digital Cams

Yellow filter:

I’m not a ‘professional photolab’ – i’m a small lab in a high street department store.

IR film is wonderful fun – but pricey. I shot a few rolls as tests last year, and had a good presentation up on www.photo.net for a while – but I deleted it after I got annoyed at one of the newer moderators who started playing God (deleted all my work actually, as I was so annoyed). Basically, with a camera that uses IR advance, such as most EOS and some later Nikons, you get very slight edge fogging, which doesn’t protrude beyond the edge of the slide mount. Yellow and orange filters were my favourites, shoot at midday on a very hot summer day (its IR you work with, not light) and make sure the lab you send it to can process it (I used one in Norwich) as most can’t. Latitude is very narrow, and lightmeters are useless – its IR, not light. I had best results, from memory, bracketing around 250/320 ISO in half stops. I have yet to shoot anything with it other than tests (I fancy doing a gothic wedding) and have not tried the black and white stuff yet, but heres are some resukts from the tests.

First is with Orange filter:

Snapper what are your experience with use IR film? Problems? Advantages and Disadvantages?

-steve

Thanks Snapper, that was very useful info indeed.

Nice to talk to fellow photographers. Im doing a Photography and Video BA at the moment so thats where my background is (a limited one but its expanding gradually)

As for uprating film , i only used it really as an example but i do find it useful for when i do want high contrast images when you’ve only got a 400asa HP5 film loaded. Im going to give some Fuji 1600 Neopan a try at some point i think.

Ive never worked in a Professional photolab and my knowledge of the systems you use most days comes from one letting me have a run through on the machines showing me how to do it from start to finish 🙂

What do you usually snap on snapper?

Does anyone here use video?

And to add a vote for digital capture – no more colour casts from flourescent / tungsten / sodium lighting etc, no more scratches or dust (that does it for me), Far superior colour balance, (cleaner colours and contrast). It really is a great advancement, now that it is finally at an acceptable level (as in since the last year or so) As such, my first digi is on order – and though it may be obsolete within a year, it won’t stop working – and as the quality is better than 35mm, why is obsolescence of a digital camera even mentioned?. My film cameras will not be going (5 35mm SLRs and a 6×9 Medium Format), but they will be used radically less. The problem is, I can’t digitally do what I can with Kodak Ectachrome Color Infrared slide film, can’t make fibre-based black and white handprints (handprinting is really pleasant, I do that for fun only) and I like ‘hard’ copies of some things too. All my personal shotting has been on slide film for years anyway, as the prints from negs don’t (can’t) compare to the colours and contrast of slides.

Me? Work for Klick? LOL! No, their counter staff are minimum-wage muppets generally. Our local one has brought cameras in to me to load for their customers a few times!

“Fair enough snapper, i understand you think what im saying is bollocks but is what i said about 20/30 min photo quality correct or incorrect? At least put me right.”

Its *sometimes* correct – but sweeping generalisations are straight away worthless (ooops, my prior sentence shoots me in the foot). It takes me 12 minutes to do a film, from taking it out of the customers hand, to putting i in the completed drawer. That takes into account extracting the leader, shaping the end, feeding into the neg processor (automatically taken through dev, bleach-fix, stabilisers and dryer), taking out, feeding through the dust brushes and into the printer. Then, adjusting colour and density of every image on the analyser screen, hitting the print key (thence through dev, bleach-fix, stabilisers and dryer), chopping the negs up and sleeving them, and checking for disasters. 4 minutes to get the required reprints through – rarely needed. . The thing is, in all labs, each morning the machines are balanced against reference prints. This minimises any problems – therefore a muppet like me can *almost* guarantee decent results, which are detected in a quick flick through. As can anyone I train to do my job (which, in all honesty, is dead easy). It used to be more complex. I learnt in the days when you ‘read’ each neg, and punched in the density and any neccesary correction for colour. Within a month I was beating ANY colour analyser equipped machines (this would have been the case up until the analysers that appeared 3 years ago or so, but those, like almost all minilabs manufactured now, are digital) I do the same routine for a 24 hour as I do for a one hour, and could offer a 20 minute service If I felt it was needed – I don’t, as that would mess me up in the event of a machine breakdown. My advantage is that I am a photographer by trade, so I have that extra bit of ‘gen’ to back me up. As I want an easy life, and can pay my mortgage in this way with minimum effort, I do this for a living. The photography (and other stuff) I do for myself on the side supplements my income rather nicely indeed. I have never had a roll of my own stuff done at Klick, but their machinery is first-rate. Its large scale commercial stuff, of the same ilk as Kodak etc use.

