below $1000 film vs digital

For quality and cost-effectiveness, buy a Mamiya C220 or C330 with the
55mm lens set and possibly the 80mm and 135mm lens sets, or the 105 and
180mm
lens sets. (No longer in production, so will have to be second-hand -
maybe
from KEH). Buy a heavy tripod (and use it). Then get a reasonable flat
bed scanner with film scanning facility built-in. You should get a
reasonable photo-editing package bundled with the scanner - if not,
download
the Gimp from www.gimp.org. You will be getting quite large files - you
will need a reasonable amount of memory - preferably 512Mb of RAM, and
either a large hard drive or be prepared to burn a lot of CDROMs or DVDs.

This is a set-up I have, and negs I have scanned and manipulated myself I
can print (even using a consumer photo-printer) to a higher technical
quality than pro labs have managed with hand-prints in the past using
traditional printing methods. And when I get a professional print from a
pro lab using my digital file - Wow!

As another poster wrote, you could buy a 35mm SLR with 2 or 3 prime lenses
and a dedicated quality film scanner. The results would be almost as
good, unless you wanted to print above 10X8inches, and could be more
convenient

My understanding was that good 35mm technique, combined with a dedicated
35mm film scanner, would exceed the quality of MF with a flatbed scanner.

I'm curious...

On Thu, 3 Jun 2004 22:11:59 +0000 (UTC), "Keith Patterson"
wrote:

For quality and cost-effectiveness, buy a Mamiya C220 or C330

Are the differences between the two models significant?

"Mike" wrote:

My understanding was that good 35mm technique, combined with a dedicated
35mm film scanner, would exceed the quality of MF with a flatbed scanner.

That may have been true prior to the 4870, but if the sample on the
following page is right, the 4870 shifts the balance to MF. The 4870 isn't
quite 2700 dpi, but it's clearly more than 2000 dpi, and that's 3000 x 4400
pixels from 645, which is way ahead of 35mm.

http://www5e.biglobe.ne.jp/~longnose/scanner_test.html

David J. Littleboy
Tokyo, Japan

For quality and cost-effectiveness, buy a Mamiya C220 or C330
Are the differences between the two models significant?

Yes, the C220 is more simple, the main difference being that it lacks the
very useful parrallax indicator. But it is lighter and cheaper. See this
page for a lot of details:

http://www.btinternet.com/~g.a.patte...q/m_faq-1.html

--
Vincent Becker
Photographie et appareils anciens - Photography and classic cameras
URL:http://www.lumieresenboite.com
Merci de passer par mon site pour les réponses par courriel

In article , Mike wrote:

My understanding was that good 35mm technique, combined with a dedicated
35mm film scanner, would exceed the quality of MF with a flatbed scanner.

The flatbed scanner would have to be quite poor to make that so, but
regardless - it presumes scanning. Doesn't anyf*king body make real wet
prints anymore?

On Fri, 04 Jun 2004 14:39:20 -0500, Mike wrote:

My understanding was that good 35mm technique, combined with a dedicated
35mm film scanner, would exceed the quality of MF with a flatbed scanner.

I'm curious...

Flatbed scanners come in all sorts of resolutions. If you're talking
about a sub-$100 consumer model, that's true. OTOH, if you're talking
about a Creo EverSmart Supreme II, with 5600-dpi optical resolution,
a DMax of 4.3, and optional oil mounting station, well, no.

--
Michael Benveniste --
Spam and UCE professionally evaluated for $419. Use this email
address only to submit mail for evaluation.

jjs wrote:

In article , Mike
wrote:

My understanding was that good 35mm technique, combined with a dedicated
35mm film scanner, would exceed the quality of MF with a flatbed scanner.

The flatbed scanner would have to be quite poor to make that so, but
regardless - it presumes scanning. Doesn't anyf*king body make real wet
prints anymore?


I do and I also find it comical everyone compares digital to scanned film.
--

Stacey

Stacey wrote:

The flatbed scanner would have to be quite poor to make that so, but
regardless - it presumes scanning. Doesn't anyf*king body make real wet
prints anymore?


I do and I also find it comical everyone compares digital to scanned film.

And than scan those wet-prints again as soon as you want to do something
with the image other than hang it on the office wall???

In article , "Q.G. de Bakker"
wrote:

Stacey wrote:
[...]

I do and I also find it comical everyone compares digital to scanned film.

And than scan those wet-prints again as soon as you want to do something
with the image other than hang it on the office wall???

I don't quite understand your remark, Q.G., but I do know another
particularly productive (and often published) photographer who scans
11x14" silver B&W prints rather than negatives, and for good reasons.
First, he scans prints only to present samples on the web. And regardless
of the hard metrics of scanning MF negatives, he's a printer through and
through. Believe me, I've done some scans of MF negatives to show him what
one can do, and while he is very impressed with the control that post-film
digital work can do, he does does wet prints. I think his rationale is the
same as mine: it has something to do with the craft of wet, conventional
printing: a craft unto itself.

BTW, I have been investigating making silver negatives from digital scans
for two years (thanks to Dan Burkholder's most excellent research), but it
still isn't the same thing. Variability between prints due to the hands of
the printer is a _good thing_, imho.

But there I go digressing into conventional MF photography again.

Q.G. de Bakker wrote:

Stacey wrote:

The flatbed scanner would have to be quite poor to make that so, but
regardless - it presumes scanning. Doesn't anyf*king body make real wet
prints anymore?


I do and I also find it comical everyone compares digital to scanned
film.

And than scan those wet-prints again as soon as you want to do something
with the image other than hang it on the office wall???

Yep, it works fine for me, YMMV. You can always have the film scanned if you
need it -that- good for other applications. I've never found the need for
it.

My point was people always compare film, using a consumer grade "home"
scanner they can afford, to digital cameras. Just like this person saying
35mm is better because they compare 35mm film scanned using a good film
scanner vs medformat film scanned on a cheap flatbed. Yea that makes sense
to me.

Hey I know, I can scan 35mm film on a cheap flatbed and the results from my
640X480 polaroid digicam look better so that $50 digicam is better than my
OM 35mm gear! Why "dumb down" film (or medformat) to compare it to other
thing? Have the best wet print you can have made and compare that to see
which is best.

Just because they can't afford a medformat scanner that is as good as a 35mm
one, doesn't mean 35mm is "better". It just means they can't afford (or
don't want to buy as in my case) a good medformat scanner!

--

Stacey