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Thread: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

  1. #31

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    Re: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

    I agree Bruce. Drum scanners have no issue with negs made for wet printing, even very dense ones. Personally, I hate the idea of making negs that are so flat they suit only scanning (presumably on scanners with low Dmax). At least with darkroom optimised negs you will retain both options long into the future and I strongly suspect darkroom printing will be around every bit as long as scanners capable of dealing with transparent materials.

    The last prints I made from drum scans were from 6x7 negs and printed to 40". There was grain, but as you say, it was slightly digitised grain if you like. Not as organic as real grain, but a lot closer to that than to pixels or other digital artifacts. The look was very pleasing and only if you sniffed the print could you see that it was not the grain you would expect from a wet print, but a little different.

  2. #32

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    Re: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

    Turtle:
    "There was grain, but as you say, it was slightly digitised grain if you like. Not as organic as real grain, but a lot closer to that than to pixels or other digital artifacts."
    Turtle,

    How is a pixel generated by a film scanner different than one generated by an in-camera image sensor? Is it just smaller, or is there some other distinguishing feature of an otherwise featureless pixel that distinguishes one generated from a film scan from another generated by an in-camera sensor? It's a sincere question -- I don't know much about scanning or digital cameras, but I'm trying to learn.

  3. #33

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    Re: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

    Jay,

    I'm not talking about pixels, but more how a finite number of pixels manages to resolve grain.

    My impression is that the resolution of the scan (for 300dpi output at 40") was easily sufficient to show the grain, but not high enough to resolve the precise shape, edges etc of the grain. The result is that the grain does not look as crisp and 'natural' as it would on a wet print. Printed to a smaller size, I suspect this would be harder to see, but as a roughly 15x linear enlargement, it is noticeable if you look closely enough. I am guessing that the resolution required to show all the nuances of grain at large print sizes would be stratospheric. Bear in mind I am talking about Delta 100 grain here, so it is very small. In shadow area it was very hard to see this, but in mid and upper mid-tones where there were contrast increases made, it was most apparent. The grain just looked a little 'blockier/blobbier'. This is the sort of stuff only photographers would see and not important, but the result is still clearly a film based image. You are left in no doubt about that.

    I am sure that messing around with scan resolution and output would alter things, but I was gobsmacked at the quality of the prints after working with my digital printer (the person, not the machine) for a few hours and this issue was more of a passing observation than a criticism. Up on the gallery wall, the images look closer to wet prints than I thought possible with all the benefits of being able to work with the files in LR/PS (one of which is absolute hell to print conventionally at any size)

  4. #34
    Resident Heretic Bruce Watson's Avatar
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    Re: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

    Quote Originally Posted by Jay DeFehr View Post
    Turtle,

    How is a pixel generated by a film scanner different than one generated by an in-camera image sensor?
    A digital sensor is deterministic. The sensor sites are usually the same size, and usually uniformly distributed. This uniformity gives rise to digital artifacts like moire.

    What a film scanner does is somewhat different. It lays a deterministic grid over the film, which in turn is stochastic. That is, the film grain is more or less randomly distributed, and the scanning grid is uniform. Film grain varies widely in size, while the scanning pixels are exactly one size. The scanner then "looks through the holes in the grid" and measures what it sees of the film through that hole. If it sees nothing by metallic silver, the resulting pixel is solid black (a digital zero). If it sees nothing but film base, the resulting pixel is solid white (a digital 256, or 4096, or 65,536 or whatever max your scanner has). This is obvious, yes? But what happens when it sees just a portion of a film grain? It does just what you'd think -- it averages the part that's blocked by metallic silver with the part that isn't, and the pixel gets a value in between zero and max.

    So the scanner doesn't necessarily follow the exact pattern of the film grain. But on the plus side it tends to even out the tonal changes. Combined you can get a really excellent representation of the image. Highly detailed, and amazingly true to the negative. But it's not an exact copy. Think of it as an extremely high quality second copy (scene you photographed > film > scan). Just sayin'.

    Bruce Watson

  5. #35
    Land-Scapegrace Heroique's Avatar
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    Re: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

    Quote Originally Posted by Bruce Watson View Post
    ...The scanner then “looks through the holes in the grid” and measures what it sees of the film through that hole...
    Bruce, nice explanation ... but this part is just a little bit creepy.

    I’ll never think of my Epson in the same way.


  6. #36

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    Re: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

    Quote Originally Posted by Bruce Watson View Post
    A digital sensor is deterministic. The sensor sites are usually the same size, and usually uniformly distributed. This uniformity gives rise to digital artifacts like moire.