Question is, why do you uprate neg film? All you succeed in doing is dramatically increasing grain and contrast. Slide film is good for it, as is black and white, but with 2-3 stops latitude, unless in a dire emergency, its really not worth doing. I doubt the Klick bods would know what you meant, generally, but would the majority of labs? Even if the minilabs did know what you meant, I don’t rate your chances of them doing anything about it – few know how to do it with a machine (1.2 degrees on the developer per stop, which is a break in production of 20 minutes for the machine to warm up and cool down again) and fewer still would consider doing it.

My biggest problem with quality is the crap I get handed in to develop (from which I imagine you are exempt – with the gear you have, you almost definately know how to use it). Fogged, very underexposed, very overexposed, over-flashed, out-of-date, cheap films, films found in drawers, films that have been in the washing machine, scratched because they are from the bottom of a beach-bag with a light trap full of sand, double exposed, unexposed……the list goes on.

(anyway, bollocks, specifically, referred to the generalisation. It is an old clerical term you know.) Hope this is of some interest – any more questions, please ask and i’ll do my best to answer them.

Fair enough snapper, i understand you think what im saying is bollocks but is what i said about 20/30 min photo quality correct or incorrect? At least put me right.

1hour processing to me seems like a fair time of getting good qualtiy pictures…. Enough time to develop the negs, wash and fix. Then Dry them, and then ahve someone scan through them quickly to sort the ND levels beofre printing them with adequate time to let them dry.

20/30 mins leaves little , if any , time for someoene to go though the prints? If i am wrong put me straight on this one as opposed to saying bollocks.

I still think klick are crap though. The staff know little about photography , although thats from personnel experience and im sure there are many exceptions, the print quality is nothing to write home about either.

I dont use Klick much, i did put my money where mouth was, the only time i use them is to save money on shots which arnt important. If i took a film in which id uprated and ask them to take this into consideration do you think they would know what i was on about? Some might i guess but would they alter the settings on thier machine for me.

You dont happen to work for klick do you 😉

“hope that is b*llocks enough for you snapper”

Having managed 1hr labs for the last ten years, yes, i’ll stick with the word bollocks.

To elaborate, the assumption that the stuff goes through with no thought to quality is bollocks, and the multi-million pound machines that Klick use being poor quality is also bollocks. The two other minilabs in my town use the same machines as the main pro-lab in the area, and that lab takes second place of the 3.

My quality is crap though, because i’m too busy surfing the net……

Damien – I do enjoy the action shots but in fairness to yourself and others I like some kind of historical connection . One picture of a Mustang flying at North Weald is very much like one taken at Little Gransden doing the same thing.
The other side of this is that I am competing with a couple of hundred other photographers doing the same task. Shuttleworth
is probably my favourite location as it’s difficult not to take a good shot there. My personnal equipment is a Canon 300 with 28-80 and 75-300 plus a 540EZ. I am tempted with a Eos1N which are
easily affordable now.
My personal opinion is that the event is just as important as
the shot. I would much rather go to a small private strip and see
a first flight of a machine rather than go to Legends etc .

