Film is still hard to beat

[smithy]

You do realise that much of what you see on TV has been recorded on Beta tape don't you? Beta VHS wasn't better than VHS Beta, VHS just won the marketing war.  Beta and its successor Digital Tape (which is based on Beta) is far superior to VHS.

On the other side of things, yes film digital is more convenient, and yes it is easier to learn at the beginning as you see your results. Does it make us lazy though?  I believe to an extent it does: shoot away and it can be fixed more easily in post so many don't bother to get it right in camera.  I shoot all medium format in film mix of black and white and Reala/Ektar 100.  There are still some qualities that I like in the film that isn't present in digital. Other views will vary of course

I edited your words to help your post make sense

[itsnotmeyouknow]

You do realise that much of what you see on TV has been recorded on Beta tape don't you? Beta VHS wasn't better than VHS Beta, VHS just won the marketing war.  Beta and its successor Digital Tape (which is based on Beta) is far superior to VHS.

On the other side of things, yes film digital is more convenient, and yes it is easier to learn at the beginning as you see your results. Does it make us lazy though?  I believe to an extent it does: shoot away and it can be fixed more easily in post so many don't bother to get it right in camera.  I shoot all medium format in film mix of black and white and Reala/Ektar 100.  There are still some qualities that I like in the film that isn't present in digital. Other views will vary of course

I edited your words to help your post make sense

Oops don't know how I managed that. Thanks!

So this is what I meant:

You do realise that much of what you see on TV has been recorded on Beta tape don't you? VHS wasn't better than Beta, VHS just won the marketing war.  Beta and its successor Digital Tape (which is based on Beta) is far superior to VHS.

On the other side of things, yes digital is more convenient, and yes it is easier to learn at the beginning as you see your results. Does it make us lazy though?  I believe to an extent it does: shoot away and it can be fixed more easily in post so many don't bother to get it right in camera.  I shoot all medium format in film mix of black and white and Reala/Ektar 100.  There are still some qualities that I like in the film that isn't present in digital. Other views will vary of course

[markd61]

Those are beautiful images.

What is ironic is that the scans from your negs are probably better than what can be achieved by optical printing on photo paper.

When I first started scanning negs on a Kodak RFS 3570 back in the 90's I was astonished to see the dynamic range of the scans that far surpassed the quality of printing conventionally. I was able to create prints from my scans that left my clients speechless. The best part was when they took their negs to other labs and could never get prints to equal the range in our prints.

[paul13walnut5]

Some days i'm in a film mood, some days I'm in a digital mood.  The digital days outweigh the film days probably at least 100:1 these days, but I still have a film camera and some film waiting to be used.

My decision is based on liking to shoot black and white with chromagenic film now and then, I love xp2 and 400cn.

The grain is lovely, quite pronounced, yet doesn't get in the way of detail, quite unlike digital noise, the contrast and gamma scale is totally different too, and the biggest bonus of all: I can optically filter the lens.

When I've tried this on digital the results are very flat - post-processing being better for digital mono's- but a red or yellow or occasionally green filter over my lens renders my viewfinder 'momo' to all intents and purposes, certainly it makes it far more easy for me to see in mono: with an unfiltered viewfinder I struggle to see visualise a good mono shot.

There is the argument of shooting RAW with the mono picture style on (giving me a mono live view, but colour RAW if I really need to tweak) but I find this less immediate, ironically.

My shots on film tend to be more rigorously planned an executed, I think technical merits of the medium aside, film forces you into a different way of working : sometimes it's great to have space for 500 RAW files at 8fps.  Other times it's great just to take your time.  Not that this is exclusive to film users of course.

I'm not looking to be corrected as it really is just an opinion and it is what works for me, but thats the point, these debates always come down to which is 'better'.   I reached the conclusion that they are different, and folk who write one off against the other are potentially missing a trick.

On the Beta / VHS debate (It really isn't the same thing, Beta / 16mm would be a better comparison) VHS won out because it was cheaper to make, had higher profit margins and the studios got behind it.

Beta was technically far superior (component colour vs composite colour) but the decks were more costly and the distributers never really got behind it.

I have a Sony J3 deck (pro betacamSP/BetacamSX/Digibeta) which still gets daily use and a JVC S-VHS deck which is used occassionally, normally for friends looking to dub their 1980's holiday videos to DVD.

Ultimately, Beta derived formats won....   Which reminds me, I have 2 rolls of S8 ektachrome I need to use up!

[gary samples]

do they still make film?

[dr croubie]

do they still make film?

Making it isn't the problem, everyone here still sells it, even the local supermarkets and Big W.

It's the processing that's a bitch, I get my normal-colour and colour-B+W (like Tmax) films done at the 1 Kodak Express between here and Melbourne, even they can't do slide (like Velvia) so they post it to someone else. The 'true' B+W films like BW400CN I get done at another shop called (funnily enough), Black+White Photographics (who also, funnily enough, do process Velvia and slide films).
Besides those two shops there might be another one or two around the place, if they close then it's postage to Sydney or Melbourne or start mixing my own chemicals...

[paul13walnut5]

@drcroubie

Think you got your true and colour bw films mixed up there old chap: 400Cn is chromagenic (c41 process) TMax's are old school mono.