Digital BW, The Print

On Tuesday, June 17, 2003, at 12:41 AM, Austin Franklin wrote:
>>
>
> It, technically, isn't ANY "generation".  It is interpreted by the 
> sensor,
> then by an A/D, then by some thresholding/levels adjustment/PRNU and 
> then a
> Bayer composition algorithm...etc. etc.  The thought of "generation" 
> with
> digital camera image capture is really meaningless.  I can come up 
> with ten
> different processings that happen to the file...so if you want to 
> assign a
> "generation" to every time the data is changed, well, digital will 
> fall FAR
> behind film in that regard.  It also matters how much the "fidelity"
> (accuracy of reproduction) of the image is affected by each change...
>
>> When shooting film the image passes through the camera
>> lens on to the film and then when scanning a second lens is involved
>> with possible imperfections.
>
> Yes, and with every processing that happens to your digital camera 
> image it
> changes the image.
>
>> Does this make sense to anyone else?
>
> Sigh.  (this isn't aimed at you, BTW)...  What makes sense is that, 
> for some
> reason, there is so much misinformation about digital imaging out on 
> the
> web, and therefore in people's minds...and that there are a LOT of 
> people
> who leave their sense behind and somehow want digital image capture to 
> be
> better than it is...for what ever reason.
>
> Austin

Austin;

I am 100% sure that you know multiples more about this than I do.... 
but I think you  missed the main thrust of my post, perhaps because I 
did not express myself correctly.

My main point is this : The vast majority of users out there can not 
create 100% perfect scans due to either a lack of equipment or scanning 
experience. And jobbing out the scans is often not an option and also 
does not guarantee a perfect scan for a particular output. Putting the 
fact of pure resolution aside, I think many photographers will get 
better prints from a good pro digital SLR (if the prints are kept small 
in size do to the relatively low resolution of most digital cameras) 
than they will from shooting film and scanning. The exception is the 
photographer who has the time and money and expertise to really get in 
to truly hight end scanning.

This is what I have seen in the real world (so far).

-Jeff