M8 vs. M7 & Velvia 50

[zlatkob]

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I think the comparison is meaningful, but similar comparisons have been on the internet for years now. They show very convincingly something that is not surprising at all, that film is very grainy. And no matter how you scan it, it will still be very grainy. Scan it better, and you show the grain better. There's no way around that. One of the reasons for digital's popularity is that most people prefer the cleaner look of digital, which can be achieved so easily without any special scanning technique, without cloning out dust spots, etc. But the look of film is a valid and interesting expression of the world as well, and some people prefer that look. So the questions in the end are not which is scientifically better, but very simply which do you prefer to see in your photos, whether printed or otherwise, and which do you prefer in your workflow. Comparisons like this provide a straightforward route to answering these questions.

[redfalo]

It is possible that I missed something, but have you corrected the camera -to-object distance due to 1.33 crop factor?

I compared m8 and provia 400x and didn't find much difference, except for somewhat limited dynamic range of the film (very nonscientific comparison)

A couple years ago I compared a ISO 400 print film and 6mp top-of-the-line dslr. I'have not found much difference as well.

 

yes and no. all shots were done from the same position. In the first example with the same lens (Cron 50). In the 2nd example with different lenses (21mm on the M8, 35mm on the M7).

[afineman]

When scanning film:

Skip the ICE

all it does is unsharpen everything.

Also, scan with as high of a multipass as possible (16x is best)