below $1000 film vs digital

"Chris Loffredo" wrote in message
...
Mark Weaver wrote:
Yes, CDs and JPGs will be readable in 20-30 years. I already have
20 year
old audio CDs that are perfectly playable. If CDs, DVDs, and JPG files
were
to become unreadable in a generation, that would mean a near total loss
of
popular culture (music, movies, photographs). When has such a thing
ever
happened? Punch cards and "digital cassettes" were never ubiquitous
like
CDs and JPGs.

Mark



Partly inspired by this thread, I downloaded a program (Nero CDspeed) to
check the error rate of my CD-Rs.

Result? Scanning my older audio CD-Rs (1997-1999), so far I'm finding
about a 50% serious error rate (and, yes, media type does make a
difference, though not absolutely - "green dyes" are almost all bad and
"Mitsui Gold"s are "only" about 15% bad...).


What speed are you testing at? With a 5-year-old disc, I get no errors when
I crank CDSpeed down to as slow as it will go (10x) but do get errors when I
let it test at the max speed (of my DVD+R drive). Those old CDRs weren't
rated as fast as current discs.

Mark

Chris Loffredo wrote:

Alan Browne wrote:

Chris Loffredo wrote:


Partly inspired by this thread, I downloaded a program (Nero CDspeed)
to check the error rate of my CD-Rs.

Result? Scanning my older audio CD-Rs (1997-1999), so far I'm finding
about a 50% serious error rate (and, yes, media type does make a
difference, though not absolutely - "green dyes" are almost all bad
and "Mitsui Gold"s are "only" about 15% bad...).

So now I'm copying the bad CD-Rs, and to my joy have discovered that
the first 2 have errors to the extent that I'll have to do extensive
manual editing.



Try burning a new CD and then checking the error rate. I would not be
surprised if there were recoverable errors right off the start.
Question is, how much v. the 5 yr. old CD's.



First thing I did: New CD-Rs (5 out of 5) had zero errors.

Relatively new CD-Rs (about 1 year old) - spot checks, maybe 4 samples -
were 100% ok.

But the older ones, whether through age or outdated(?) media seem pretty
unreliable.

Not a nice prospect...


Hmm, so many backups to redo... Time to look at a DVD writer I guess.

--
--e-meil: there's no such thing as a FreeLunch.--

Nick Zentena wrote:
Mark Weaver wrote:


I wrote a program years ago and saved it on a paper punch tape the
machine used. If I hadn't made an analog copy of the code on the printer,
it would be gone.


Right. Media that was only used by computer professionals was in not common
enough usage to remain generally readable.



So you're saying a media that was used by highly paid professionals in a
controlled enviroment. Often containing highly valued data. Data that was
looked after far better then almost any home user would dream of. That sort
of media is no longer readable? But you're trying to say that stuff looked
after by home users will last?

Nick

Yes, because there are many more home users than business users, and the
business users migrated their data from the older formats, then
discarded the old machines and media.

In rec.photo.equipment.35mm Mark Weaver wrote:

You miss the point. It's not that punch cards are no longer 'readable' in
the sense that they have deteriorated (they're just thin bits of cardboard
with rectangular holes--I assume they'd hold up for decades if not
centuries). The point is that the market for the equipment was never broad
enough and it didn't have a wide enough variety of uses, so when 'highly
paid professionals' stopped using punch cards for data, the equipment became
rare. But CDs/DVDs are not used just for data by a relatively small number
of 'highly paid professionals', they're used for music, movies, and data by
literally hundreds of millions of people. Completely different situation.

you can get punchcards read easily enough, and setting up something
to do it on your own (assuming you don't need hundreds of thopusands
read) is easy enough. The trick is called flatbed scanner.


Mark



--
Sander

+++ Out of cheese error +++

In rec.photo.equipment.35mm Alan Browne wrote:
Chris Loffredo wrote:

Alan Browne wrote:

Chris Loffredo wrote:


Partly inspired by this thread, I downloaded a program (Nero CDspeed)
to check the error rate of my CD-Rs.

