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From: "Larry N. Bolch" 
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Subject: Photo processing - fume-room and pixel-room
Date: Sun, 30 Nov 2003 12:38:41 -0700
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Wayne Young wrote:
> My intent was to encourage the film-based camera users to express
> their thoughts on this
> Photo echo because their cameras still have some advantages over the
> digitals eventhough
> some people found the digitals totally satisfactory for their uses.
> And that's all right too.

Interesting, I paused to contemplate what film does better, and I really can not
think of much. The product of the Canon 1Ds has been compared directly to a
professionally made drum scan of a 6x7 ISO100 chrome, and the 6x7 was found to
be somewhat wanting. http://luminous-landscape.com/reviews/shootout.shtml

Drum scans are used for highest possible quality reproduction. Drum scanners are
very expensive devices requiring a high level of skill and considerable training
to use. Not at all consumer items.

For tabletop in the studio - catalogues, advertising, etc. - the scanning back
has long since replaced film in medium and large format cameras. These do one to
three passes, essentially scanning the aerial image at the film plane of the
camera, and produce image files comparable to drum scans of film - without the
film. They are tethered to a computer by a cable, and have no storage capacity
themselves. With the highest resolution units, exposures are minutes long and
image files of more than half a gig in size. Many shoot at 48-bit and some are
even 64-bit. Though the prices run to $30,000+, they pay for themselves within
weeks at a busy catalogue studio in time savings.

Since the image is available on the computer screen upon completion of the
exposure, the art director or client can approve immediately. With film, the
sheet has to be processed and returned to the client - a couple of hours
minimum. In case a reshoot is needed, the tabletop, lighting, camera, etc. must
be left in place for this time. When the film-shot is approved, then it must be
drum scanned and files provided for the layout people and those doing the
separations for the press.

With a scanning back, approval or reshoot decisions are made immediately, and
the image is already in digital form for layout and press. The table, camera and
lights are then free for the next item. A drastic improvement in production
efficiency. While these are intended for static set-up shots with no action,
backs of 16MP to 22MP are available for a variety of medium format cameras that
will shoot action and work on location outside the studio. Again, this is not
available in consumer equipment channels for the most part, but rather from
dealers supporting the photographic industry.

In case you are curious, Calumet Photo sells several lines of these and has
pictures and detail on their web site.
http://www.calumetphoto.com/

> I found your aurora shot and the lightning shot interesting because
> not too many digitals
> can .take "B" shots which any film-based camera can handle with ease.

The Nikon CP5000 is functionally very similar to the F5 film camera - matrix
metering and the lot - with the addition of the array of pure digital functions.
It is a fully adjustable camera in every way. It can do up to a five minute shot
on "B". It is my second camera, and I have yet to run into any
situation too
extreme for it to handle with grace.

Being a five megapixel camera, large prints or extreme cropping is not a
problem. It was by no means an impulse buy. I took lots of time to compare and
check out the competition. One of the biggest selling points was the
availability of the magnificent 19mm equivalent lens component that transforms
the built-in 28mm -> 85mm equivalent lens to the equivalent of a 19mm -> 58mm
zoom. While it offers program, aperture priority and shutter priority
automation, auto-focus, etc., it can be used as a purely manual camera in every
way. The shooter has total control over every aspect of its operation, if so
desired.

Of course, this capability comes with a substantial learning curve. The camera
is not difficult to use. However, the capability is so immense that it can be
daunting to approach, specially for someone who is not fluent in photography. It
can be used as a point and shoot, but that squanders most of the camera's
potential.

> The "Children" shot looked  more like art work, but nicely done.

I have been working on a "Pseudo-Aquatint" technique since early
spring. By the
way Jasc used the shot in their Paint Shop Pro newsletter - July if I recollect.
I now mainly use Photoshop for this technique.

> On the rocket shots, I was wondering why you didn't show more than 2
> sequential shots since your camera can handle 3 shots per second.
> Of course personal choice prevails.

These are very powerful rockets, and I only got a few sequences with three
shots. Most were the rocket igniting and then leaving the second frame. They
really haul. That is to say, from ignition to out of the frame in 2/3 of a
second.

