Anyone burned out on digital and going back to film?

puredrifting

puredrifting

Major Contributor
Hi all:

I have been a photographer since I was a kid. I grew up on a horse ranch, my parents went to horse shows. I interned with a very well respected horse photographer for two years. I shot for yearbook in junior high and high school, had a darkroom, and in general, shot a lot of photos. I landed two magazine cover shots for nationally distributed magazines when I was 14. I have always loved photography and all that I learned has served me well in developing my cinematography skills.

I stopped shooting film for stills pretty much when everyone else did, back in the late 90s. I have owned and used a Nikon d70, D80, D300 and numerous point and shoots. I am kind of not digging photography nearly as much in the digital age. I went through boxes of my old prints and negatives and although I have become a better photographer in the past ten years, the images are lacking something in the look and feel.

So I just bought a really cheap Nikon 35mm film camera. I am also contemplating a used medium format camera setup. I think that going back to shooting film will inspire me a lot more than I have been for the past few years with digital.

Anyone else missing film? I also used to shoot a lot of S16 before HD came in. I miss that as well but I cannot afford to shoot S16 anymore. It's weird, I like shooting with my HPX170 almost as much as I ever did with S16, so my film obsession seems more limited to still photography.

Anyone else feel this way? If so, why?

Dan
 
It took me quite a while to switch to digital. Now that I have (May 2006), I can't go back to just film. I love to shoot and could never even remotely afford the number of shots I can take, if I used film. With the modern digital cameras and the amazing Photoshop tools, as I'm sure you're aware, we can get some amazing things accomplished.

That being said, I think that with the look of film, which cannot and likely never will, be perfectly reproduced digitally, I think that there is a place for both. It just depends on what one wants their end product to be.

With my Sony A700, a good lense and Photoshop CS3, I'm happy and expect to be for a long time.

It just depends. My family and some friends did Niagara Fall's a couple years ago. My youngest son (16 at the time), wanted to do film. He shot four rolls on my old Minolta. Some of the shots are great and some are garbage. That was him though, not film. But there is definitely a place for film and a place for digital.

I did a trip out West not too long ago. I'd hate to pay to get 1800 shots "developed". :)

just my .02 worth ...
Larry
 
Hey Larry:

Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I think a lot of it is mindset and probably the aesthetics of age. I am 45 and grew up on film. I definitely have taken some great digital still images and yes, I know exactly what you mean, I did a Southwest roadtrip two years ago, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Utah and Nevada and I probably took close to 1800 images. That would have cost quite a few hundred dollars to have shot on film. But I bet I would have liked the images better and I would taken far fewer than 1,800 of them.

I am going to travel throughout France, from Paris to the Riviera in June for a documentary project and I will be leaving my D80 and D300 at home. I will be bringing my F75, about 20-30 rolls of film and my Canon point and shoot. I am also willing that I will take more high quality images with the film camera, reserving the point and shoot for when I am shooting video also and just need some snapshots.

But I also agree that digital has taken the thought and care that I used to take with film away. Digital is like being at a shooting range with the machine gun. You are going to blast through a heck of a lot more ammo that you will with a bolt action rifle, and with digital, the ammo is free but how many times are you going to hit the target? Also with digital, the gun is a LOT more expensive. My Nikon F75 cost $69.00 new in the box vs. $1,800.00 for the D300. Which one shoots higher resolution images? (35mm film = about 25 megapixels vs. 12.3 mgeapixels with the D300) Which one is lighter (13 oz. vs. a few pounds for the D300), simpler (F75 is a basic 35mm plastic camera), and more reliable? (F75 has very basic electronics whereas the D300 is ALL electronics).

I figure I bought my D300 body for about $1,800.00 (early adapter, paid too much). This camera is already outdated and in another year, may break, have problems or just stop working OR more likely is that Nikon will come out with a D500 or a cheaper D700. Oh, and I will be like a kid in a toy store, pressing my nose against the glass and exclaiming how I MUST have that new camera becuase it has more megapixels, has an FX instead of the DX sensor (oh, yeah, now all of the DX lenses are going to be useless or not as useful on FF, gotta buy more FX lenses to replace them). See what I mean? Digital has all of us on a treadmill because they keep improving them so much. I miss film cameras where the right camera would easily last me 10 years and at times, even 20 years. So in the end, if I stay on the digital track, my D300 will probably cost me $100.00 per month to own, whether or not I am actually shooting it. My F75 will cost me $3.83 per month whether or not I am shooting it and assuming I am getting rid of it in 18 months (unless it breaks, I will be keeping it for many years).

