Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/07/25

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Subject: Re: [Leica] digital quality
From: Mark Rabiner <mark@rabiner.cncoffice.com>
Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2000 13:54:24 -0700
References: <002d01bff66e$19d9c1c0$6a0110ac@ccapr.com>

"B. D. Colen" wrote:
> 
> But then, given that not a lot of people walk into an art gallery or my
> house with a densitometer, we get back to the real work question...What does
> the print look like, framed, under glass, from 18" to six feet away?
> :-)
> B. D.
> 
><Snip> 
18" to six feet away?
I had a photo teacher in '75 who was unsuccessful at trying to teach us all
kinds of mathematical stuff.
Half the class dropped out because of it.
Give me one of those cardboard slider wheels in the darkroom handbook any day!!

But one number thing got absorbed.
The viewing distance thing.
An inch is about 25 mls.
So a fifty ml normal lens is a 2 inch lens.
The short side of a 35mm neg 24x36 is also roughly an inch.

Viewing distance is the focal length of the lens times the magnification.
So if you make an 8x10 with an 50mm (full print) that's a 2 inche lens times an
8X enlargement.
2x8
16 inches.
With a 24mm lens your viewing distance is 1x8 or 8 inches away.
Try viewing your print at that exact distance.
A warm fuzzy feeling incurs. 
Déjà vu of eyeball.
Mark Rabiner

In reply to: Message from "B. D. Colen" <bdcolen@earthlink.net> (RE: [Leica] digital quality)