In one of the forums, someone was bitching that the camera was incapable of
shooting action, and since I had just spent two days shooting very fast action,
I selected a few examples quickly to disprove what he wrote. I just grabbed a
few representative shots upon arriving home, without really reviewing the whole
shoot - mega-numbers of exposures.

> The other sequency shots of car and people are attention getters. I
> can imagine the hard work
> involved...

In the fume-room, it would be a daunting task involving creation of a mask for
each instance and would require an enlarger with pin registration. Very
exacting. With Photoshop, it is pretty much the same technique, but registering
layers on a pixel level is quite easy. View at 100% or greater, set the top
layer to "Difference" mode and use the cursor keys to nudge it into perfect
register. When set to difference, any differences show up as bright lines or
pixels against darkness. When the whole image goes dark, then it is in perfect
register. These were shot off a substantial tripod, but they still were out by a
pixel or two.

Once in register, set the mode back to Normal, add a layer mask and use the
airbrush to paint with transparency to show the guy in the layer below. Merge
the layers and do the next one. With the layer mask, the colour black paints
transparency and white paints opacity. Thus if you wipe out some detail, you can
switch to white and paint it back again.

It takes a bit of time, but is really fun and not at all difficult. The results
seem to be quite mind-blowing to people when they first see them. I love to
watch people's reactions to my prints.

Another BIG advantage of digital is detailed at
http://www.larry-bolch.com/layers.htm

This too could be done in the fume-room, but again with great difficulty.
Shooting digital is like shooting Kodachrome. There is not a whole lot of
latitude, and when confronted by subject matter with a long range between the
darkest and lightest, it is very difficult to find an exposure that does not
result in opaque shadows and blown highlights. Like Kodachrome, one exposes to
preserve highlights. There is no way in either the fume-room or the digital
darkroom to recover highlight detail, once blown.

My camera has a feature that allows a sequence of up to five exposures at
intervals of your choice of 0.3EV, 0.7EV or full stops. Starting with the
darkest exposure as a background layer, one layers the next lightest. The
darkest layer, of course has the maximum highlight detail while the next
lightest one will have some blown highlights. Using layer masks as above, one
renders the blown highlights transparent, showing the detail in the layer below.
Merge the layers and go to the next lightest, continuing until the final
exposure provides rich shadow detail. This can add an extra 4.0EV to the dynamic
range that can be captured, without ending up with a muddy, low contrast image.
Prints of interiors absolutely glow!

I might add that precise exposure is made much easier by the histogram function.
A test shot and a glance at the histogram tells me exactly where my density
lies - if there is under or over exposure or if the dynamic range of the subject
overwhelms the ability to capture it. It is far more sophisticated than any
light meter one can buy. At the minimum, I can then dial in whatever exposure
compensation needed for perfect exposure or if the dynamic range is too great,
use the technique above to extend it. http://www.larry-bolch.com/histogram/

On the rocket shoot, I also brought my magnificent Plaubel Makina 67, and shot a
couple of rolls of the prairie landscape. I have barely looked at the negs, and
not even begun to scan them, even though nearly half a year has passed. Unless I
find a bunch of money someplace to buy a medium format film scanner, the direct
output of my camera beats the quality of 6x7 scanned on my high-end flatbed. At
the moment, the local store has a Nikon 8000 scanner for $3300 Canadian. I
neither have, nor could justify this amount. I have not had the space to set up
a fume-room in nearly two decades, so that is simply not an option.

Nor is it desired - my average run of the mill snapshot from the digital
darkroom is the equivalent or better than my best portfolio prints from the
fume-room. Back then, I would spend a day or two and a box of paper and
attendent chemistry to get a single print of the quality I wanted. Now I nail it
the first time every time. The expected longevity of my digitally processed
prints is comparable to the colour from the fume-room.

I rarely work in monochrome. The newspaper I worked at in the USA through the
1960s and 1970s was a pioneer in daily colour, with the most advanced colour
press in the world when I arrived. The whole culture was one of colour and I
found it very much to my taste. I had planned to stay little more than two
years, but ended up working there for over 13! Colour is my natural medium.

larry!
ICQ 76620504
http://www.larry-bolch.com/

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