Digital BW, The Print

for many of us "old-timers" (really, I'm not *that* old;) 35mm Tri-x 
in D-67 just gave a "special" look that we came to love... then we 
have drifted into the digital darkroom for one reason or another (for 
me it was a severe aquired sensitivity to photochemicals).  If we 
were currently using higher resolution scanners and printers there is 
no reason that we can't reproduce Tri-X images by digital means, we 
just need a high enough capture resolution to scan it off the film 
and then print resolution to get it back out.  When you use a scanner 
that has too low a resolution to actually capture the film grain you 
do not end up with a "Tri-X photograph."  Each pixel is going to be 
an average of a bunch of grain clumps and the resulting image will 
have a look of "Tri-X being scanned at XXXppi," which may be 
desirable to some people, but will not look like a traditional print 
from Tri-X.  As I've said before, it isn't an issue for large 
negatives becuase they don't have to be enlarged so much and you 
can't see the effect so clearly, but for 35mm you definitely can.

Well, anyway... if I could still work in a darkroom I would be 
shooting lots of 35mm Tri-X and if I could digitally scan and print 
it to my satisfaction I would be shooting a lot of it as well...

mark

...
> Part of the photographic art is exploiting the aesthetic nuances of 
the 
> equipment and materials. It blows my mind to hear of workers trying 
to 
> overcome TX grain, or now in the digital age, trying to create 
the "look" 
> of TX grain with digital cams.
...