c.chryss Posted October 14, 2007 Share #1 Posted October 14, 2007 Advertisement (gone after registration) I ask you. Is it only me that sold my digital for analogue? I did more than 10.000 photographs with digital and I think, they all were senseless. I bought an mp to get rid of automatic systems, and I started learning photography... at last! My Mp makes me think, compose, create photos. I don't just shoot anything! And most important: the film I use makes me think what and how to photograph! If it is a high contrast film I shoot certain kind of photographs than with a fine grain, soft grayscale film. This is the analogue beauty. Makes you think before you take the pictures. The digital, makes you think after you took them and you end up with thousands of photos with different prossesing... Listen everybody. I believe I will not be the only one to swich backwards! People will want to try the real think in photography. I am telling you. We want the film back! c.chryss Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted October 14, 2007 Posted October 14, 2007 Hi c.chryss, Take a look here I sold all my digital cameras for film!. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
plasticman Posted October 14, 2007 Share #2 Posted October 14, 2007 Congratulations! I did exactly as you did, and I haven't regretted it for a moment. Your words really ring true for me, and I'm sure you're right that we're not alone! More and more people are tiring of the easy way a person can snap a thousand images with digital without giving it any thought - and then the three or four 'good' images are given a little meaningless 'fixing' in Phostoshop and posted to the net - or forgotten forever on a CD. Welcome back to capturing light on real film instead of mathematical logarithms in a microcomputer! PS: your post made me feel really happy! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
likea Posted October 14, 2007 Share #3 Posted October 14, 2007 I think that you nailed it; with film it's think first shoot second. With digital it's shoot, shoot, shoot and then see if there's anything there worth thinking about. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
c.chryss Posted October 14, 2007 Author Share #4 Posted October 14, 2007 The photographers should turn their backs to digital. I work in an advertising company as a creative director and all photographers give us the same digital files we could also produce in our offices! This is an outrage. Some years ago, photographers had our respect with film. Now they offer nothing more than what everybody can do. Digital clicks! It is a big mistake for photographers to switch to digital. They lost people's respect. They should return to the analogue world. Production of new analogue cameras for professionals should start again. Also, film production shouldn't stop for a minute! c.chryss P.S. you made me happy too with your "switch"! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ron110n Posted October 14, 2007 Share #5 Posted October 14, 2007 Welcome aboard the Leica Forum Cathy! You will make our moderator Allan Brewer happy as an avid MP fan. I consider the two media a different beast from each other. Obviously you are a very particular person when it comes to your images. That's the reason why you deja voux to film. I have a consumer (LX1) and a prosumer digital (L1) camera where I use them for practical reasons. But if I shoot for presentation; of course that will be film, either or 35mm or 120. When I travel on a holiday, I will always bring my consumer point & shoot pocket digital camera with me and it will take tons of snaps on the given event, without thinking. But when it comes to ... "show me your best shot on your vacation"... It will be a 35mm and 120 B&W (gray scale) or Slide film. (M3, M6, M7, Rolleiflex 2.8FX, Rollei 6008i Pro) We're not blind... the results are obvious. Nothing wrong if you sell your digital camera... Cause if you buy again... it will always be better than the one you sold. They're like computers. I prefer not to make it very expensive when buying digital camera with it's technologial life-span. Film cameras??? That's a different story and I'm sure serious film people only wanted the best. If it's not the best and it's an old fudd film camera; Barnack, Folders, Russian. We want to show-off how we can make it jump with our shooting skills and developing skills. Possibilities are never ending. Best, -Ron ________________ Caveman's Gallery Neolithic Artistry Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
beramos Posted October 14, 2007 Share #6 Posted October 14, 2007 Welcome to the Forum Catherine. My full support to your words with which I fully agree. The charm of the film is something we do not know who is not appreciated but who knows not change for anything. Thanks for your opinion. Regards. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tom0511 Posted October 14, 2007 Share #7 Posted October 14, 2007 Advertisement (gone after registration) For me I dont see how I would think or compose any better or more when using my M6 with film compared to my M8. Actually I think that using auto-exposure lets me focus better on the subject, and being able to push ISO gives me more freedom when shooting. In film times I sometimes could not take an image because I had loaded the wrong film. For me the only possible (eventually) advantages of film are 1) the look of certain films - and it might be a little tricky to get that look with digital. However I am pretty happy with the look I get from the M8 2) I just like film, the sound when you transport for the next exposure, and sometimes it was cool that you had to wait some days for the result. Little bit like a surprize. Overall I dont see how digital is a problem for creative photography, I think you can even learn faster, as long as one does not just shoot and shoot and shoot. Cheers, Tom Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
