emulating painting, they were denying the artistic nature of pure photography, "possessing no qualities of technique, composition or idea, derivative of any other art form". In this context, the critique would be that emulating film denies the artistic possibilities of the new, digital medium in its own right.

This might be an issue if the goal of the majority of digital photographers was trying to emulate film, but it isn't. This is just another tool.

NB23 said:
Film is absolutely superior.
Some people simply can't afford film, a darkroom, and time.
Digital is like cyber-sex: simply unsatisfying.

You go ahead and believe whatever helps you get through the day.

bvy · Oct 31, 2014

It's only cheating if the results are convincing.

MattKrull · Oct 31, 2014

Sorry Mainecoonmanic, I completely disagree with you.

It is a tool to get the image you want, either using the tools you have, or that are more appropriate to the task.

I use the DxO film emulator when I'm shooting digital. Why? Because it is a set of tone curves that I like and I can quickly apply to any digital photo I've taken to take a lot of the repetative work out of getting my RAWs to where I want them. Kodak spent decades getting the tonal response of current films to be as pleasing as they are. I'd be a fool to throw that experience away simply because the light capture medium behind the shutter has changed.

Lets face it, if I'm doing animal portraits for the local animal rescue (where I'm going to shoot hundreds of shots in an afternoon, need them online quickly, and they will only be looked at on a screen) then digital is the right tool. Am I trying to look all cool and vintange? No, but Porta has a darned good tone curve for what I want, so using the Porta preset gets me half way there much faster than playing with the curves from scratch every time.

I have a Bronica 645, and I love shooting Porta400 on it. I've shot pet portraits for friends with it. But I'd be an idiot to use that when photographing animals for the local rescue.

And what about the kids with their digital cameras (or phones) using this, or any of the dozens of softare filters out there? Yes, they're doing it for the look and the novelty. But so is everyone shooting Lomo Purple, Rollei Redbird, or any other novelty film. Was photography as an art ever harmed by people goofying off? Is oil based painting harmed by the existance of water colors?

"Not in the spirit of taking chances"? Why you need to risk destruction of your work or paycheck for the risk to be sufficiently significant for your art to grow? Are novels less well written today because the authors have word processors and can correct mistakes without white-out? Was Casablanca a better movie simply because the editor could have ruined the film with a slip of the wrist?

Besides, as long as you're shooting roll film, you're just a poser working in a inferior medium trading quality for effort, trying to replicate what the plate photographers did first and did better.

railwayman3 · Oct 31, 2014

MattKrull said:
Besides, as long as you're shooting roll film, you're just a poser working in a inferior medium trading quality for effort, trying to replicate what the plate photographers did first and did better.

I wish I really could replicate what the great plate photographers did !

aRolleiBrujo · Oct 31, 2014

bvy said:
It's only cheating if the results are convincing.

That's what she said.

This is just cheating

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