RE: Quality of prints from digital files on photo paper

[Alan Zinn <azinn@xxxxxxxxxx>]

At 09:56 AM 10/19/2000 -0400, you wrote:
>I think Zonghou is correct in many ways, particularly with regard to image
>quality.  And here I'm talking objective quality (what the image
>qualities - grain, gradation - are), not subjective(or, how
>an image "feels").  I'm a longtime "fine art" photographer, having shot
>film for 40 years now and making enlarged prints using traditional
>opto-chemical technology.  I have a problem I need to solve digitally:
>putting credible copies of my images on my web page.  I'm no luddite but I
>am skeptical about substituting digital for anything more demanding than
>this project at hand.  So, I went to a digital imaging meeting last night,
>hosted by an Apple techno-geek/salesperson.  There were lots of what the
>gurus of the medium were calling top quality digital photographs on
>display for all to see...
>
>the stuff was OBJECTIVELY mediocre at best.  To compare this output to
>film prints is like comparing a Yugo with a Mercedes.  And, yes, this was
>touted by all these folks with their (I won't mention the name of the
>national photography organization here) medals dangling from their necks
>as being the greatest of the state of the art.  As an economist by day, I
>tried to put the digital revolution in its perspective as appropriate for
>news and wedding work (with a Phase One equivalent back - very high
>quality capture).  For purposes of the 100 roll per year amateur, it makes
>no sense and can't be written off on taxes.  But, for me, the stunning
>reality was how crude the digital image quality really was. It's really
>still in its infancy and far too expensive for the average photographer,
>particularly where OBJECTIVE image quality is concerned.  Now, where you
>want to talk about Tango drum-scanned 4x5 negatives output to a $300,000
>LightJet printer, I agree.  The results may even be said to be better
>than can be produced through opto-chemical means. Still, remember, this is
>hybrid technology.  While everyone is touting the
>quality of output from a 18 MB file from a Nikon D1, I am reminded that my
>8x10 negatives would require a 2 GIGABYTE file to give me the
>equivalent to film quality.
>
>The price/performance ratio of digital imaging compared to film is still
>way too high.  It will probably take 5 to 10 years for the curves to
>cross.  While the purchaser of $10,000 woth of digital imaging equipment
>watches their investment decline to $zero over the next five years, the
>Leica buyer can watch that investment remain stable - or even grow.
>Doesn't make any sense to me.  But it does make sense for my phot-editor
>buddy who shoots 15 rolls of film per day for the newpaper and can write
>down the cost of the equipment while saving a ton on film and processing.
>We just need to accept the appropriate uses for this stuff and discard the
>rest until the technology goes from the equivalent of a Model T Ford to a
>year 2000 Taurus.  And the dawn of that day is certainly not upon us.
>
>Curt
>Curt Miller, MPA
>
>On Thu, 19 Oct 2000, Xiong, Zonghou wrote:
>
>> I think it is important to say the advantages of digital photography are 
>> digital manipulations on a computer.  You achieve this either by
>> film+scanner
>> or by a digital camera.  Having seen a few local people struggling selling
>> fine
>> art photos using digital cameras,  I wouldn't recommend this option.  The 
>> advantage of digital cameras is speed, not image quality. One photo
>> journalist
>> I met thought everybody was using Nikon D1 at the Olympics.  However, for
>> fine
>> art prints, a cheap point & shoot plus a consumer scanner would beat D1.
>> 
>> Zonghou Xiong
>-
>
>

Curt,

Too bad you didn't get to see some good digital prints. They are out there.
True, there are those who insist that a d-print on glossy stock looks just
like a silver print. I haven't seen one of those yet. 
But - I think what you say is similar to comparing 35mm prints with 8 x 10
contact prints - a pointless comparison.  Side-by-side with good silver
prints, d-prints are just different. Not worse. Why make silver prints the
quality holy grail? Worse-case, an ink jet print looks as good as a fine
litho. I regularly see fine silver prints of all formats and know that a
fine d-print can also be made with modest equipment and relatively small
size files.  Given that simple and inexpensive fine d-printing has only been
available for a year or two and has just now reached fine art print status
it will be a while before the skeptics quit mumbling in their beards.


AZ  

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