plasticman Posted October 14, 2007 Share #8 Posted October 14, 2007 In film times I sometimes could not take an image because I had loaded the wrong film. I think that in some ways this sort of 'limitation' is one of the elements that paradoxically gives film it's strength: you may think you'd 'missed' a shot, but it may be that what was presented to you was an opportunity to creatively react to the subject in a different way than you first thought. This is one of the things that we mean about 'thinking first' with film - if you'd had the digital camera with you. then you would've pushed a couple of buttons and suddenly the camera has 'black&white' high ISO film and you press the shutter without needing to think anymore - but with the low ISO color film loaded, maybe you'd be forced to think some more and try another approach. I think you can even learn faster People often say this in defence of digital - but I personally feel that the knowledge does not go very deep. Mistakes are erased so easily that most digital photographers never learn anything more than how to dial exposures up or down randomly, depending on what they see from their previous shot on the LCD. Obviously I don't mean this applies to you. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest malland Posted October 14, 2007 Share #9 Posted October 14, 2007 What a silly position to take and what a silly thread! I have no problem with photographers who prefer shooting film, but anyone who says that you have to shoot film to have the "real thing" is simply talking baby talk: why not go to glass plates if you want the real thing? Photography ever since its inceptions has had changing technology, and will continue to change. What matters is the photograph produced, not the process used. The idea that film makes you think in advance, while digital does not because "you do everything afterwards" simply ignores what photography has always been about. Ever hear of Anselm Adams' statement that "the negative is the score and the print is the perforrmance. It's hardly worthwhile to spend more time adressing this monumetal ignorance, but I have several times referred to my "Bangkok Series" of 150 photographs, of which 48 were taken with the M6 mainly on Tri-X and HP5+ while the rest are all digital, taken with the Ricoh GR-D and GX100, except for about a dozen taken with the Leica D-Lux 3 — except for some obvious cases, you'll be hard-pressed to judge which are film and which are digital: —Mitch/Bangkok http://www.flickr.com/photos/10268776@N00/ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
plasticman Posted October 14, 2007 Share #10 Posted October 14, 2007 Mitch - I think we should really try to discuss this topic without resorting to abuse: if you want to be obnoxious there's the M8 forum for that kind of behavior. Incidentally, in spite of what you say I think that what people are reacting against is the massive tidal wave of mediocre image-making that is swamping us these days. You may be an exception, but on the other hand I'd say that not a lot can be judged from online jpeg images. We discussed 'integrity' on a very long thread here before - and interestingly the same word was used in a post on Mike Johnston's blog over on theonlinephotographer.com recently, which you also responded to. One of the photographers mentioned in the ensuing discussion was this. Now while I'd say that the final, square-format, grainy, sepia-tinted images are interesting and attractive - fine images in many ways - for me they lose their charm when I know they are captured with one of the cameras from this range. That's why I disagree with you to a certain degree about 'the final image being the thing'. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
c.chryss Posted October 14, 2007 Author Share #11 Posted October 14, 2007 I am talking about professional photographers and not amateurs. In the advertising company I work, we had made already a dozen of print ads in-house with zero cost for us, when photographers for the same digital result were asking 6.000 to 9.000 euros!!!! They won't get them! The "mysterious black box" that photographers had, is now lost since everyone has a sensor behind it... even my mom can take a wonderful photo out of 1 giga of photos!!! If you let a monkey take 500 digital photos, at least one could be equal to Bresson! And what a silly quote you made. Could you have the same Ansel Adams results with digital? Try to defend your hard work's craft and not the ease of use a digital offers. c.chryss P.S. It will be a thrilling thread! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
rsh Posted October 14, 2007 Share #12 Posted October 14, 2007 As some of you may have seen on the M8 Forum, I sold it. I will keep the d-Lux 3 and the V-Lux 1 for family and travel snaps. The M5s, MP and SL2s will continue to get the serious work. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Antony Posted October 14, 2007 Share #13 Posted October 14, 2007 It's hardly worthwhile to spend more time adressing this monumetal ignorance, but I have several times referred to my "Bangkok Series" of 150 photographs, of which 48 were taken with the M6 mainly on Tri-X and HP5+ while the rest are all digital, taken with the Ricoh GR-D and GX100, except for about a dozen taken with the Leica D-Lux 3 — except for some obvious cases, you'll be hard-pressed to judge which are film and which are digital: Mitch Alland's slideshow on Flickr —Mitch/Bangkok Flickr: Photos from Mitch Alland OK I'll try! Mitch I watched the slideshow (a very good set of images, you're a great image maker) With pencil in hand I made the following judgements, sorry for the titles I'm going as fast as I can. 1 woman in street - film 2 fish- film 3 motorbike- digital P&S 4 Building - film 5 woman cooking digital P&S 6 Building - film 7 Bus on street -film 8 Man in trailer -Digital P&S 9 Sleeping people - Digital P&S 10 Building - film 11 Rusty car - film 12 People on boat & cop -film 13 people sitting man in RHS foreground-film 14 girls sitting- Digital P&S 15 waiter - digital P&S 16 woman sitting eating - digital P&S 17 woman sitting chefs? - digital P&S 18 Corrugated shacks -digital P&S 19 people in alley- digital P&S 20 man sitting plant in foreground- digital P&S I couldn't go on (pencil broke) but how did I do? I think I've probably got near 90% even though its hard to tell with some, others are just so digital (shot 3) while some have the gritty reportage look with higher DR and lower sharpness that looks like TRi-X or HP5. Don't get rid of your film cameras, a good photographer deserves to be able to attain the best image possible, those shots I've guessed are digital don't live up to your technique!! Regards Mark Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Antony Posted October 14, 2007 Share #14 Posted October 14, 2007 To the OP I agree with you to a large degree, I find myself using digital for work (speed counts) and film for my personal stuff, where I just like the films character. I have a blog about analogue (film based) photography. Photo Utopia Most importantly enjoy what you do, and never let people say that it is less relevant than others modus. Mark Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
luigi bertolotti Posted October 14, 2007 Share #15 Posted October 14, 2007 Chris... I understand your point... and really for some kinds of pro work, digital has lowered the perception of the photographer as a skilled professional... I work in IT from 1982, and the same happened in our world... the person who "knows how to make a computer work" has no more the aura of 2 decades ago... and this was the PC explosion consequence. But these kind of tech leaps are NO RETURN... digital photo SHALL GO ON, simply... but until some GOOD photographer shall be able to demonstrate he can do A BETTER JOB with film, and BE PAID accordingly... the film will retain its niche: but... A NICHE, sorry... And about the observation that digital is shoot shoot shoot and film "think and then shoot" well, with the advent, years ago of motorized autofocus SLR... mmmhhh... for me the shoot shoot shoot frenzy started from then. Personally, I love a lot my M8, but 15 days ago went out with old Rolleiflex TLR and ONE new 120 rollfilm... I rediscovered really the importance to think, think again, then shot: 9 goods on 12 negs : that's true: with digital is a percentage not even thinkable... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest malland Posted October 14, 2007 Share #16 Posted October 14, 2007 ...OK I'll try!...Mark, thanks for the comments and thanks for looking. You got them all right. A few months ago I posted on pdreview 3 digital and 3 film picture, and everybody guessed incorrectly. —Mitch/Bangkok http://www.flickr.com/photos/10268776@N00/ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlanG Posted October 14, 2007 Share #17 Posted October 14, 2007 I am talking about professional photographers and not amateurs. In the advertising company I work, we had made already a dozen of print ads in-house with zero cost for us, when photographers for the same digital result were asking 6.000 to 9.000 euros!!!! They won't get them! The "mysterious black box" that photographers had, is now lost since everyone has a sensor behind it... even my mom can take a wonderful photo out of 1 giga of photos!!! If you let a monkey take 500 digital photos, at least one could be equal to Bresson! And what a silly quote you made. Could you have the same Ansel Adams results with digital? Try to defend your hard work's craft and not the ease of use a digital offers. c.chryss P.S. It will be a thrilling thread! Yes I beleive Ansel Adams could have taken similar photos with digital. Plenty of photogrphers are using MF digital backs on view cameras for incredible landscape photos. What kind of ads does your company produce? Are you going to buy hundreds of thousands of Euros worth of ad space and then try to save on the photography? OK I'll try to defend my craft which has little or nothing to do with amateur photographers doing what I can do. (Try doing a good job on architectural interiors without understanding how to represent the space, adjust props or light the rooms.) A lot of the skill in advertising photography is the production work: Choosing and directing models, stylists, etc. Also finding locations and doing the lighting. I never felt that the camera used was significant. But I can't see doing this work on film today. When I shoot advertising work, the A.D. and client are often on site and need to see the results as we shoot tethered to a laprtop. Polaroids won't cut it for them these days. Here are a couple of examples from last Friday. We had a dog or a cat in each setup and when we got the right pose and expression, we could move on to another variation. If I had been shooting film, I would have had a hard time knowing, or confirming with the art director that we had the shot he wanted in each setup. And we probably would have had to shoot so much more with film that we would have worked the animals so hard on each shot that we couldn't have tried as many variations as we did. Plus the film costs would have added up if we shot a hundred or more MF frames on each. If a photographer really wants to challenge himself in terms of technical skill and pre visualization, then why not use a view camera? (Film or digital.) Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here… Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! Link to post Share on other sites Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members! ' data-webShareUrl='https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/35691-i-sold-all-my-digital-cameras-for-film/?do=findComment&comment=376649'>More sharing options...