    What a film scanner does is somewhat different. It lays a deterministic grid over the film, which in turn is stochastic. That is, the film grain is more or less randomly distributed, and the scanning grid is uniform. Film grain varies widely in size, while the scanning pixels are exactly one size. The scanner then "looks through the holes in the grid" and measures what it sees of the film through that hole. If it sees nothing by metallic silver, the resulting pixel is solid black (a digital zero). If it sees nothing but film base, the resulting pixel is solid white (a digital 256, or 4096, or 65,536 or whatever max your scanner has). This is obvious, yes? But what happens when it sees just a portion of a film grain? It does just what you'd think -- it averages the part that's blocked by metallic silver with the part that isn't, and the pixel gets a value in between zero and max.

    So the scanner doesn't necessarily follow the exact pattern of the film grain. But on the plus side it tends to even out the tonal changes. Combined you can get a really excellent representation of the image. Highly detailed, and amazingly true to the negative. But it's not an exact copy. Think of it as an extremely high quality second copy (scene you photographed > film > scan). Just sayin'.
    Thanks for the explanation, Bruce. It still seems to me that there is no grain in a scanned image, just pixels, and that the scanner converts a stochastic image to a deterministic one. I get moire patterns and noise when scanning film, for instance, so I still fail to see how the pixels of a scanned film differ from those captured in-camera, except in location, ie, digital sensors tend to exhibit noise in low values, while film tends to be grainiest in high values. I'm not trying to be pigheaded about this, I'm really trying to understand the issue. Thank you for your patience.

  7. #37

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    Re: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

    No matter how good a scanner you may have it will not resolve individual silver grains. However, higher quality flatbed and drum scanners are definitely capable of imaging clumps of grain, and this may or may not be visible as granularity in the scan and/or resultant print. In my experience Epson flatbed scanners and the like are not capable of imaging clumps of grain. Interestingly, this lack of definition sometimes results in smoother, and more pleasant looking, scans and prints.

    One of the very big advantages I find in digital capture is the lack of noise/grain at normal and medium ISO.

    Sandy
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  8. #38

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    Re: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

    Quote Originally Posted by sanking View Post
    No matter how good a scanner you may have it will not resolve individual silver grains. However, higher quality flatbed and drum scanners are definitely capable of imaging clumps of grain, and this may or may not be visible as granularity in the scan and/or resultant print. In my experience Epson flatbed scanners and the like are not capable of imaging clumps of grain. Interestingly, this lack of definition sometimes results in smoother, and more pleasant looking, scans and prints.


    One of the very big advantages I find in digital capture is the lack of noise/grain at normal and medium ISO.

    Sandy
    Sandy,

    I'm just learning about digital capture, but already I agree with you. I have yet t make a digital print, but I'm looking forward to it.

  9. #39

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    Re: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

    ...and of course the presence/absence of grain is either desirable/undesirable depending on what you are doing. My images were documentary shots in Afghanistan and so a silky smooth image were not desirable. Drum scanning of large negs is of course a hybrid process, with hybrid results, but that is its appeal to me in some respects. It allows me to produce very large prints without the enormous cost and difficulty of darkroom work at these sizes, but with a 'feel' to the images that is fare closer to the original film capture than digital.

    I have heard of some people scanning film images at a resolution that just begins to show signs of soft grain, the uprezzing them. This supposedly maintains a smoother look but allows large prints. I guess it would work well for some applications, but I tend to want all the detail and sparkle I can get and grain has a role here.

  10. #40
    Resident Heretic Bruce Watson's Avatar
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    Re: Best B&W film/developer for scanning (that's not bad for optical prints either!)?

    Quote Originally Posted by Jay DeFehr View Post
    Thanks for the explanation, Bruce. It still seems to me that there is no grain in a scanned image, just pixels, and that the scanner converts a stochastic image to a deterministic one.
    Not quite. The scanner creates a deterministic image from a stochastic image. It's not a straight up conversion. There's some blurring and averaging taking place, but at a very low level. If done well, below the level at which image detail information is recorded on the film. If that's the case, then for all practical purposes a scanner does what you say.

    Quote Originally Posted by Jay DeFehr View Post
    I get moire patterns and noise when scanning film, for instance, so I still fail to see how the pixels of a scanned film differ from those captured in-camera...
    The major difference to me is that the digital capture is a first generation copy. A film capture is also a first generation copy. When you scan the film, you are making a second generation copy. The big question though is "does it matter?" As far as I can see, it doesn't, not even when making 10-12x enlargements.

    The problem in comparing digital capture to scanned film is that, like most such comparisons, it's an apples to oranges comparison. Both methods have their own strengths and their own weaknesses. So what matters to me may not matter to you, and vice versa. I'm more interested in the images than I am in the technology of the capture. But that's just me.

    Bruce Watson

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