Actually something similar is what pushed me into digital. I did a
side by side on tripods of my 6 month old Nikon Coolpix 5700 5MP
against my OM4T(I forget the slide film. Provia, probably). I figured
that if the Coolpix was halfway decent at all in comparison, I could
justify a DSLR. I framed them the same. I scanned at 4000dpi with a
good film scanner and downsized the scanned images until the subject
sizes matched the ones from the Coolpix. I did not have noise
reduction software yet. So I did not do that part. I could not see
any difference in the detail recorded. One was essentially grainless
with accurate color and the scanned film was grainy and had to be
corrected for color if I wanted to print it. That was at sizes 100
percent or less. When increased beyond 200 percent the film held up
better.
I was blown away by the result and got my DSLR and later did a side
by side with the Coolpix in normal daylight conditions. The DSLR was
definitely better to my eye, I think because of the bigger pixels
sites and the better lens. I have no doubt someone might be able to
satisfy themselves the other way. Certainly some photographers on
this list that I respect a lot including you, say so.
I find your explanation of the behavior film grain is interesting.
Wouldn't it still be black or white though, not really contributing
to recording of fine detail if it was larger? Wouldn't you argue that
it recorded the most detail when it stayed fine and separate?
It shows me that his explanation does not capture the complexity of
what is going on, especially if you consider the multiple layers in
color film. And I suppose that one could argue on the side that since
a true RGB scan should be so much better than Bayer interpolation the
difference should be larger than it actually is.
Winsor
Long Beach, California, USA
On Jul 23, 2005, at 12:30 PM, AG Schnozz wrote:
> Want proof? Take a high-res scan of a slide, do some noise
> removal on it and then downsize to the same pixel count as the
> digital camera image. Sharpen a little and compare. Wow! What
> happened to the grainy skies? Sometimes it helps a film image
> to dumb it down. And you have the benefit of not going through
> a Bayer array correction algorithm.
>
>
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