I saw the funniest looking thing at Samy's Camera in LA Friday. It was a Leaf Aptus 75 mounted on a Mamiya RZ67. We are still in transition phase. A mix of the old and the new. Wait 20 years and see what film is worth.
I saw the funniest looking thing at Samy's Camera in LA Friday. It was a Leaf Aptus 75 mounted on a Mamiya RZ67. We are still in transition phase. A mix of the old and the new. Wait 20 years and see what film is worth.
I hope in that amount of time, the images I am producing now, and in the recent past, are seen as valuable by someone. When you consider images a few decades old selling well (or really well for better known photographers), I think there will always be interest in the past. I doubt people will dismiss the images of the past just due to having been made with technology of the past.Originally Posted by Doug Dolde
Oil paintings are hopelessly low resolution outdated technology, yet people still buy them. Maybe in 20 years the only film will be in an art supply store, and the only option might be self developing. I would imagine in such a situation that film would be expensive, just like oil painting already is today.
Ciao!
Gordon Moat
A G Studio
Well, now that everyone is so enthusiastic about stitching, maybe the prices on 4x10", 7x17" and 8x20" cameras will drop through the floor. They were so 2005-06, anyway.
If there is a valid "film versus digital" argument at present, this is possibly it. However the single large negative remains the leader for alternative process prints, though I guess a digital negative could be made from the stitched image...
Cheers,
High quality stitches, especially for panoramic format, are very viable on the Canon 5D using Canon tilt shift lenses. I just got back from a two week trip in New Zealand. The vast majority of my "super" landscape images were made by stitching. My panoramic stitches involve just two captures, one with the lens shifted all the way to the left and one all the way to the right (and moving the camera slightly in the arca swiss tripod mount to correct for parallax error). First, when there is not much movement in the scene (clouds are easy, waves in the foreground are not), the stitches are a breeze. I do them manually in Photoshop. It takes me about 5 minutes per stitch. They're perfect. The panoramics will print up to 40" wide at close to 4 x 5 quality. I also did some stitches with the camera mounted vertically using 3 stitches (middle, left, right), to get an aspect ratio close to 4 x 5, and these will print at least to 30" on the large dimension, if not larger, at 4 x 5 quality. Second, I have been more successful than I'd expected doing perfect-looking stitches when there's movement in the frame, including waves in the mid to foreground. By being conscious of the movement in the captures, and trying to match captures as much as possible, and by using advanced selection, feathering, and blending techniques in Photoshop (I'm a fairly advanced PS user), I've been very pleased with the results. Third, the depth of field on these images, especially the panoramics, is amazing. In the first, place, I was using the 24mm and 45mm lenses, which, due to their short focal lengths, permit far reaching depth of field anyways. The Canon tilt shift lenses allow you to pan (shift) all the way in one direction, and then do some tilt to hold foreground focus. It's almost impossible to get the tilt right if you focus and tilt visually because of the small viewfinder image, but I did a fair number of tests in advance involving the more common types of compositions I gravitate towards, and have a "cheat sheet" that permits me to hold focus throughout the scene. For the most part, focusing at infinity or near infinity, and using about 1 degree of tilt on either lens, and shooting at f16 for the 24mm (otherwise the image isn't sharp to the edges when fully shifted) or f11 with the 45mm, permits me to get panoramics images with everything in focus from foreground to background. Sure it's a bit of a hassle, sometimes more of a hassle than others, but I never miss an exposure (using the histograms as verification), and get much better highlight and shadow detail than I obtained shooting slide film on a view camera. Also, no concerns about getting film abroad or having it ruined by xrays, and no film expense, and not needing to carry two camera systems (an SLR for travel shots and a view camera for landscapes). YMMV.
One of the questions for me is where do I want to spend my time - in some wonderful landscape location with a view camera or holed up in front of my computer.
Lets see
outdoors in the real world vs inside in front of a monitor
outdoors in the real world vs inside in front of a monitor
outside in the real world
teve simmons
Steve, with all due respect, I think you're misplacing the point here. The time spent with your camera out in the field is the same, regardless of which capture technology you are using.
What really is different is the processing time. So, you should be asking yourself whether you prefer to spend the time in the darkroom or in front of your computer. The answer is individual and sujbjective - whatever works for you is the right answer for you, but it is probably different for me or the next person.
Hello Marko,
I agree on the subjective aspect. However, it seems that often the comparison is darkroom or computer. That leaves out a third choice that some of us use: dropping off film at a lab. Another consideration amateurs and enthusiasts might miss, but professional consider, is minimizing post processing time. It is not always as simple as darkroom .vs. computer, especially for those of us without a darkroom.
To add a bit more to this, Nikon just did a pre-PMA announcement of a 10MP compact called the P5000. When you go to the Nikon website, and read the brief information they provide, you discover there is an auto-stitching feature built into the camera. They also claim that 10MP allows nice 20" by 30" prints. Obviously many of us know that a 10MP compact is not like a 10MP D-SLR, but once you add that auto-stitching feature it seems to me some people are going to find that fairly close, or good enough. Maybe at some point in the future (soon) people who dumped 4x5 for D-SLRs and stitching to reduce weight, might go with compact digital and auto-stitching. At the expected price of a P5000, you could buy two for about what a D80 costs, arrange them on a board for maximum FoV, then get some even larger images to stitch, all in a very small package. Strange times we live in . . . . .
Ciao!
Gordon Moat
A G Studio
Last edited by Gordon Moat; 3-Mar-2007 at 12:44. Reason: spelling
Hey Gordon,
I agree with you about the third choice too, in general. But the talk here is about stitching and I somehow doubt a lab would do it for you, at least at a reasonble price and with the level of quality you need.
As for automated perspective stitching, I prefer to do it manually, but if I have to automate, I'd much rather leave it to Phothoshop on my computer than to OEM's software in camera. Two reasons for that - a) a stand alone computer is way more powerful than an on-board one and b) Ditto for Photoshop,OEMs are not really famous for the quality of their software. But the camera you mention does look interesting - on paper - for travel, hiking and such.
I'd rather call the times "interesting" than "strange", though.
I only had a lab do a stitch for me once, and that was for an RA-4 print. However, they did get the first attempt wrong, prompting a do over. Luckily the time delay still allowed me to drop off that print for exhibition. Yes, much better to control those stitching aspects than let automation handle it. Though with an as yet unreleased camera coming soon, I think it is too early for me to judge the results . . . I might be surprised.
On a practical level, I think four frames is about the limit of stitching I would want to do from scanned 4x5 transparencies. I have an architectural photographer friend who sometimes uses a 75mm and two overlapping frames to get a wider panoramic view, sometimes useful for across the street set-up shots. I think most mentions of D-SLR stitching I have seen involved much more than four frames, at least if the idea was truly to emulate (replace?) a one shot 4x5 image.
Decisions, decisions . . . okay, interesting it is . . . and sometimes curious.
Ciao!
Gordon Moat
A G Studio
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