How many of you shoot "Figital" ???

Figital in Film scanned to PC.

Hardly used a digital camera this year for anything important at all, got back into shooting 35mm and enjoying a wide range of cameras and great lenses. Just had some stuff back from the labs I've shot over the summer on Fuji Velvia and just looking at them realised the true glory of shooting film and that nothing and I mean nothing digital can compare with it. You can shoot your D3 or your EOS 5d or whatever and you will not get the sheer beauty, depth, clarity, full range of colour that you will from shooting great E6 film like Velvia. I shot wide open @ f2 using a Leica Summicron on many shots on one roll and I am the happiest I've been with photo results for years. Even stuff shot on humble Nikkor lenses looks so good too. Next step is a medium format camera like a Mamiya 645 I think to see some truly stunning film detail.

Also, B&W never looks great on digi when compared to film - it lakes the sheer tonal range that only film can offer and don't let anyone tell you different regarding digital because they will be lying through their teeth. By all accounts people are moving back to shooting film, especially Pro's, in great numbers. Cameras are so cheap too though prices do seem to be on the rise, my main cameras are currently a Leica R8, Nikon FA & Contax G1 and the last 2 I picked up for peanuts ... lenses as well. How much a new Olympus E-P1 without even a viewfinder - £700 , I paid £70 for a Mint- Nikon FA with databack ...how many rolls of film to buy/dev will it take me to spend £700 ??? It's far cheaper to shoot film end of the day.

The only bind of course is then scanning all the stuff and this is most time consuming even using a good film scanner .... takes ages on my Epson V700. Lab scans defeat the purpose on the cost front of things as the price is so high. I'm only paying £1.50 + VAT per film for E6 processing so want to keep the costings in line.

Some good stuff on The Figital Revolution website for anyone interested:- http://figitalrevolution.com/

So just wondering, how many of us on here do the same?

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To answer your second question, roughly 470 rolls of film, which at 36 shots a roll is a touch under 17,000 images. That said, I don't think you factored in the cost of a good scanner? Not that it matters really.

To answer the first question, I don't and probably never will. Film was always a 'barrier to entry' to photography for me (for various reasons) and I was only able to start taking my photography seriously when I got my first DSLR some 4 years ago. So I doubt I'll ever shoot film. I'm not ruling it out, but I suspect as my photography improves, so will digital, and by the time I feel that using film would make a real difference, the difference between the two would have narrowed even further (if that makes sense).

As someone who dislikes 'hassle' at the best of times, the ease of use which digital provides (in terms of processing the shot once it's taken) is far more important to me, given that digital is now at a very high standard. For me, digital now may not be as good as film, but it's easily good enough.

I think , given my current skill and experience level, the chances of me being able to take the some of the same images would have been much reduced if I'd used film. I guess what I'm saying is that if I got it right with film, the image might be better, but the chances of me getting it right would be lower. Obviously for those with far more experience that isn't a factor.

That on top of the added 'hassle factor' - buying film, making notes as I shoot so I know what I've done in each image, having different film types for different purposes, then getting them developed and then scanned in, means film isn't very attractive to me at the moment.

So for me it somes down to an individual decision and preference - is the 'extra' that film gives you worth the personal investment?

Just a different view

Ruz

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Sounds great, but the target medium, an LCD monitor, is limited to displaying colours in the sRGB colour space... so why not start with a device that shoots in sRGB colour space - AKA a digital camera?

I've spent 100s of hours in various darkrooms doing mostly mono & a little colour using the Ektaflex system. I did all my own developing accept slide at home.
My Minolta 35mm film scanner is badly underused.
Most or certainly many of my lab processed E6 are in a poor state with fungal growths on many of them. My own mono & colour negs are fine 'cos I washed them properly!
I find scanning to be very time-consuming & the results disappointing. The Minolta cost ~£400 in 2001 - cheaper than the Nikon that came with much better software. The effort involved in obtaining decent results involved too much manual scratch removing & colour correction for my liking. I even scanned many of my own prints. A less optimal way of digitising but much easier.
As for those starting off with film, still using it or returning to it - good luck! I suspect that when done carefully, the results will be superior than pure digital but I remain unconvinced that the effort is worth while. However, I really should scan far more of my film as well.

