Re: [Leica] Film types

[chmilar@mminternet.com]

Erik van der Meulen <e.van.der.meulen@avondel.com> said:

> Basically I would like to know the arguments for choosing slide film
> over negative film (or vice versa). I have heard that slide film is more
> sensitive to exact lighting, but that's about it.
> 
> My general processing practice is to have the film developed and scan
> the negatives (Nikon Coolscan III), so I basically do not care for the
> slide-projector argument too much.

The main advantage to slide film is that you can
throw a slide onto a light table and see what
you've got.

The advantage of negative film is that it has a
wider dynamic range, ie. it will capture a larger
difference between the darkest and brightest parts
of a scene.

The wider dynamic range can buy you two things:

1)  You have more latitude in your exposure (ie.
you can screw up your exposure, and still extract
a usable image from the film (within limits)).

2)  You might be able to get some more shadow or
highlight detail into your final image, if the
scene you are shooting has a large variation in
brightness.

If you have a good scanning workflow set up, the
"light table" argument won't mean much to you.
You can just evaluate your results after scanning.

However, it might take more work with the scanner
and PS to get a nice result from negative film.
There are more choices to make to when setting your
black point and white point, and you do have to
make sure your software compensates correctly for
the orange mask.


> A related question concerns black and white photography. Do I obtain
> best results if I purchase actual B/W film, or can I just as well use
> colour (slide/negative) film and convert the scans later in PS?

Reasons to always shoot color:

- - You don't need to decide which red/yellow/green
filter you want to use, in the field. You can use
PS's channel mixer to dial in the exact amount of
filtration you want. (Don't use PS's "convert to
grayscale" option, which is crap. Make a channel
mixer layer over top of your original RGB image.)

- - No need to change film, or carry multiple camera
bodies.

- - You might find you like the shot better in color.


Reasons to shoot B&W:

- - Different grain structure and "look" to the
negative.

- - Possibly finer grain (especially with higher ASA).

- - B&W film may also have a wider exposure latitude
than color negative film (and certainly much more
than color transparency film).

- - B&W offers more control in the development process,
to control contrast and dynamic range.

- - Shooting B&W makes you seem more "serious".

- --
To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html