Film

Good Evening,

I still shoot with film sometimes. Granted it is not often due to costs, time, ease of digital. I recall the magic of it though. While in high school I worked on the newspaper and the yearbook. Taking a few pictures but printing them often. It might be nostalgia, seeing an image come into being after putting it into developer was mesmerizing. If you get the chance do it first hand. I introduced my daughters to it however they were born into a digital age and never had to wait for pictures, or pay for them. I do not have the ability to develop prints at home even though it is something that I would like to have them experience.

The advantage of film is that it has nostalgia, each film has a different look and feel to it, shots have to be thought out, you are limited to how many images you can take, and all of those add up to us slowing down.

Some of this can be done with digital. The nostalgia not so much, but during outings with our cameras if we limit ourselves to 36 exposures while turning off the preview some of the feel of film can be captured. If you want to go a step further limit the WB and ISO. Back in the day the only way to get a new ISO or WB was to change out the roll of film. Getting the look of the film is still a little difficult. There are some profiles out there that are decent, I haven't tried too many. Another way to get it is to shoot the same thing and the same time with digital and film then copy the look from the film. It is time consuming to do but I feel the look is better.

Here are a couple that I took and edited after. The size difference is from using a crop sensor on the digital camera and roughly the same position I believe. Without exif data I can't say for sure what lens I was using.

A couple of recommendations that I have if you are going to shoot film. Find a lab with a good price and good reviews (I used Willow Photo Lab for these on Ektar 100 film), and be prepared for the price. I sent in 10 rolls to develop/scan/print and with shipping it was $7.00+ per roll, with a single roll it would have been $7.50 per roll without shipping. First time using them and the work was good. Get some nostalgia going on or if you are too young to have ever shot film learn what us old timers had to go through before digital photography by borrowing or buying a film camera. If that is too much lock settings in and turn off your preview then wait a couple of days before looking at your pictures. What ever you decide to do just pick up a camera then go out and shoot.

~Scott

Slowing Down

Good Evening,

So today we are going to slow down a bit. In this day and age getting things done quickly has become the norm. 10 frames per second, faster focusing, live view. Sometimes it is better to slow down and think about what we are taking a picture of. Contemplate the image we want to create or capture, scan the frame to see if there are any elements that are not wanted, and see if the elements that are there serve a purpose. Would a different angle provide a better image? Would better lighting? Would waiting for people to clear the frame help or would waiting for a person to walk into the frame make the image stand out?

Back in the days of film every image cost money, it took time to process and get back. People would take their time with their pictures because of these things. With digital we have a tendency to take lots of images without a thought or care then delete the ones we don't like.

One way that we can slow down is by using a tripod. It takes a little time to set up so we don't have a choice but to slow down there. Once it is set up it is in most of our natures to not want to put it away until we have the picture that we want that is close to perfect for us. Now we don't need a tripod to slow down it is just a helpful tool. Buy the sturdiest tripod that one can afford. A good one can last years possibly even decades. Grab a camera, take your time, go out and shoot.

~Scott

ISO

Good afternoon,

Now I will move onto ISO (International Standards Organization) or ASA (American Standards Association which might be seen in older publications) which is a measurement of how sensitive to light a sensor or film is. I sometimes shoot film still and enjoy it, I even have had my daughters use film.

The ISO can usually be changed in almost any setting on a DSLR type camera, and if I recall quite a few point and shoot cameras as well. Unless it is turned to auto. Auto from my experience doesn't use the whole range that the camera is capable of. I have cameras that are a few years old and they are both capable of 16,000 (more on this in a bit). I don't ever use them at that setting but it is there, I have gone up to 3200 with decent results though. ISO goes up/down in stops, it doubles every time for one full stop. 50, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200, etc... from 12800 to 16000 isn't a full stop though and higher end cameras can go in between full stops (64, 120, and so on). If you are in A or S priority then the setting will double or half when decreasing or increasing the ISO in full stops accordingly. 

Some of you might be thinking "why not always use the highest ISO?" Well every increase in ISO adds noise or grain to the image. It is the price that we pay for more light gathering ability. Somethings the noise isn't an issue with (things not needing fine detail, documenting events or just needing to have a photo, night shots) and others it is (wanting fine detail, portraits, stationary items).

I kept the aperture at f5.6 while changing the shutter speed to compensate from 30 seconds at 50 ISO to 1/10 of a second at 16000 ISO. To see the detail lost look at the books and the wood grain. These are 100% crops of the pictures.

*I changed it from the previous pictures. I felt these demonstrated the ISO difference better.

The highest acceptable ISO depends on what we are taking pictures of and what we are using the image for. Landscapes low ISOs work well because we usually mount on a tripod for them for sharpness and high dof. Action we want a high ISO to stop the motion and get a sharp stopping of it. Indoor either high ISO or a flash, my personal experience is that an image taken at a get together is not usually going to be blown up to a large enough size to make higher ISO degrade the print.

I kept the aperture at f2.8 and the shutter at 30 seconds, the ISO was changed to show the difference between the light sensitivity. More stars can be seen until it gets blocked out by ambient light. At 400 there was a plane flying through the frame.

*I changed the image to 100% crops of the upper left corner so the stars would be more visible.

So far we have covered the points on the exposure triangle, next week I think that we should move onto the Histogram which more or less defines a "perfect exposure." Go on out and shoot, experiment with new knowledge. Change your settings and see what you can do.

~Scott