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IS the extra worth it? = Well in honesty a yes and a no from me, depends on time constraints as you have hinted. I was doing a mass batch of Kodak C41 400CN BW last night and it was bliss as my setup for C41 BW scanning is great. I was scanning Velvia the day before spending hours on trying to get the scans looking like the slides and it was hell on earth. Many swings & roundabouts tis true.

Hey don't get me wrong, I still shoot digital and *do* see it's value and usefulness beyond a doubt but I just get more pleasure over shooting a film camera (If you are a news or sports photographer then digital is clearly the way to go as is family snaps etc, etc but landscapes? Street? Nope, not for me) ....scanning can be such a bind and so time consuming and I wish there was an easier way around that.

Scanner? = Yes expensive true, the price of a decent DSLR lens I guess with only the Epson V700/750 to choose from as top end flatbeds primed at the film scan market other than the Plustek "single scan" film scanners or the mega expensive Hasselblad Immacon scanners currently on the market. I hear Nikon too are leaving the fray now.

Monitor? = Well Jake that applies to any type of photo use/editing on the PC surely? A decent monitor is serious money and out of the reach for most. Things like calibration help a bit I know but yes that will always be a problem ..... I only wish it was that messing up my Velvia scans atm.

I guess at the end of the day I just HATE the modern marketing which tries to give the impression that digital is better than film when it's not. Yes it's more convenient, user friendly in some respects and has it's place and uses but both film and digital can survive side by side and even combine wheras the photography mags all paid for by the big guns ad's carry nothing more than "DSLR shoot-out's" each week/month giving the impression that there is only one format.

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AAISP

In reply to a post by Lazza:

I guess at the end of the day I just HATE the modern marketing which tries to give the impression that digital is better than film when it's not

Better is a bad word to choose - everything in life is a compromise and it's all down to what fits your needs best.

For the general consumer digital is definitely the way forward; those who have more specialist requirements know not to believe everything they read in the first place!

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In reply to a post by jonathanHodd:

In reply to a post by Lazza:

I guess at the end of the day I just HATE the modern marketing which tries to give the impression that digital is better than film when it's not

Better is a bad word to choose - everything in life is a compromise and it's all down to what fits your needs best.

For the general consumer digital is definitely the way forward; those who have more specialist requirements know not to believe everything they read in the first place!

Yeah I get what you are saying Jake and agree. But I'm sure like me you must have been in a local say Jessops in recent times and overheard a sales bod sell a camera to a customer with little photo knowledge and sell said camera as "better" purely because it has more mega pixels ... I've heard this pitch far too many times now and feel sorry for the poor customer because they could have spent far less on a camera that would have suited their needs.

But yes for sure digital is the way forward for consumer but it's nice to see/hear on Flickr of many people who are now trying film after only ever using digital and saying that only now are they truly learning photography as an art and understanding essential things like depth of field etc.

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AAISP

I think if I had the time I would love to roll my sleeves up and get the chemicals out. It would be like owning the latest hi-tech car for daily use, but trotting out a pristine old classic for the weekend.

But I still think you're losing something by shooting film then scanning to a different, incompatible colour space. Have a look at Peter Lik's website... you look at some of the pics online and think "meh" (okay, they're still pretty impressive), but see them in the flesh in one of his galleries and they blow you away.

Oops, bad form replying to myself, but that last post was meant to be in response to Lazza, not JonathanHodd. Sorry for any confusion.

In reply to a post by jakeperks:

I think if I had the time I would love to roll my sleeves up and get the chemicals out. It would be like owning the latest hi-tech car for daily use, but trotting out a pristine old classic for the weekend.

But I still think you're losing something by shooting film then scanning to a different, incompatible colour space. Have a look at Peter Lik's website... you look at some of the pics online and think "meh" (okay, they're still pretty impressive), but see them in the flesh in one of his galleries and they blow you away.

Yes a good analogy there with the cars, probably about the closest one can get.

I know what you are saying about post scan compared to good ole wet print - there is and cannot be anything that will match that. I do a lot of my work in BW so to a degree that doesn't matter but scanning say Velvia or old Kodachrome simply does not do it justice when compared to wet printing from it. Though I feel there is a vast difference between scanning using home type stuff like top end Epson ala 700/750 or dedicated Nikon film scanners and then having film scanned using a commerial drum scanner or even the Immacon ..... the images are streets ahead of what the average person can afford.

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AAISP