Sure film isn't free but for casual shooting, it costs under $6.00 per roll of 24 for film to shoot in total (.99 and a half cents per roll for Fuji 400 Superia in six packs from Costco) and $1.59 for devleoping and $2.99 for high res scans to a Gold Kodak CD. If I only NEED to shoot a few rolls a month, I am saving thousands of dollars over shooting digital, have better quality images with much better archival capabilities (all of my digital photos are archived on two CDs or DVDs - so far so good, but I have lost about 20 data CDs so far to digital rot, I am sure that I will lose many of my digital images in the next ten years if I am not hyper vigilant about transferring to other media). Film negatives are proven to last at least 100 years with proper storage and much longer if you are lucky. Sure, I will be working with the digital images from the Kodak CDs but I will also have real negatives in my fireproof safe as well that can be re-scanned anytime in the future to new types of media also. Negatives are just plain better than only digital long term storage.

As far as Photoshop, I guess that is my age showing through again. Yes, I use Photoshop. Yes, I am decent with it. Study the books, take all of the classes, Scott Kelby stares at me from my bookshelf and computer monitor at least a few times a week. But I have to say, I prefer images that just need a bit of cropping, perhaps some slight tweaking of curves and that's about it. I am somewhat of a purist in that I don't like the look of super digitally manipulated images. To me, Photoshop is an artistic tool that stands at least somewhat apart from great photography. I have seen some great images created with Photoshop and some awesome skills, but I will never be that Photoshop artist and I don't really want to be. I prefer to create images mostly in-camera and leave the Photoshop to minimal cleanup and repair chores. HDR, virtual lighting, most Photoshop plug-ins look extremely stupid to me, they look phoney and way too manipulated. Not to most people because they have been conditioned to it, it is everywhere.

I just looked through that idiotic magazine Popular Photography and most of the reader submitted images looked really horrible. Photoshopped within an inch of their lives and that hideous Lucis Looks filter applied to everything. Yuck.

It's the same in filmmaking, I reject most visual effects in comparison to practical effects. Almost all of the popular feature films today look like moving Photoshop effects. Showing my age but optical and practical effects in films like Bladerunner and Brazil have yet to equaled by the best DI, Flame and Smoke artists IMHO. Almost all popular films today contain visual effects that to my eye, will be looked upon as quaintly in 50 years as we look upon Georges Melies, "A Trip to the Moon" today. In other words, to me, in general, Photoshop and most feature film VFX have a plastic, synthetic, unrealistic look to them, everything looks too perfect. Digital cameras as well. Sure we can add grain and manipulate in Photoshop but in general, it all looks synthetic and manufactured to me, especially in print. Most car commericals, other than obviously live running footage use photorealistic 3D models of cars. My kids don't even give it a second thought, to them, these cars are "real", but to me, since I started out on LightWave, they just look like someone spent some major money with Viewpoint Labs, buying 80,000 point models and animating them. Fine for the look, but it's not the real car you are looking at, it is an avatar. Drives me nuts. At some point, I wonder if people will tire of digitally manipulated imagery that looks so perfect that it is obviously fake?

But I don't think that organic, naturalistic, imperfect images will age quite so quickly. If you compare the images from the Melies film above to a still like the Bresson "Man Jumping Over a Puddle", I think you would agree that the Bresson image looks less dated, much more elegant and organic. It looks pretty timeless to me, wheras the Melies images looked quaint even 10 years after they were created.

I am probably diverging way too much from the point at hand here. Thanks for listening.

Dan
 
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I've really been thinking about why I sold all my film camera. T70, EOS 10S, F4s... I may buy an old F2 and shoot some E6. Maybe some Reala, or good old K64. Can you still get it?
 
I did film in college and loathed it, give me photoshop and no chemicals or any darkroom experience for that matter. I'm too impatient for film, I want to see my results as soon as I get home:) In school we shot film then scanned it all for digital and just around when I graduated, Nikon came by the school and did a digital camera back demo that was well beyond my price range but I knew I was in love. In the seventies I had a Ricoh 35mm with a 500 mm catadioptric lens and I would romp around Toronto doing candid closeups of people and loved it. Even then though, I hated waiting for my rolls to come back (did I mention I'm impatient) When I got my first decent digital camera and coupled it with my PS skills, I never looked back. I think digital is still very much in its infancy and will eventually close the door on film (for the most part) indefinately. Just my .02
 
Well it depends on how you use it. I have had my 5D for 1 year almost to the day. And i take phtos all the time, but none of them are "machine gunned", every picture i take is thoughtful.

i used to shoot film like that too... it cost me a fortune over the years.

now i make one big investment that keeps on trucking.
 
