Re: [Leica] Kodak Focus

["Barney Quinn" <Barney.Quinn@noaa.gov>]

bd,

You are right, of course. I also sent the same set of files to the pro lab
which does all my film processing and printing. I am quite interested to see
what they can do. It's fairly daunting to be at the beginner's end of this
learning curve.

I also think that it is sad that so many places don't seem to have access to
reasonable photo processing, and I don't mean film v digital. A bad image is
a bad image. It doesn't matter how it was produced. I would think that, in
the long run, decent processing would be a good thing for all forms of
processing. Perhaps the fact that digital let's you do it and control it
yourself, short circuiting the lab scene, is one of the reasons it is so
popular. I am lucky. We have several superb labs in my part of the world.

Barney

bdcolen wrote:

> Gee, Barney, your experience with the digital prints from Kodak sounds
> precisely like what happened to me what I made the Godawful mistake of
> dropping off a couple rolls of Fuji 800 - shot with an M and a Nikon -
> at the Walmart in Harlan, KY. I got back the most garish looking prints,
> and color skewed negatives, you can possibly imagine.
>
> Sure, you'll say, drop off your film at a Harlan, KY WALMART and you get
> what you deserve. ;-) But the Harlan Wal-Mart is the equivalent of where
> most of America gets its film processed.
>
> Does all film processing suck? Of course not. But neither does all
> digital printing by companies such as Kodak.
>
> B. D.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us
> [mailto:owner-leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us] On Behalf Of Barney
> Quinn
> Sent: Thursday, October 02, 2003 2:15 PM
> To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us
> Subject: Re: [Leica] Kodak Focus
>
> Hi,
>
> Ted Grant wrote:
>
> > Peter Klein offered:
> > Subject: RE: [Leica] Kodak Focus
> >
> > > Guys, don't you get it?  Film is *dead*. <<<
>
> I am going to regret this, but here goes anyway........
>
> </ rant mode on />
>
> It has been said about me as a photographer, more than once. that my
> strength is technical, not creative. For a long time I took this as an
> insult. Then I got to thinking about it. It finally occurred to me that
> I am an engineer, and it would be very strange indeed if I weren't
> technical. I have been reading post after post about how film is dead
> and digital is now it. With each post my resistance softened a little.
> Kodak's announcement last wek that they were going to suspend
> development of film, or what ever exactly it is that they said, really
> chilled my blood becasue I am a medium format film guy. So, I gave it. I
> am trying out a 2.7 MegaPixel Nikon D1.
>
> I can see why digital is so popular. The D1 body, to me, works like a
> dream. I shot 180 pictures over the weeked. I am quite surprised at how
> easy and convient it all was. I put the USB cable in to my Mac
> PowerBook. iPhoto woke up automatically and uploading the pictures was
> all but automatic. No fus, no muss. Instant electronic catalogue. You
> can set iPhoto so that if you double click on an image it opens in
> PhotoShop. Years of hard won dark room skills transferren over in an
> instant. Crop? No problem. Something you don't like. Hit it with the
> clone tool. I got fourteen pictures edited and ready to go in two hours.
> It was fast and easy. Ted and Tina, I am sure, could beat me in the dark
> room, but there is no way I could get 14 silver images ready to go out
> the door in two hours. To get them printed all you have to do is to
> click an icon and off they go to Kodak. Automatically. It was a breeze.
> I was really impressed until I got the images back!
>
> I am sitting here looking at the 4x6 inch prints produced by Kodak. They
> are, at best, pathetic. If Kodak is going to make it in the digital
> world they are going to have to do a lot better than this. These prints
> are among the sorriest excuses for a photograph I have ever seen. What
> makes them particularly horrible is that although nothing is really
> wrong with them, nothing is really right with thenm, either. The color
> is flat, flat, flat. There is no information in the shadows, there is no
> information in the highlights, and there is no real detail. They aren't
> crisp, they don't sparkle, there isn't an ounce of life in them. They
> are, on a trechnical level, dreadful. They look like 35mm pictures did
> thirty or fourty years ago. Blah! Humbug!
>
> I admit I am spoiled. I usually shoot with my M6 or my Hassey, or my R8.
> I usually make 4x5 and 5x7 prints. When I get a shot I like I make a
> gallery quality 16x20 from it. The prints are technically and visually
> stunning, if not altogether "creative". I have no doubt that digital
> will get to a point where it can make technically decent images. (It may
> even be there now, but not at a price I can afford.)  It ain't there
> yet, not for me, anyway. No how, no way. My wife looked at these 4x6's.
> She could tell. All she said was, "Honey they don't look as if they were
> taken with your "special camera" ( which is what she calls the FE 203. )
> She was being kind.
>
> Yes, I know, at the end of the day most people don't give a damn about
> image quality. But, for some throw backs like me film is far, far from
> dead.
>
> </ rant mode off />
>
> Barney
>
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