When is Analog photography not Analog???

[Mike1234]

Ohh my shite...been here... don't do it!! NOT unless the right place. :0

 

[Chan Tran]

what you plan to do is fine. as for the question is it analog? NO! It's hybrid.

 

[Scott_Sheppard]

Gentleman:

ANYTHING you capture on a ANALOG substrate is ANALOG.

What you do with it after the fact has NOTHING to do with ANALOG PHOTOGRAPHY.

What if I shoot CHROME, Am I NOT complete analog photographer because I don't make CIBACHROMES ?? UMM ??

Most of the GREAT Color photographers of the 20th century did not make ONE PRINT, they all shot on CHROME... (I can name a LOT of them)

Are they Analog Photographers ... YOU BET !!

So why does it REALLY matter what you do with your negatives or positives after the FACT ??

So its ALWAYS ANALOG if it was shot on a ANALOG material.

You guys better embrace the HYBRID workflow... This is the OLNY way that FILM will be able to LIVE ON !!

If you want to make ANALOG prints then GREAT.. They are ANALOG PRINTS

If you want to make DIGITAL prints then GREAT... They are DIGITAL PRINTS

BUT AGAIN... If an image is captured on a ANALOG substrate is ANALOG.

END OF STORY !!!

Thanks

Scott

 

[2F/2F]

Boy...I am glad someone cleared that up for us.

 

[keithwms]

It's always amusing when a year-old thread is dug up

 

[Erik Petersson]

So, I can scan a post a negative only if I have a physical print to match it to? We without darkrooms may then not share our work.

 

[Cliffy13]

I never had the space or the skill to do my own D&P so all my fiolms were commercially processed,now I have returned to the fold my films will still be commercially processed but I then have the ability to scan the results in and dodge and burn to my hearts content.Scanned film still has a different look and feel to a pure digital image and I have no qualms about using digital technology to produce such results from film.

 

[Maris]

"Analog photography" is a tautology. The physical phenomenon of photography is already analog in nature.

"Digital photography" is an oxymoron. There is no such thing as digital photography. Digital picture-making, yes, but photography it isn't.

Capture doesn't count. Using a camera at the first step does not guarantee that everything down-stream will be a photograph.

Remember, all pictures start their production sequence by light hitting a sensor. That includes the Mona Lisa, the Sistine Chapel ceiling, all photographs, all digital images. All cameras are eyes. All retinas, film surfaces, and CMOS arrays are sensors. If you are going to name pictures correctly its the last step, not the first step, that fixes what they are.

A photograph is the actual surface that bears picture forming marks because it was penetrated by the light that occasioned the changes that resulted in the marks. Simple. No?

Everybody, even digital officianados, must know this in their very bones.

And as for analog versus digital remember that the photons which form the only external energy input a photograph needs are not little particles. If you put the classic Maxwellian 4-vector field theory aside photons are bosons, the carriers of electromagnetic force, and are accurately characterised by their quantum wave function. This wave function maps an open-ended range of connected values, not just discrete step-wise values characteristic of digital entities. At its heart the particle image of a photon is a convenient mental fiction that is easier to visualise than a non-intuitive wave function.

The only place where true and genuine digital quantities exist is in the abstract world of mathematics. Modern digital technology is an engineered approximation to this mathematical ideal. The universe itself is physically analog all the way down to the Planck level beyond which we are unable to say anything meaningful.

 

[Shangheye]

Analog means infinite. Something that cannot be explained with a unit of a specific fixed size such as a pixel, byte, bit, black or white, or on or off instruction/description. Something that is what it is, and has never been digitized AKA sampled from that which exists in the physical world. It means nothing but film, paper, and light, basically. The second a "sample" is introduced, it is digital.

Damn....that should be in a dictionary somewhere


On the "other" matter, I don't understand why hybrid photo is not just simply a dedicated forum and gallery in this website with a password to be part of it if you want. That way the ones who have enlargers can not join in and those who don't can make the best of what they have...as long as the starting point is analog and there are no "manipulations other than enlargement". Those who want to be part of both can also do so.

I have an enlarger, and I am happy with the status quo, but I really think that this apartheid will only serve us less in time. K

 

[Photo Engineer]

Well, I agree with Scott.