If you like to sell stock photo's most travel magazines will only buy images shot on film. Same with most nature magazines.
 
Chip, do you sell the negatives to the stock websites. If so then it would make sense because negatives keep up with the technology. They can be scanned in as scanners get better and better. If they only take film but want it scanned in and digital, I think its kind of silly....the end result is what should matter in that case.
 
I do not sell stock still photo's some friends do. They only shoot film for the $ shots and digital for thier personal photo album's. My understanding was they send the magazine publishers the negative's and do not scan them to make a digital copy.
 
Starmapper:

You sound like a child of the new generation ;-) Just like my daughter, everything is needed NOW! Can you enjoy Gone with the Wind or Barry Lyndon in one sitting? I was crushed to show my daughter Raiders of the Lost Ark, one of my favorites and she was yawning 10 minutes in. The pace and cuts were way too slow for her.

I do think digital will close the door and just like shooting HD is numbering motion picture films days, it is the same with still gear. But the gear I own today, I don't like it as much as I like film, especially for travel, art and portraits. But for family, sports and just experimenting, yes, you cannot beat digital.

Dan
 
Hi Timur:

I know you are a DP so you are probably one of the few digital users who shoot that way.

I even find myself doing it, when I shoot sports, I have about a 2% keeper ratio, the rest are just deleted. I definitely don't have the eye and the reflexes to shoot sports. Candids I do better at and I am pretty good at landscape, travel and sort of abstract art shots.

5D is a sweet camera.

Dan
 
I guess in the end, you have to shoot with whatever you are comfortable shooting with. But the money equation on digital still makes me think it is a supreme ripoff for serious amateur photographers. It is the perfect addiction for wealthy amateurs, go and surf the photography sites, you have amateurs on there that have gone from the D80 to the D300, back to the D90, then to the D700, then to the D3 and now they want the D3X. Insanity, especially in this economy. Or the one that really kills me, the "grass is always greener" guys, you know, I have three EOS bodies and 12 Canon lenses, but I am thinking of switching over to Nikon because it has better xxxxxwhatever. I am going to take a beating on selling all of my Canon stuff but I gotta have the Nikon DXXX cuz it's so much better." Jeez, talk about being sucked in by marketing hype.

I have owned both brands and to me, they are the same (yes, a tiny bit different but eseentially for all intents and purposes, the same). If you have a great eye and are a good photographer, camera doesn't really matter so why not shoot with a cheap one?

Other than an occasional stipend or doing so in the line of DP work, I don't really shoot stills professionally so my situation is a little different. If I was a pro, I probably would either be shooting large format film or would have about 2-3 D3Xs. Doesn't matter in the least for pros, they have paying jobs and a D3X or an EOS 1D is just a write off, it is paid for almost instantly.

I am curious, are any of you still pros? (make your living shooting stills?)


Dan
 
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I'm have a still based Studio in San Francisco. Only a couple of reasons to shoot film now days.

1- 4x5 for High End Architecture...... Hang on.....most of you photo hobby guys are thinking.... tilt shift on a dslr..... or correct it in Photoshop. Or even Horseman rise fall camera on med format digital.... better, But still not the same. The field of view is much bigger on 4x5 (notice I didn't say angle of view)

2- Shoot film for fun to make real paper based b&w prints. Not shoot film than scan.... Thats stupid.... Just shoot digital.

Digital has taken photography to another level..... Just like back in the day when we used polaroid to work up to the final shot.

frisco
 
puredrifting said:
Starmapper:

You sound like a child of the new generation ;-) Just like my daughter, everything is needed NOW! Can you enjoy Gone with the Wind or Barry Lyndon in one sitting? I was crushed to show my daughter Raiders of the Lost Ark, one of my favorites and she was yawning 10 minutes in. The pace and cuts were way too slow for her.

I do think digital will close the door and just like shooting HD is numbering motion picture films days, it is the same with still gear. But the gear I own today, I don't like it as much as I like film, especially for travel, art and portraits. But for family, sports and just experimenting, yes, you cannot beat digital.

Dan
Click to expand...

Hopefully I can still squeeze in as a child of the new generation, but at 53 it becomes increasingly suspect:) I can sit through Barry Lyndon in one sitting but I've watched it probably ten or more times. Now if I had never seen it and it was on ebay for 5 bucks or at my local video store for twenty, I couldn't wait for shipping so I'd drop the extra fifteen and watch it now. I've watched "The good shepherd" numerous times and been totally absorbed each time and pacing doesn't get much slower than that. On the other hand, I've screened "Bourne Ultimatum" more than is healthy and love the high speed pacing of that film. I like digital because it's imediate and I have total control over the process from beginning to end. To me, mourning the death of film is similar to missing the characteristic style of quill written letters verses the document my canon printer spits out. Not to suggest in any way that you're mourning, you just enjoy the look and process of film and to quote Martha..."That's a good thing" :)
 
puredrifting said:
Starmapper:

You sound like a child of the new generation ;-)
Click to expand...

