Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2002/08/19

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Subject: [Leica] Digital and Analog comaprisons...
From: "tlianza" <tlianza@sequelimaging.com>
Date: Mon, 19 Aug 2002 22:50:30 -0400

Hi to all,

This whole experiment started out with a conversation that I had with a
great photographer, Ian Lloyd.  www.rianlloyd.com.sg/
Ian and I were good friends in college.  I was recently in Singapore and I
we spent time talking over some technical issues ( my degree is in
Photographic Science) .  Ian mentioned that he could see switching to
Digital when he could get the quality that he gets from his 35mm work on a
two page spread in a book.  Ian shoots with Canon equipment (he switched
many years ago from Leica mostly do to the nature of his work...lens changes
are rough in the field)  National Geographic and the Discovery Channel
funded a 25 year retrospective of his work from which he produced a book
(The spirit of Asia).  The images from the  book were printed at very large
size on a Durst Lambda (I'm thinking a minimum of 30 X 40 inches).  The book
is great, but the labor was incredible.  Each image was scanned (80 mbyte or
so) and retouched and then send back for printing both in the book and the
exhibition prints.

When I got back to the states, I picked up a Nikon D100 to compliment my
other Nikon gear and I figured that I might as well run the "Ian challenge".
I spent a few wonderful weekends running around New Hampshire, with my Leica
Ms, my Trusty R6, Nikon N100 and the Nikon D100.  I shot images trying to
match available focal lengths .  I shot every scene with the Digital and
atleast one analog camera.  Each camera had Ektachrome EPN .   I  used EPN
because it is a very accruate film from a color standpoint (i.e. boring....)
I processed the films and scanned them using the Nikon Ls4000 scanner.  I
scanned the film strips rather than from mounted slides, for better
flatness.

I turned off sharpening in the Nikon D100 and I turned of sharpening in the
LS4000.  I matched the tone reproduction of the film based images to the
D100.  Right off the bat, I could see that the digital system was presenting
a more pleasing image on the screen than the film based image.  I was sure
that was going to happen because the EPN does not enhance saturation.  With
a little touch up in tone reproduction and a little saturation boost, the
images looked very similar.  I applied sharpening in both cases.  One thing
became very clear, very fast: I could apply a great deal more sharpening to
the digital image than the scanned image. There was a lot less grain noise
in the D100 image. I tried my best to balance the sharpening and grain boost
in the film images to prevent grain from being an objection and I backed off
the sharpening on the D100 images.  In the end, when I printed the images on
my Epson 1200 printer on archival paper, it was very difficult to see any
difference.  I took the data files and had them printed on a Fuji Frontier
system to 10 X 15 inch and then I showed the images (4 different scenes) to
12 different observers, some with photographic experience, others who just
like to look at pictures.  In the end the observes ranked the D100 image
quality higher(image appeared sharper)  than the analog images about 20 to
1.  There was only one image, shot with R6 and 180 apo Telyt, that caused
some confusion in the process.  It became clear to me that the
scanning/printing process was probably the limiting factor.  The additional
MTF of the scanning step was sufficient to have an impact on the final image
quality.  The scanner was in focus, I was resolving the grain just fine....
As a matter of fact, if you didn't have the D100 images to compare, there
would be no complaints about any of the images. I shot the D100 files in
Jpeg mode, not native, the film scans were tiff.  While I'm sure that a drum
scan might improve the situation a bit, nothing can be done about the grain
noise / sharpening issues.  I think that with sufficient work, I could
develop a work flow that would equal or exceed the digital workflow quality,
but the fact is with no sweat at all, the images produced using digital
means, looked better than the analog images after processing.

Now after all this, will I throw out my Leica and Nikon film cameras? Of
course not.  I can carry two Leica M's, 5 lenses and 20 rolls of film in a
small messenger bag. I know that I will be bring back an image regardless of
batteries.   I could bang tent stakes in the ground using the R6/r7 and
still take pictures at 0 degrees on a winter day.   My Nikon F100 is just
great and it has a great metering and flash system. The fact is, the biggest
limitation to great images from any of these cameras is me.  The whole
experience was an eye opener for me.  I saw that I was consistenly
mis-focusing the M images. I tended to use the outline of thick objects,
rather than the front detail to focus, the SLR images showed this problem
clearly when viewed side by side with the M images.  Now I'll be a lot more
careful with the M.  I learned that I can rely upon the digital camera for a
high quality image. The downside is the time spent building digital archives
and copies.  My experience and instinct leads me to conclude that if I am
going to electronically reproduce the image, I should start with a digital
camera.  The next series of tests I'm going to run will be to shoot some
color negative and go print them in my darkroom and compare those to the
digital images printed through the Fuji system.  I'm not expecting any great
differences, but it will give me more time to sharpen my skills with the M.

A final note, nothing will ever give me more personal satisfaction than
printing a tri-x negative developed in D76 1:1 shot with my old M2/ 50mm DR
summicron on fiber based paper....that's photography the way I learned to
love it.


Tom Lianza
Technical Director
Sequel Imaging Inc.
25 Nashua Rd.
Londonderry, NH 03053



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