The only way to assure reasonable permanance of the original and high quality is to use Analog. If, afterwards you diverge to either analog or digital prints or any reproduction it is still analog with the quality that analog gives to any subject.

Digital capture is just that. Nothing more or less. It is much more subject to degradation and loss and starts at a disadvantage.

PE

 

[jeffreyg]

You could consider digitally enlarging your negatives and contact printing using a light bulb or better yet platinum/palladium and using the sun. Analog>digital>analog. Two against one. The real true original is the first negative.

 

[Kirk Keyes]

You could consider digitally enlarging your negatives and contact printing using a light bulb or better yet platinum/palladium and using the sun. Analog>digital>analog. Two against one. The real true original is the first negative.

You just can't post them here on APUG.

 

[Kirk Keyes]

It's always amusing when a year-old thread is dug up

Keith - What I wonder is how many more years this issue will have to keep coming up?

 

[keithwms]

Keith - What I wonder is how many more years this issue will have to keep coming up?

This just in from CNN, Sept 18 2109, New York: A mob of youths wielding light sabers and advocating global pixelation confronted a group of monks performing a ritual that they described as "peaceful collodion".....

~~~

Perhaps the only way to avoid the vitriolic nonsense that creeps into these discussions is to stick to the hard, scientific definition of when analogue is no longer analogue. In an attempt to avert the tragic confrontation forseen above, I will now attempt to produce an agreeable definition:

A continuous, 'analogue' signal, when processed by an analogue-to-digital converter (ADC), is rendered a discontinuous 'digital' signal. In the limit of high bit depth and high bandwidth sampling, the digital signal can become sufficiently indistinguishable from the parent analogue signal to render it acceptable for some common purposes.

So... that's where we need to direct our ire: the ADC. The ADC is what we don't like. Not the sensor. The sensor is cool, the sensor is good. It accepts photons and dispatches a corresponding number of electrons from the valence band, just as any faithful silver halide grain would. Reasonable people like yours truly try to make better sensors. The sensor is not the enemy. The ADC is the enemy. Down with the ADC!

 

[Sirius Glass]

No, the sensor is still the enemy and will continue to be the enemy until:

1. The size of the pixel is the size of a film grain molecule.
2. The pixel has the color gamut of film.
3. The pixel can faithfully record the same latitude of light that film can.
4. The cost of the electro-optical system is less then or equal to the cost of the use of film.

Steve

 

[rcoda]

Let me ask you all this. What do you consider this?

Scenario 1.
Original in-camera negative from 4x5 or 8x10" film
Exposure or spotting make the negative impossible to print, but the image is too good to trash
Drum scan negative
Fix defects/exposure in Photoshop
Have output to a new silver negative
Print in darkroom traditionally

Scenario 2.
35mm film negative, sky blownout looking up at WTC, impossible to burn/dodge realistically
Drum scan neg
Fix sky (just give it some tone) in Photoshop
Have file output out to a new 11x14" silver negative
Contact print traditionally in darkroom

Scenario3:
Didn't have film camera with you, but there was an image you HAD to make.
Make the image with your pro DSLR in color, although you pre-visualized it in BW
Work on it in Photoshop, creating a Grayscale version
Have file output to new 4x5" silver negative
Enlarge in traditional darkroom

What would you consider each of these scenarios?

I have done them all. I refuse no tool to get me to final conclusion in the print.

 

[keithwms]

No, the sensor is still the enemy and will continue to be the enemy until:

1. The size of the pixel is the size of a film grain molecule.
2. The pixel has the color gamut of film.
3. The pixel can faithfully record the same latitude of light that film can.
4. The cost of the electro-optical system is less then or equal to the cost of the use of film.

Steve

1. It is (But, n.b. it is incorrect to think that the molecular scale sets the resolution)
2. It does
3. It can
4. It is

Again, most of your objections have to do with what it done to the analogue signal that is generated by the sensor. Is this a trivial point? Actually, no, it's not... not to those of us who do such things for a living

~~~

Look those of us who do purely analogue work do so primarily because we enjoy the analogue workflow. And that is reason enough. There are plenty of other good reasons, but.... let's call it what it is: we do this because we like it. And that's okay!

