what's the big knock against digital b&w?

[back alley]

is it that it looks too clean? no grain? too cold?

i'm serious...

the big knock against the compact disk for music is that there is no warmth...too clean.

is that similar for the digital black & white image?

that would make sense to me...i love digital music, even as a kid i disliked the 'extras' that could be heard on a vinyl record...i like grain in an image but i much prefer that clean, clinical look.

btw, if you have not checked out the b&w digital image thread...you should, some wonderful images in there.

[Clovis]

For me its the look of the highlights, especially the transitions. I find them often harsh looking and the stark whites very distracting. Not to say that some images look alright converted, I just see it much more often in digital B/W than B/W film prints/scans.

I also think and shoot different when I know that I'm shooting native B/W. Something that isn't really the case when I shoot digital.

[paulfish4570]

it is just a different look - usually. but if one controls the highlights when shooting digital, then one can make lovely BW conversions. look at ricnak's work. sumptious. and carole dame's work from china.

[135format]

Its a question of process for me. I like to print in the darkroom and actually take a great deal from making something by hand. Also having worked in software for 35 years I've had my fill of computers. They hold no interest for me anymore and I simply can't get excited about being an end user of someone elses piece of software and the way it dictates to me how I have to work.

digital music was based on the human ear only being able to hear upto 20,000Hz I think. They since discovered we can hear much higher and lower frequencies than digital music frequencies and subtleties contained in those extremes make a lot of difference to our perception music.

[jordanstarr]

For me, a lot of B&W conversions are done by people who have no idea how to print black and white images "properly", so the conversions look bad (either too high in contrast, blown out highlights, too flat in areas that need more punch, the burning/dodging looks bad, it looks too muddy in the greys like a darkroom print of a colour negative or the entire thing is way too polished). This is all my personal taste though. For the reasons I would knock it, others would embrace it. The end result for me is a good print and I have yet to see a black and white digital print that looks better than a wet print of the same image even after seeing Master Printers of both digital and analog battle out the same photograph.

That being said, on a screen, I've seen some great black and white conversion/digital images and it often is hard to tell which was started with film and what ones are digital. But I don't really care what's on the screen or I'd just get by with a phone camera. The print for me is the tangible trophy at the end of the day. The thing I don't have to turn on to see my photographs interpreted by software, calibration, etc. I couldn't be satisfied with photography otherwise.

...and often, I got on my site, check out my images and go "what the hell was I on when I was editting this?". When I get a final print in the darkroom that I've laboured for 3 hours on, I can't think of a single thing I would change. My prints look way better than anything I have online.

[thirtyfivefifty]

I love digital black and white images.

[mervynyan]

transition amongst the greys is too smooth, that is why many ppl increase contrast even for a very good exposed photo.

[tbarker13]

Originally Posted by thirtyfivefifty

I love digital black and white images.

Same here. I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss working in a darkroom. But it was the actual working the darkroom - as much as anything else - that I loved.
I'm quite happy with b&w that I've done digitally.

[sebastel]

open your own eyes.
if you see a difference, then you see a difference.
if you see no difference, then you don't.

[mfogiel]

It is very simple, the digital B&W is plain ugly, and if you don't see that, then don't worry about it.

[f16sunshine]

If it does not look poor digital I don't see any problem with it. I don't like HDR-ish looking images. Overly smooth or clean can be ok if the tones are in a reasonable range and have nice transitions. Too much DR looks like poor digital B+W. Same with blocked or too quick highlight and shadow transition.

It's late and I lack the words. I don't think there is an overwhelming feeling against Digital B+W. Simply that the look that looks best is still one that resembles the results from film.

[John Bragg]

They look too plastic to my eye. Hard to quantify but that is the phrase that best describes it I think. Like comparing air brushing to oil painting with images that are originated on a traditional negative being the oil painting. More organic and posessing a different feel.

[J. Borger]

I shot B&W digital exclusively for many years. Since i switched to B&W film there realy is no way back for me. Simply can not get the same look digital. Has nothing to do with adding grain etc. in post. Yes i sometimes see B&W conversions that look realy good. But at least 80% of the digital B&W conversions i see online look horrible to me. The tonal range simply is not the same.
The word "plastic" used by John pretty much sums it up.

[135format]

Originally Posted by back alley

btw, if you have not checked out the b&w digital image thread...you should, some wonderful images in there.

where is it ? Ah I found it I think:

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/foru....php?p=1528167

[gavinlg]

I have to admit, after a year or 2 of purely digital capture, and then selling off my dslr and buying a contax G1, film generally blows digital away for black and white in purely aesthetic terms. It's a royal pain in the ass with the scanning/dust/negative curl/development control and all that, but when it's all said and done and you have a roll of tri-x or tmax on your computer scanned and processed, and a card full of converted b&w digital pics, the digitals just don't compare, even after excessive tinkering and processing.