ron110n Posted October 14, 2007 Share #18 Posted October 14, 2007 15 days ago went out with old Rolleiflex TLR and ONE new 120 rollfilm... I rediscovered really the importance to think, think again, then shot: 9 goods on 12 negs : that's true: with digital is a percentage not even thinkable. Luigi, My neice and nephew who only do digital often wonder why before I make a shot, my neck turn like a goose all over the place looking at the sun's position, looking at the shadow direction, where to meter on the subject, etc, etc. But truthfully, MF is very forgiving as compared to 35mm and 35mm will indeed give you a good challenge. For sure on your TLR & New MF, the depth went from front through miles away to the back. That is on each and every shot. Likewise forgiving in high ISO grain characteristics. But never-the-less, we're talking about a media that can collect information about 6x more than a 35mm media. Glad you enjoy both media and properly utilize it's advantages to each other. -Ron ________________ Caveman's Gallery Neolithic Artistry Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AlanG Posted October 14, 2007 Share #19 Posted October 14, 2007 And about the observation that digital is shoot shoot shoot and film "think and then shoot" well, with the advent, years ago of motorized autofocus SLR... mmmhhh... for me the shoot shoot shoot frenzy started from then. Personally, I love a lot my M8, but 15 days ago went out with old Rolleiflex TLR and ONE new 120 rollfilm... I rediscovered really the importance to think, think again, then shot: 9 goods on 12 negs : that's true: with digital is a percentage not even thinkable... The famous photo by Avedon of Nastassja Kinski and a snake took hours to shoot and Avedon went through 8x10 film as fast as his assistants could load the camera. Just because he had an idea of what he wanted didn't stop him from shooting a lot of film until he got the perfect "unanticipated" moment. Digital photography just makes this approach affordable to everyone. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Antony Posted October 14, 2007 Share #20 Posted October 14, 2007 Mark, thanks for the comments and thanks for looking. You got them all right. A few months ago I posted on pdreview 3 digital and 3 film picture, and everybody guessed incorrectly. —Mitch/Bangkok Flickr: Photos from Mitch Alland Well I'm not surprised Mitch, I'll tell you why. Your film images have quite a high DR, a small random amount of grain more like HP5 than Tri-X, though its hard to tell; they aren't Neopan 400 and certainly not XP2. But they have a certain quality. Most of your digital stuff (not all) has quite low DR, very high contrast and sometimes a 'too sharp' look that is inconsistent with low light shots certainly for it to be film. Its as if you are trying to PP to look like pushed Tri-X but starting with a digi P&S with low DR and bumping the contrast doesn't do it. To me it looks false. I don't want to pick on one shot (and I hope you don't mind) But the 3rd shot the street scene with the motorbike, is way over PP'd for my taste and the grain/noise in the roof of the car/taxi on the left could only be from a digital P&S– really ugly. Compared to the later shot from fast film the building looks too stark and tonally restricted, like the sinister biker with no face. Don't be hurt by my critique I think the execution of your images is good, I'm not sure the equipment is as good as the photographer. Regards Mark PS I'm having fun with a Rollei 35 at the moment, I'd MUCH rather use one than a digital P&S Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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