That doesn’t ring true Damien – I use the ‘Konica’ shop in Stamford and always get super results. I went into a ‘Happy Snappers’ or something like shop in London and only later realised that half the prints were missing so in my opinion
personnal service is something I find usually missing in ‘fast’
outlets.
Regarding digital – how much you choose to spend is entirely up to you . What I am saying is do they hold models back ? – are the advances in digital that fast to allow for new models each year or have the advances already been made ?
As for how many camera’s you chose to have – that’s your choice but I guess eventually at the current rate of progress
many photographers will have to develop their muscles somewhat to cater for the increasing number of last years model
hanging round their neck.
As a question to what advances can we realistically expect of the digital slr on what we already have or is it a case of price reduction?

i guess its a matter of personnel preference then 🙂 i think boots do a pretty good job and Snappy snaps do an excellent..althought expensive…job.

Snapper, from your profile i gather you are in the business, what is your knwoldege of fast processing places that do the images in 20-30 mins. Would you recommend them ?

Perhpas i should elaborate a little……….

If you take your films in to be processed at somewhere that does them in 30mins/20 mins then your film is most certainly going to be developed and then printed without a member of staff taking more than a very quick glance at them. There is simply not enough time for the staff to go thorugh and adjust the ND setting for each image. Changing this can drastically improve an image and it is this kind of control which you would get if you were developing and printing yourself.

As for my somewhere like Klick comment, I dont believe they spend much time checking the images when they come through. Also in comparison to other photo retailers i think the service is not as good aswell as the results.

hope that is b*llocks enough for you snapper 😉

(ncie when people speak there mind)

best regards,steve

What interests me with the digital lobby is how many thousands
you have to spend ever few months to get the latest update of a Cannon D series – does the quality of digital reproduction really change that fast or are they just very good at holding models back to make the advances seem slower.

Well that was straight to the point Snapper.

What a lovely looking Mustang in the middle of Dezz’s pic.

“Also dont get your films processed at Klick or any 30min deal as you are guarenteed to get rubbish pictures.”

Really? I think you may just be talking bollocks there.

Personally i prefer 35 mm. To be blunt, it should not be that expensive if you learn how to take good photographs. Theres no need to end up with half a set of awful prints with a few good ones thrown in. Follow a simple set of rules and get a good light meter and you will be fine. Also dont get your films processed at Klick or any 30min deal as you are guarenteed to get rubbish pictures.

best regards, steve.

Steve,
But why waste ink and paper when you can either take the best pictures to a developer and get first class prints done or load the images onto a CDRom and look at the pictures on your 32″ TV?

Another problem rears its head on static shots – unless you are careful with placing of the sun, you get Chromatic Aberation with a lot of aircraft shots. All those shiny surfaces and perspex to reflect light off!!
Not all digital cameras get CA as bad as others but it can be a problem, sometimes needing twiddling with Photoshop or whatever!
Here is a good example of CA

Nice bit of purple fringing around the hangar windows!!

here would be my advice to anyone thinking of buying a digital slr……

buy yourself a an adequate low end digi cam( one with shutter lag, but with a fair resolution) to waste on shots of statics etc And get a 35mm SLR for the rest until in a few years time, Digital SLRs will be a lot lot cheaper.

Also remember……Its no good having a very high rated digital slr if your printer cant produce that quality!

best regards, steve

Thank you Forum

Thank you for your replies so far! i guess its down to reviews searching varouis sites for info on which cam is the best.
How difficullt can it be to find a cam HAHA! Anyway i think im gonna settle for the Fuji s602 zoom once i have read the instructions and digested all that information i shall endeavour to take some shots and post them on here all being well.

Originally posted by Hatton
For those on the forum with a Digital SLR, surely there is no shutter lag on these models?

Hatton,
As the digital SLR owners are a bit slow off the mark;) I’ll answer you. The higher end SLR cameras such as Nikon D100, Fuji Finepix S2, Canon D60, and now the Canon 10D are a lot quicker than the majority of ‘lowend’ digital cameras. They can shoot up to 9 frames in one go, the AF is a lot better and the shutter lag is pretty well non existant. You are of course paying between £1300 and £2000 just for the body so you are going to have a far better bit of kit.
As mentioned above, a real good source of reviews and user comments as well as forums can be found at www.dpreview.com

I will of course accept correction by those who own a digital SLR 😀