 

[wfe]

Ok I just deleted what I was about to post which would have had me banned from APUG so I'll make a simple point.

I love film and silver prints and there is some amazing work here and I do appreciate and respect what folks are doing here. Just please get off of the digital bashing band wagon, it's a total waste of time and energy. This is an analog site so let the analog topics and work speak. It is good and will speak loudly. No need to bash anything. Bashing is negative energy and creates nothing of value.

What should be banned from APUG is the word digital but it is permitted. Just simply talk about your work and processes and forget about digital. Have faith and confidence that your work will speak for itself.

 

[keithwms]

I totally agree with you, Bill! I am here to discuss analogue methods with other with similar interests. Not to rehash the same freaking stuff over and over and bash the methods of others.

What would you consider each of these scenarios?

I consider them all valid ways that some people use to produce effective images. I also "refuse no tool"... I just don't come here to talk about (or bash) digital. I do like the A in APUG

 

[Sirius Glass]

Let me ask you all this. What do you consider this?

Scenario 1.
Original in-camera negative from 4x5 or 8x10" film
Exposure or spotting make the negative impossible to print, but the image is too good to trash
Drum scan negative
Fix defects/exposure in Photoshop
Have output to a new silver negative
Print in darkroom traditionally

Scenario 2.
35mm film negative, sky blownout looking up at WTC, impossible to burn/dodge realistically
Drum scan neg
Fix sky (just give it some tone) in Photoshop
Have file output out to a new 11x14" silver negative
Contact print traditionally in darkroom

Scenario3:
Didn't have film camera with you, but there was an image you HAD to make.
Make the image with your pro DSLR in color, although you pre-visualized it in BW
Work on it in Photoshop, creating a Grayscale version
Have file output to new 4x5" silver negative
Enlarge in traditional darkroom

What would you consider each of these scenarios?

I have done them all. I refuse no tool to get me to final conclusion in the print.

All three are hybrid photography.

 

[Sirius Glass]

1. It is (But, n.b. it is incorrect to think that the molecular scale sets the resolution)
2. It does
3. It can
4. It is

Again, most of your objections have to do with what it done to the analogue signal that is generated by the sensor. Is this a trivial point? Actually, no, it's not... not to those of us who do such things for a living

~~~

Look those of us who do purely analogue work do so primarily because we enjoy the analogue workflow. And that is reason enough. There are plenty of other good reasons, but.... let's call it what it is: we do this because we like it. And that's okay!

Please show me sensor that can do any of those four. Since I design electro-optical systems, I am sure you cannot. I have done digital photography since 1977 on Voyager I and II and IR remote sensing before that. There are very few that predate me in digital photography. I still prefer and use only film. The four points are my criteria for switching to digital. You may have other criteria. Whatever works for you. But I will wait until all four criteria have been met.

There is analog, hybrid and digital. Pick what works best for you.

Steve

 

[Photo Engineer]

The problems introduced by aliasing are, to me, a major stumbling block in any digital sensor today except those that stack R/G/B in a manner similar to film. A digital sensor array could be composed of very minute pixels but if these pixels were side-by-side, the sensor would still suffer from artifacts introduced by aliasing.

In another vein, the treatment of the D LogV curve is an essential part of converting from a purely digital to what appears as a pseudo analog signal to the human eye. A large portion of this is done by software in the camera. I have seen photos ruined by this "conversion" judged for me by a software programmer somewhere else when I want the photo to look the way I want it to.

PE

 

[Ian David]

The four points are my criteria for switching to digital. You may have other criteria. Whatever works for you. But I will wait until all four criteria have been met.

Aaarrrgghh! The scales have fallen from my eyes, Steve! All along I thought your devotion to analogue was due to a love of the process...

 

[Mike1234]

Obviously the arguement here between analog and digital is currently misplaced. This forum began as all about analog therefore we hybrid members are just visitors for now. We must respect that. That said... analog photography itself was, for a very long time, considered too modern... too automated... to different. Perhaps it's time for APUG to shift its focus to include us hybrid outcasts? Time marches forward... technology advances... perhaps it's time for us all to come to an agreement. I've never felt unwelcome here but we're outcasts none-the-less. We're the bastard stepchildren of "real photographers".

 

[agman]

Bill, you said it all in your last sentence.

agman