M8 on the street, How's it stack up to film Ms?

[atufte]

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Oh, and thanks Alexander. That argues that it's the printing onto analog silver paper that contributes to the "look" huh? I actually looked into that enlarger. I could skip retirement altogether, and get one : -) Ouch !!!

 

Hehe, yes this is expensive shit... :-)

 

I actually got the prices from a dealer in UK today, hold

on to your chair's:

 

DE VERE 504DS DIGITAL ENLARGER SYSTEM

PLUS 504DS DIGITAL SYSTEM FOR RETRO–FIT

TO OTHER ENLARGER CHASSIS

PRICE LIST - January 2007

 

EUROS STERLING

DS1 Complete working enlarger

17.2 million pixel digital LCD panel

LED light source, control & operating software

Computer 27.000,00 18,000.00

DS2 Enlarger, 17.2 million pixel digital LCD panel

LED light source, control & operating software

No computer & Windows 23.750,00 16,500.00

 

DS3 17.2 million pixel digital LCD panel,

LED light source, control & operating software

Computer & Windows

for fitting to other enlarger chassis 22.500,00 15,500.00

DS4 17.2 million pixel digital LCD panel

LED light source, control & operating software

No computer & Windows

for fitting to other enlarger chassis 21.000,00 14,000.00

 

Conversion for roll easel 1.125,00 750.00

 

TRAINING:

 

Two days at supplier premises, pay own expenses LABOUR F.O.C.

On site – per day & expenses 450,00 300.00

Prices are quoted ex-works & ex-sales tax

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[martinb]

For that film look , I really like the M8 at ISO 1250 just adds the grain from the noise that looks very film like to me. Also I have been using Raw developer with channel mixer and i add a touch of warmth to it and i really like that look. for me the M8 is a no brainer for the streeet and a lot of other places too. I have some heavy commercial shoots this week and next and this little baby is going to get a work out bigtime.

 

I agree. At ISO 1250 it looks a lot like Fuji Reala. Funny, why are people complaining about noise?

[mwilliamsphotography]

Well, that's one heck of a bundle of cash to simulate analog film prints.

 

Guess film will just be in my bag along with the MP3.

 

Sorry to those who think ISO 1250 looks like film. Looks like ISO 1250 digital to me ... not that there's anything wrong with that ... it just isn't film and may never be ... at least not to my eye. But that can change I suppose.

 

A couple more NYC street shots:

 

No matter where I go I just can't seem to escape weddings 1) Times Square ...: -)

2) Lost in the Jungle. 3) Morning paper 4) big loud guy. 5) Goody Lady

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[devils-advocate]

Marc: nice work - the lovers & single girl is particularly compelling

 

Jamie: Elevator Digital here in Toronto has a Lambda which can write directly onto traditional B&W Fibre based paper, which is then hand processed. The results are truly stunning and the price is comparable to custom B&W printing.

 

- N.

[jaapv]

Great shots Marc. And I agree, why should digital look like film? Or the other way around, for that matter. But of course, we must remember that we have known film for all our lives, so it has become the reference cadre against which newcomers are measured. It takes a conscious effort to judge images that are presented as digital on their own merit. In that light I must agree that 1250 ISO on the M8 is pretty good and eminently suited for black and white. In fact, on my camera it is user profile 2.

[Guest guy_mancuso]

Honestly I have NO desire to ever shoot film again it has been about 12 years and i could go another 50. That time has passed for me. To me it is like opening a long planted coffin, my life is to the future and as long as i can hang around i will enjoy the new age of digital. I like B&W for what it is and not to compare to something that was. But that is me and we all think differently. BTW Marc nice stuff, I was there at Christmas and really enjoyed NY and playing with the M8 and I actually was noticed once when shooting it. i think people think it is a P&S and ignore you , which is just perfect.

[Bill Sievers]

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I shoot alot of street. So far the M8 has performed very well. However, it has not fully replaced my M6 and Ricoh GRD, both of which I consider superb street machines.

 

See recent images from all here:

 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/captainvideo/

[wilfredo]

Marc,

 

You wrote: "B&W I'm not so sure about. The M8 B&W files are very nice, but lack the visceral emotional feel of films like Tri-X ... ( I think I just heard a sigh of relief from my MP3 : -)"

 

I've said this before, when it comes to B&W digital images, I don't think anything can beat the M8, and even if they don't produce images that replicate film, I think they are in a genre all of their own, and that's part of the beauty. There's digital, there's film and there's the M8 look :-) which to me is simply phenomenal, just enough texture to give it emotional substance. I enjoyed your shots by the way. I'm sure that wedding couple would have loved to have your picture of them in their wedding album.

 

Cheers,

Wilfredo+

Benitez-Rivera Photography

[mwilliamsphotography]

Thanks Wilfredo. I'd have to go along with you on the M8 B&Ws .... we're still using those M lenses here and it shows IMHO.

 

And I do have to admit that I have a little bit of an advantage on many who still shoot film and process to digital ... having bit the bullet on getting the Imacon 949. Frankly, with that set up, there is little I can do with the M8 that I can't get from film beyond the obvious advantages inherent in digital capture from any digital camera.

 

But (big BUT), I love the ISO 640 on the M8 and dearly wish they had a ISO 800 on the camera which I suspect would work just fine. That bit of extra ISO over my usual ISO 400 set to 320 with film combined with the Lux asph lenses is a compelling combination for available light work.

 

Both have their place in my camera bag.

