Digital BW, The Print

on 5/21/02 11:12 PM, Austin Franklin wrote:

> I find Dan's comments on this topic quite wrong.  Doing tonal moves in 8
> bit, CAN make a REAL difference.  It's a fact.

Austin

Just keep one thing in mind, and as you don't monitor his list I don't
expect you to know this. This topic, specifically as it relates to Dan
Margulis, has been DISCUSSED to death. The whole slant that Dan brings to
the conversation is to drop the TALK of why bit depth matters and SHOW
IMAGES that support the logic.

So far, many people have DISCUSSED the logic of utilizing higher bit depths,
some of them highly regarded PS gurus who consult, write, teach, and do
major ad campaigns with PS. But none have presented IMAGES (as in photos) to
support their case.

Any of us who've looked seriously at the bit depth issue know why what Dan
says is (supposed to be?) wrong, but heretofore nobody has stepped up to the
plate to visually, with images, demonstrate him to be so - which IS his
challenge. He never issued a challenge to have the logic explained to him.
He began the challenge by explaining the logic behind highbit editing and
admitting he bought into it for many years for all the mathematical
reasons...BUT...all the while his eyes told him otherwise.

And to be fair, he never said working an image in 16-bit was a bad thing to
do, just that with the larger "freight" associated with doing so (file size,
memory requirements, etc) and more cumbersome workflow (lack of layers, etc)
he feels the people who advocate the higher workload owe it to their
listeners to demonstrate it's worth the added effort. I think that's valid,
don't you? Naturally, they feel otherwise. They feel they are generous
enough just bestowing their wisdom, which I can see too, and so the
"challenge" waits.

Now, on the other side of the equation, the criticism against Dan's
challenge is that the parameters of it have been less than excruciatingly
well defined, and some feel they may be a moving target - I don't know if he
includes grayscale images in it or not, for instance. But if you think
you're ready to step to the plate and put some images with your words - and
I don't mean diagrams, histograms, and equations - I mean posterized prints,
or what have you, I'll gladly forward his contact info to you so you can
discuss the details with him.

BTW, regarding Dan, while he is not afraid to take on the big wigs of the
industry in the most direct and confrontational manner, through this debate
I've had the pleasure to meet him (he lives nearby), and on a personal level
he is a really nice guy - warm, witty, personable, respectful, kind, etc. -
so don't be fooled by the nature of the "challenge". I don't believe he's
out to embarrass anybody, he simply wants to bust the hype (or make a little
of his own, I'm sure). It's not about the numbers to him, it's about ink on
paper, or pixels through monitor, or a file trough a film recorder, etc.
IOW, it's about how people PERCIEVE an image. The image, the image, the
image...

BTW 2, he's been known to be wrong before. I'm told (I haven't seen it) that
in an earlier edition of his book he made a major guffaw by utilizing the
same image at four different resolutions and proclaiming that when printed
at his books line screen no readers would be able to tell the difference
between them. Apparently the differences were obvious and he looked foolish.

Other times he's shown two different "corrections" of an image side by side
and proclaimed any fool would pick "version B" as the better version, only
to be swamped by reader mail saying they much preferred "version A". In the
case I'm thinking of the image was a white seal on snow. He liked the darker
image better because of how much more detail was present. I was among the
group that preferred the lighter version because I felt it was more
neutrally colored, and the lightness was more representative of my
perception of whites on a bright day. "More" detail was unnecessary.

So, go for it. Show him that your results back up the logic. It's
unbelievable nobody has yet. It's as though everyone is watching a trash can
fire blaze, thinking someone should throw water on it, but nobody does...

Todd