Result? Scanning my older audio CD-Rs (1997-1999), so far I'm finding
about a 50% serious error rate (and, yes, media type does make a
difference, though not absolutely - "green dyes" are almost all bad
and "Mitsui Gold"s are "only" about 15% bad...).

So now I'm copying the bad CD-Rs, and to my joy have discovered that
the first 2 have errors to the extent that I'll have to do extensive
manual editing.



Try burning a new CD and then checking the error rate. I would not be
surprised if there were recoverable errors right off the start.
Question is, how much v. the 5 yr. old CD's.



First thing I did: New CD-Rs (5 out of 5) had zero errors.

Relatively new CD-Rs (about 1 year old) - spot checks, maybe 4 samples -
were 100% ok.

But the older ones, whether through age or outdated(?) media seem pretty
unreliable.

Not a nice prospect...


Hmm, so many backups to redo... Time to look at a DVD writer I guess.


you mean - get more damage more easily? If anything, recordable DVD
(lets not even talk aboutteh dual layer ones) are going to be less
relaible than CD-s. Even those making the media admit it.

--
Sander

+++ Out of cheese error +++

MikeWhy wrote:

"Stacey" wrote in message
...
Why can't people compare a good optical print to a digitally printed
digital
shot? Why do they always scan the film and use that to compare them?

I haven't seen any advantage to a straight optical print compared to
digital, and certainly not one that would justify the price difference.
I'd like to hear your experience in detail. Notice we're no longer talking
about deli counter prints.


Looks less grainy and still as sharp from what I've had done. To get the
scanned images as sharp as optical seems to exagerate the grain as the same
time. I've seen some software like neatimage that seems to work good but
haven't tried it in print yet.

And I'm not talking about what costs what at this point, yet haven't seen
much difference in price between the two. Maybe if someone was doing it for
a living they would be looking at which is cheapest? I don't have that many
shots I need blown up and do most myself anyway.

Custom lab optical prints from 35mm are decidedly a waste of hopes, time,
and money. It's the worst of all possible worlds. DSLRs match it in image
quality, and edge it decisively in convenience and consumables cost.

I rarely use 35mm anymore, only for something like sports shooting where MF
isn't feasable. IMHO 8X10's from 35mm aren't that great.

MF kills it in film area.

Which is what -I- said! :-)

--

Stacey

Mark Weaver wrote:


"Chris Loffredo" wrote in message
...

Partly inspired by this thread, I downloaded a program (Nero CDspeed) to
check the error rate of my CD-Rs.

Result? Scanning my older audio CD-Rs (1997-1999), so far I'm finding
about a 50% serious error rate (and, yes, media type does make a
difference, though not absolutely - "green dyes" are almost all bad and
"Mitsui Gold"s are "only" about 15% bad...).


What speed are you testing at? With a 5-year-old disc, I get no errors
when I crank CDSpeed down to as slow as it will go (10x) but do get errors
when I
let it test at the max speed (of my DVD+R drive).

How do you tell a CD drive to read the data at a slower speed? Not "test"
but acutally read it? Just curious, never seen this option.

--

Stacey

Mark Weaver wrote:


"Stacey" wrote in message
...

And I'm not so sure jpegs will still be a software standard in 20 years

Whether or not the current JPG format is still *the* standard in 20 years,
it will still be readable/displayable/printable. Why? Because doing so
is not complicated,

This just a guess on your part that it won't be complicated to do so. Time
will tell if it's a reality.


nor will the file systems be the same, you obviously think they will. FAT
is
already a past tense file system and with longhorn, it probably won't
even be recognized.

Irrelevant -- nobody's proposing you back up your photos by taking a
current hard disk, unplugging it, and storing it in the closet for 20
years.