[lars_bergquist]

I agree that film is film and digital is digital and each should be honestly shown as what is it. We've been through this before. In the 1930's, discussions raged about 35 mm grain. Most people wanted to get rid of it completely and they did the darnedest things to achieve that, from developers that would have made a Witch of Endor blanch, to printing through matte glass! In time however there developed a 35 mm esthetic that accepted grain within limits. (And of course there were people who went the whole hog, dunking their Tri-X in boiling Rodinal and making prints that looked like pictorial macadam.) Me, for all my love of the creamy smoothness of medium format, I think there's a special thing about prints where grain is subliminal -- you suspect it more than seeing it.

 

So I'm sure that as we learn to use the digital medium, there will develop a digital esthetic too. And that will include an acceptance of genuine image noise too. It will become the mark of available light photography. And if the manufacturers manage to remove it, we shall hear some people bewail the loss, just as they deplored the 'grainlessness' of T-Max films. I even overheard one Tri-X junkie call it 'spooky'. So take heart: ideology will sooner or later have to bow to reality.

 

The old man from the Age of Glass Plates

[sean_reid]

Thanks Wilfredo. I'd have to go along with you on the M8 B&Ws .... we're still using those M lenses here and it shows IMHO.

 

And I do have to admit that I have a little bit of an advantage on many who still shoot film and process to digital ... having bit the bullet on getting the Imacon 949. Frankly, with that set up, there is little I can do with the M8 that I can't get from film beyond the obvious advantages inherent in digital capture from any digital camera.

 

But (big BUT), I love the ISO 640 on the M8 and dearly wish they had a ISO 800 on the camera which I suspect would work just fine. That bit of extra ISO over my usual ISO 400 set to 320 with film combined with the Lux asph lenses is a compelling combination for available light work.

 

Both have their place in my camera bag.

 

Hi Marc,

 

That nominal 640 actually is a true 800.

 

Cheers,

 

Sean

[Jamie Roberts]

@ Nick--thanks for the pointer; I will check them out. We always use a Lambda for album prints, and they're great, but our (excellent) lab prints to Kodak Endura matte.

 

So getting a real fibre based paper (from Ilford, it looks like), well, I think that's the last piece of the puzzle here for me!

 

For those of you in the states, I also found this place, which I'll try as well:

 

Fiber Base Printing

 

@Marc--I know how good that Imacon scanner is; I saw some beautifully made prints from scanned TriX negs awhile back at a studio in Toronto.

 

But--not having the scanner, it's hard to tell how much latitude you have working with the negative instead of the RAW file. IOW, one thing I like about digital for BW is that I can make multiple develops for shadows, mids and highlights, and composite them in PS, sort of what I did many, many years ago with zone system BW development on MF film.

 

I know the wedding business model doesn't usually allow for that kind of time on a project (at least ours doesn't seem to), but for personal work or advertising collateral--or for the client that understands the time involved--could you not get more out of something like the M8 (or the Leaf!) than from a negative?

 

Again, I'm just curious. I certainly don't have the in-house film scanning capability here (I have a Nikon 4000ED, which is a very good scanner, but not an Imacon )

[Cruewell]

I think digital will eventually be comparable to film. There was a similar process with video a decade or two ago: colour and overal quality from early video cameras was much worse and very easy to tell from stuff shot with film then shown on tv, but today it's much harder to tell the difference. Just give it time.

 

So how does that 24/2.8 ASPH behave on the streets? I am getting one as soon as I have the M8!

[Jager]

Very nice shots, Marc. You do street as well as you do weddings. And you're one of the best wedding photographers out there. Hope you do a book someday.

 

I'm also in the camp which loves digital, and is particularly smitten with the kind of images the M8 is providing us. But at the same time I love traditional B&W and hope to always have a few rolls of Tri-X in the bag to feed my M6 and M7.

 

Jeff

[mwilliamsphotography]

Thanks for the insight Sean, I'll have to check it out with a meter.

 

Jamie, that 949 is mondo fast, and has a killer batch scan ability. I can blow through a lot of wedding negs pretty quickly, the darn thing scans so fast I can barely get the next strip preped before it's done. I have all the defaults set up and saved for different films the way I shoot them, so half the time there's very little adjusting to the pre-scan needed. I don't shoot all film anymore, just some select stuff with MF and Leica.

 

Just dabble in Street work Jeff, there are so many others who are dedicated to it and it shows in their work. I started doing it when on business trips, and still primarily do it only then. But, it is what led to doing candid wedding stuff as Art Directors and designers hired me to shoot their weddings the same way as my street stuff.

 

Love the 24 Jose because it's close to a 35ish field of view on the M8... which is my favorite lens on a film M. I don't like using aux finders, so I was thrilled that the M8 had frame lines for 24mm.

[skimmel]

I shoot alot of street. So far the M8 has performed very well. However, it has not fully replaced my M6 and Ricoh GRD, both of which I consider superb street machines.

 

See recent images from all here:

 

Flickr: Photos from Captainvideo

 

I really like your images! How did you do the toning of, for example, To Kwa Wan Market?

[nachkebia]

Nice pictures!

I find colors to be more than dull though, they are trully boring and flat, black and white tones are not great either...

[Cruewell]

Nice pictures!

I find colors to be more than dull though, they are trully boring and flat, black and white tones are not great either...

 

I ain't showing you my pictures, Vladimer, if you criticize these you'll set mine on fire!!!

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Hallo,

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