Bruce Girrell on fri 1 dec 00
I have not yet tried the Portra film, so I can't comment on it, but the fact
that it is being discussed at the same time as the digital output to slides
rang a bell in my head.
Print film has seen substantial improvement over the past decade or two. The
Portra now being discussed is apparently one more step along this line. For
a long time, slide film was the only way to go for the highest quality
product. Times change. Many professional photographers are now recognizing
that print film offers fine grain, accurate color, and a much greater
exposure latitude than slide film. The reason that print film is not more
widely embraced is that print _paper_ does not let you see the image with
anywhere near the quality that is recorded on the film. If you were to scan
a print and compare it to a scan of the original negative, you would see a
huge difference.
Because of history, ease of viewing, and the poor quality of color prints
(compared to slide color and sharpness), most publications and juries still
require slides. Technology is helping us out. With some of the new print
films available, the best option may be to shoot on print film, scan the
negative, and output to slide film for the final image*.
Even though I shoot slides when photographing pottery, I still scan the
slide, edit the defects, resize, crop, whatever, and have the image output
to a new slide before making dupes to be submitted for jurying. The next
time that I photograph our pots I will include a roll or two of print film
to see how well it performs. Hopefully, this new film from Kodak will live
up to its promises.
Bruce and Lynne Girrell
in northern Michigan. Back in chilly Michigan after a dozen days in the
Arizona sun. Eighty degree days, 50 degree nights, blue sky. Yum!
*For those of you who might want to try this, make sure that you get the
negative scanned by a dedicated slide/negative scanner, not a "transparency
adapter" attached to a flat bed scanner. I have not yet seen a transparency
adapter that can come close to a dedicated scanner, even those produced by
companies such as Nikon.
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