Many people are storing their images on a HD, they don't know any better and
you never answered the below question...


How long will the curent CD filesystem be used?

--

Stacey

At the time they were right. Have you ever printed any med format
negatives
from back then? I have and they aren't that great, nothing like medformat
film today. The film technology wasn't good enough for medformat at that
time and it needed the film area of 4X5 or 8X10 (it was best contact
printed) to not be massively grainy and to have any sharpness in 8X10 or
larger prints.

"Back then" was 1888 and no, I haven't printed any negatives from that
period, most negatives from that period have long since been lost or
destroyed, but I've seen plenty of prints made from smaller format
negatives from that time forward and the prints are excellent even by
today's standards. Since contact printing was the norm for many
photographers well into the 1950s the film didn't have to be as good as
today's to produce excellent results. The equipment and the photographers
using it were, nevertheless, disparaged by "serious photograhers" in much
the same way you disparage digital today.

Digital is at that same place. It's gaining ground but even the -best-
digital normal people can afford isn't equal to medformat or even 35mm
IMHO.

Well of course "digital" encompasses a pretty broad range of equipment even
for "normal people." However, for several years it has certainly been
possible to make a print in the 8x10 to 10x13 range from digital cameras
that cost about $700 and up that were better than a same size print from a
35mm negative. That's not to say that all digital prints in that size range
are better than all 35mm prints but the possibilty certainly exists, whether
it's realized in practice depends on the skill of the person making the
photograph and the print but the digital print isn't automatically inferior
just because it was made with a $700 or so digital camera as you seem to
think. I consider myself one of the "normal people, " I own a Nikon D100
camera and two Nikon lenses. Based in part on observation of my own prints
from an F4 camera and from the D100 camera, I know for a fact that it's
possible to make better prints with the D100 than were made with the F4
using the same lenses..

I don't know about medium format, you may be right there. I don't make the
same kind of prints from my D100 as I do from my Pentax 67 so I have no way
of personally making a direct comparison. Most of the digital prints I see
are color prints and I print only in black and white with my mediium and
large format film cameras so I can't really compare the two. I've seen
spectacular color prints made with a digital back on a Mamiya camera but I
think we'd both agree that "normal people" don't buy digital backs. : - ).

"Stacey" wrote in message
...
Vladamir30 wrote:

I
find it amusing that Stacey is so enamored of roll film and her medium
format camera. She probably doesn't realize that when George Eastman
popularized roll film the "serious photographers" ridiculed it, saying
that it was something only for the unknowing masses, that its only
advantage was speed and ease of use, and that its quality was no good
compared to sheet film in large format cameras. Sound familiar?


At the time they were right. Have you ever printed any med format
negatives
from back then? I have and they aren't that great, nothing like medformat
film today. The film technology wasn't good enough for medformat at that
time and it needed the film area of 4X5 or 8X10 (it was best contact
printed) to not be massively grainy and to have any sharpness in 8X10 or
larger prints.

Digital is at that same place. It's gaining ground but even the -best-
digital normal people can afford isn't equal to medformat or even 35mm
IMHO. At some point, like with film development, it will be. For some
people the speed and ease of use is more important than haveing the best
quality? This also explains why most people are happy with an autofocus
35mm film camera. There are alwasy the people who jump on new technology
and assume it's better just because they are told it is. I'm waiting to
see
something with my eyes that is better before I jump.
--

Stacey

"Stacey" wrote in message
...
And I'm not talking about what costs what at this point, yet haven't seen
much difference in price between the two. Maybe if someone was doing it
for
a living they would be looking at which is cheapest? I don't have that
many
shots I need blown up and do most myself anyway.

The smallest I print is 8x10. If I need something smaller, I guess I could
pick up some cold cuts when I drop off the negs.

MF kills it in film area.

Which is what -I- said! :-)

:-) At least we can agree on that much. Film area is like pixels: more is
better.