Digital BW, The Print

Garry, 

I enjoyed reading your message below and taking the virtual visit to your dark room.  
Enjoy those "memory strips" while you can.  Nothing wrong with that.  

But....I bet if you were to buy something like the Canon D60....and open your mind to a new experience/method...you would have fun too.  A different world of fun.  A different way of making those images you enjoy so much.   

As for the small viewfinder....well that is a difference..no doubt.  

As for the single hair going 20 inches....I suppose that is in the eye of the beholder.  

Despite what Austin may think (and I generally respect his 'pinions), you can still produce wonderful images with a D30 or D60 (for example).  

Oddly enough...my portrait clients aren't looking for a single hair.  They tend to enjoy the "big picture" so to speak...and the quality of the images is what makes them go "ooh" and sometimes even brings a tear to an eye (usually the mother looking at the daughter's portrait).  Digital or not...there is a lot more to a powerful image than pixels or "grain" and most clients (the buyers of the portraits in this case), don't care what technology you use to make the image...it is the image they want.  

Still....my opinion is that you could find the Digital Difference to be an enlightening and exciting difference.  

Respectfully, 
Steadman
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: garrysarre 
  To: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com 
  Sent: Saturday, June 01, 2002 10:29 AM
  Subject: [Digital BW] Get a Leaf Austin


  Having finally ordered the 9600, I have been looking for nice things 
  being said about 35mm digital hoping to skip the scanning era. Just 
  when I think I am sold on a DCS 760 or maybe even a D60. Austin 
  smashes my illusions to smithereens, not once but over and over 
  again.

  I justify my thoughts in digi snapping:

  I only do portrait - soft is OK, gentle is nice too. Yes, with 
  digital, my photographs can be more gentle. What's interpolation to 
  skin? Hmm, but the hair will be jaggedy.

  If they can stretch a D30 to 12x16, surely a D60 will go to 20x24, 
  and you do step back further for bigger ones. Maybe I can give up 
  cropping, compose perfectly whilst shooting and change all my print 
  sizes to match the sensor proportion so I can use every last pixel.

  No more dividing the frame up into grids and de-spotting film scans. 
  Backwards and forwards, space/mouse over and over.

  If I do this switch, I know I will I miss heading into the seedy 
  area of town where my darkroom is, unlocking the ex maltings 
  warehouse, and wondering down to the back, through the double dark 
  curtains after checking evaporation of the dev' in the Hope 
  overnight, pulling out the nights printing from my leather case that 
  I got in San Francisco on a trip to Disneyland with my kids, laying 
  out these marvelous antique memory strips of century old technology, 
  the 120 film strip, slipping it in to the enlarger, focusing through 
  the magnifier at full arm stretch whilst pondering how old fashioned 
  this all will seem soon. I will miss my wierd shaped dodgers and the 
  little inventions that I know I am the only one in the world to use. 
  I test, test again, full size now, nearly there, one more time 40 
  minutes later, the most beautiful richly goldern sepia 20x30 flops 
  into the basket, I hold it up and see an exquisitely fine detailed 
  optical/chemical photograph. I follow the intricate line of a single 
  hair as it loops down the side of a face a full 20 inches, it's 
  shiny on one side and thinner in one spot as it twists and curls 
  across a full spectrum of goldern greys with narry a pixel, jaggy or 
  microband to be seen.

  I can't do it, I can't even see through the piddly view finder of an 
  SLR. Looking through my Hasselblad bright viewfinder is BEING THERE. 
  Your mascara is clumped on your second from the left eyelash, look 
  straight at the lens not my head. Why do I have to spent multi 
  thousands to make worse photographs?

  I can't do this unless I have a full frame back for the Blad and 
  that's it. In the meantime, I will have to put up with Bloody 
  scanning.

  I need a 120 scanner. I only do B&W, 24 frames per subject. I will 
  produce low definition scans for previews and then scan about a 
  dozen for printing on the 9600 from 8x10 upwards.

  What is a Leaf and is it one frame scan at a time.  It would be good 
  if I could automatically slide 3 frames or more through for previews 
  at a time (like the Nikon 8000). Any suggestions or knowledge 
  appreciated.

  Garry Sarre
  www.sarre.com.au


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