[filmscanners] Re: Compact Cameras

["" <scott@adrenaline.com>]

I've been using MIS inks in a little C86. No, not exactly a wet print, but
pretty good, especially for the price (and space requirements!) Scanning
B&W film has its drawbacks, quite sensitive to the exposure and
development.  I just bought a 2200 yesterday and am about to give the
QTR (Quadtone RIP) a try.

I have a D70, which I like more or less (but it's kind of big compared to
my Leica kit and the viewfinder is kind of small and anoying for an SLR).
Dynamic range doesn't compare to B&W or color film, but I can often
live with that.  I like the color results.

As for P&S, they haven't made one I want yet. Small noisy sensors, really
poor higher ISO performance (I like HP5+ at 320 or 800, NPH, etc.), tiny
finders (shared by most film P&S cameras too), poor control adequate to
close focus (you know, focus on an eyeball from 1 meter away, etc .)

Manual exposure controls are pretty impressive, OTOH, even on some lower
end digi cams like the A75.

I'm waiting for some company to release a really capable small digicam with
a decent APS sensor, a truly superb lens (maybe a prime in the 40mm equiv.
range) and I guess some kind of deluxe EVF. Optical RF based VF is probably
hoping for too much :-) I imagine something like this will happen
eventually,
but most camera producers design efforts seem focused on the "Best Buy"
crowd.  Unfortunately, the usual candidates for producing such a beast -
Leica, Contax - are having their issues. OTOH, Nikon did produce the well
loved 28 and 35Ti cameras, so who knows.

At this point I'm a Nikonian, I guess, but Olympus and Pentax make some
relatively compact DSLRs. Pentax just release a small pancake prime lens
that is reportedly very good.  Either one of these cameras and a small lens
might match the dimensions of the typical larger digicams and offer much
greater controls and produce much better results.  Worthy of a little
research
and fondling prior to a buy decision.

Hope that helps.

Scott



lotusm50@sprynet.com wrote:

>You should check out the PeizographyBW Black and White inkjet printing
>system from Jon Cone (and inkjetmall.com).  It is really amazing.   No
>bronzing, no metemerism, no fading, rich deep black and long tonal
>scale.  It is really, really very good.
>
>
>LAURIE SOLOMON wrote:
>
>
>
>><snip>
>>
>>First, even at today's stage in technology, I do not find digital black
>>and white to be all that satisfactory be it captured with a digital
>>camera or scanned in via a scanner.  I find that both the monitor
>>displaying and the hard copy printing of digital black & white to be
>>full of problems that result in much additional work to correct or
>>minimize or in less than satisfactory quality.  Issues such as the
>>ability of dye based inkjet prints or pigmented inkjet prints to render
>>the images with true rich blacks with little bronzing or metemerism with
>>clean neutral whites without warm or cold color casts, the tendency to
>>emphasize grain structure, aliasing, and noise when rendering the image,
>>and the frequent exhibiting of color artifacts in the form of stray
>>color pixels that appear.  To be sure, some of this will be found with
>>B&W film based captures that are scanned and reproduced just as it is
>>with the digital camera captures since these issues seem to revolve
>>around the rendering and reproduction stages rather than the capture
>>stages; but I have found the problems easier to deal with when scanning
>>B&W films and rendering them into monitor displays and prints than is
>>the case with digital camera captures.  This is especially true given
>>that there are a number of varying film types and speeds to use that are
>>better for different subjects and scan with differing results with
>>respect to some of the problems mentioned like emphasis of grain
>>structure, aliasing, and noise which is not true for digital camera
>>unless one has an arsenal of different digital cameras to select from
>>that use different sensors in different configurations.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>


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