[BobYIL]

There is an excellent photographer in our forum: OurManInTangier with his pictures shot on film as well as with digital.
When I look at them I can't help of thinking "if I were him, I would be shooting only film".

[Roger Hicks]

Originally Posted by jordanstarr

For me, a lot of B&W conversions are done by people who have no idea how to print black and white images "properly", so the conversions look bad (either too high in contrast, blown out highlights, too flat in areas that need more punch, the burning/dodging looks bad, it looks too muddy in the greys like a darkroom print of a colour negative or the entire thing is way too polished). This is all my personal taste though. For the reasons I would knock it, others would embrace it. The end result for me is a good print and I have yet to see a black and white digital print that looks better than a wet print of the same image even after seeing Master Printers of both digital and analog battle out the same photograph.

That being said, on a screen, I've seen some great black and white conversion/digital images and it often is hard to tell which was started with film and what ones are digital. But I don't really care what's on the screen or I'd just get by with a phone camera. The print for me is the tangible trophy at the end of the day. The thing I don't have to turn on to see my photographs interpreted by software, calibration, etc. I couldn't be satisfied with photography otherwise.

...and often, I got on my site, check out my images and go "what the hell was I on when I was editting this?". When I get a final print in the darkroom that I've laboured for 3 hours on, I can't think of a single thing I would change. My prints look way better than anything I have online.

Exactly.

Cheers,

R.

[Archlich]

Too clean, and cheap. Some people add grain during PP, yet it's still fake - also showing the author's contempt, or at least lack of confidence toward the clean digital look, one of the media's very own property.

[dave lackey]

Originally Posted by back alley

is it that it looks too clean? no grain? too cold?

i'm serious...

the big knock against the compact disk for music is that there is no warmth...too clean.

is that similar for the digital black & white image?

that would make sense to me...i love digital music, even as a kid i disliked the 'extras' that could be heard on a vinyl record...i like grain in an image but i much prefer that clean, clinical look.

btw, if you have not checked out the b&w digital image thread...you should, some wonderful images in there.

There is a term for those on either extreme. For me, I fall somewhere in the vast middle area. Not sure what I would termed.

I like all kinds of images and I am not stuck on one process, format, genre, or emotionally attached anything. If I like it, I like it. But that's just me. I love Mudride's Diana images for sure. But, then, I find a lot of BW digital images that are excellent to my eyes.

A bit of a tempest in a teapot to me when someone "hates" digital music, or "hates" digital images either black and white or color.

The key is to make a good image period. I see an awful lot of bad images in black and white digital as well as black and white film. But I don't like throwing out the baby with the bath water.

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

A bit of a tempest in a teapot to me when someone "hates" digital music, or "hates" digital images either black and white or color.

Hyperbole rules, Absolutely!!!

[hlockwood]

Im hoping that the "big knock" is a small thud. Up until now, I've shot only B&W film, mostly with the M7; color images hold no attraction for me. But now, I've acquired an M9-P, and the captured image is color, one that I'll be converting to B&W.

My prints (the end product that counts) are made with Jon Cone's carbon pigment inks and have beautifully smooth transitions and capture all the tones available.

It's too soon to tell how the digital capture will compare. But the few prints I've made do look quite good. I hope to make many more from shots taken over the next few months. (I'm mostly a warm-weather shooter.)

The first thing immediately apparent to me has been that the digitally captured image, as opposed to a scanned image, needs far less sharpening. If one simply applies the same sharpening workflow to the digitally captured file, the result does indeed look artificial. I've printed some images from the M9 with no sharpening at all; sharpening would have degraded the print.

Harry

[Teuthida]

I love digital b&w. But I don't confuse it with film. The two have a different look, and no amount of post will change that.

That being said, I can get effects in digital I couldn't dream of getting in a wet darkroom, unless I wanted to slave away for days and weeks burning paper for that "perfect" print. I can give it a exposure curve to match the look of any given film; Ican easily swap filter efftects to see what works best; dodging and burning become extremely precise in a way not available in the darkroom.

[jsrockit]

Originally Posted by dave lackey

The key is to make a good image period. I see an awful lot of bad images in black and white digital as well as black and white film. But

Exactly! I'm not sure when people will get this through their heads. I'm shocked that "soul" hasn't come up yet... Once it does, I may puke.

One has to wonder whether those on both sides of the extreme are just inexperienced with one process or the other (or just too old / young to change).

[bigeye]

It tastes like Stevia.

.

[sdotkling]

It's fake. That's the whole thing in a nutshell.