Loupe? Whazzat?

No more lightboxes, no more getting color negs developed and asking for 5 cuts to fit your sleeves instead of commercial 4 cuts which made you use 2 sleeves! No more contact prints! No more Luna-Pros (or Luna-Sixes for the old timers), no more tearing off the box top and putting it in the film back to remind you what the heck you had loaded... or writing notes to let you know that roll was getting pushed 2 stops!!

Digital has changed a lot for sure, but you don't find the old film shooters on these forums asking basic exposure questions, or even framing questions. My keep ratio was really high even as a sports photog, because I had to learn timing. I was hand winding while my co-worker was shooting an F3.

Oh well... That's progress I suppose.
 
I left film for too long, but I'm getting back into it for fun. Don't know that I could ever swing to just one or the other. I do stick to one system though so all my lenses work on any of my bodies.
 
puredrifting said:
. Digital is like being at a shooting range with the machine gun. You are going to blast through a heck of a lot more ammo that you will with a bolt action rifle, and with digital, the ammo is free but how many times are you going to hit the target?

.... Almost all of the popular feature films today look like moving Photoshop effects.

....most feature film VFX have a plastic, synthetic, unrealistic look to them, everything looks too perfect.
...
they just look like someone spent some major money with Viewpoint Labs,

..Drives me nuts. At some point, I wonder if people will tire of digitally manipulated imagery that looks so perfect that it is obviously fake?
Click to expand...

And I thought it was only me..

Dan, I could not agree more with every single word in your post.
Probably it´s because we are almost in the same age.

When I saw Star Wars Episode 1, I almost puked because of that "Visual Quality" of the VFX and the overall look (and don´t get me into talking about the story telling, but that´s an other storry - literally).
Was a major dealbreaker for the next 2 films in my book - I skipped them.

Thou I´m guilty to do exactly what you said (shooting digital stills and use photoshop - http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=158748&highlight=merry) out of parsimony and convenience, I still have that 1962 Pentacon Six full manual medium format camera, with that wonderfull set of 1960s Zeiss primes (that I religiosly use on my LEX/HVX combo).

Anytime I use it, I fall in love again with REAL film. Especialy if I use BW material.

I also saw some pretty impressing new Super8 material telecined to HD.
It looks to me, that super8 may have a renicance since modern stock is aviable now and prices for telecine dropped.

I think all this comes from the fact, that the human body is a analog system.
So analog input pleases. Like most everyone preferes the sound of a tube amp over the sound of a transistor amp. There is a reason why hifi amps in the upper price league use tubes.

Frank
 
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frisco said:
Not shoot film than scan.... Thats stupid.... Just shoot digital.
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I gotta disagree Frisco. For me, spending thousands of dollars a year for digital camera gear that is outdated right after I buy it seems more stupid. I know that you are going to say, you don't HAVE to buy the latest and greatest but go to a soccer game or Disneyland and look around, you don;t see a lot of 3 and 4 year old DSLRs, you see a lot of the latest and greatest besides the point and shoots.

The D90 came out three weeks after I bought the D300. Same imager, better features, almost half the cost. D300 is built better but essentially it was outdated as soon I bought it. And if you bought the D3, same issue, the D700 came out and it had the sme imager, same basic features and cost a LOT less. Canon 5D MKII blows the EOS-1ds MKIII at almost half the price. That is all well and good for working pros who pay off a camera instantly but it is stupid from a smart consumer viewpoint. DSLRs are a moneymaking machine for the camera manufacturers, which is great and 99.8% of amateurs are happy to keep Canon and Nikon going and I say more power to them, but in these economic times, it is crazy to waste so much money with planned obsolescence on such a tight scale of 8-12 month cycles.

There is a lot more to it than convenience for me. Film quantitatively looks better than DSLRs, ask any measurebator. D3X is the newest, baddest state of the art 24 megapixel DSLR that costs a ridiculous U.S. $8,000.00. But at an equivalent of 25 megapixels, still 35mm film has more resolution, much better latitude and superior colorimetry. If you care about quality, why would you not shoot film?

I totally respect your opinion, I am just trying to refute it with facts. ;-)

Dan
 
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