Sunday, January 10, 2016

Scanning Negatives and Slides

Scanning film is a crucial step in nowadays hybride digital-analogue process applied in film photography.

Going through this many-steps process of shooting on film, developing the film, scanning the film, and post processing in digital allows to get the maximum out of any photograph. The maximum by means of resolution, by means of detail, by means of detail sharpness, by means of color tonality, by means of contrast, and dynamic range.

Using a flatbed scanner for digitising film allows to go to image resolution for a medium format photograph of more than 200 megapixels.  This is especially used when producing large prints with a high requirement to detail and sharpness.

There are many options for film scanning such as standard flatbed scanners or specialised film scanners. For a great overview have a look at the buying guide from B&H Photo: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/explora/photography/buying-guide/film-scanners

Tutorial on scanning negatives by Ted Forbes, The Art of Photography:


Tutorial by Tim Heubeck on using an Epson v800 color scanner for 120 film scanning:

Saturday, January 9, 2016

Color film developing at home: C41 Process

The handcraft of developing film has almost become extinct.
But, there is a recent revival of respective techniques, given the number of resources found on YouTube or blogs where the manual development processes are explained step by step.

While 20 years ago it was common to develop the film and then develop prints, nowadays it is more popular to self-develop the film and scan negatives and slides at high resolution for further digital post processing and subsequent printing.

A very nice video tutorial on developing film using the C41 process by Ted Forbes on The Art of Photography channel. All chemicals and tools as well as the entire manual process explained in great detail:

Or the explanations on the moominstuff blog:
moominstuff: Color film developing at home: Easy!: I live in a city metro area of about 3.5 million folks, 75 miles across from east to west, and there currently seems to be one single place ...

Or on petapixel:
How to Process C-41 Color Negative Film at Home, From Start to Finish

Friday, January 8, 2016

3D Smartphone Camera - Bevel

Have you ever dreamed of possibilities to capture photographs in 3D? - Have a look at Bevel 3D, this little gadget attached to a smartphone or a tablet. The 3 dimensional experience becomes true.

Bevel 3D:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/matterandform/bevel-3d-photography-for-any-smartphone-or-tablet/description

Thursday, January 7, 2016

Travel Photography using Hasselblad and Film

Here a blogpost on experimenting with a Hasselblad and film on a trip to Rome. - by Kirk Tuck

The Visual Science Lab.: What I learned when I dragged a Hasselblad on vaca...: Rome. It was 1991 and most of my assignments were being done on medium format film with one or another camera from Sweden.  There&#3...


And a second blogpost on using Hasselblad 503cx in Iceland. - by Gary Sermonic

http://filmadvance.com/2015/05/the-hasselblad-travel-camera/ "I can't think of a worse choice for a travel camera." That's a direct quote from an internet discussion about the Hasselblad. ...

Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Nikon D500 and D5 announced

Yesterday, Nikon announced two new DSLR cameras heading their DX and FX camera line-up.

Both cameras have sensors with resolution of 21 MP, and 4K video capture.

Nikon D5 - FX, 20.8 MP: http://imaging.nikon.com/lineup/dslr/d5/
The D5 is built for speed with a new AF system, 12 fps continuous shooting capability.

Nikon D500 - DX, 20.9 MP: http://imaging.nikon.com/lineup/microsite/d500/
D500 exhibits the same 153-point AF system, and the same Expeed 5 image processor.




KeyMission 360: http://www.nikon.com/news/2016/0106_camera_05.htm
Furthermore, Nikon announced the KeyMission 360 which is an action camera that allows to capture real 360° videos in 4K.
This is the launch of a first product of a new Nikon action camera product line.

Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Mountain Fog - Landscape Photography

The Swiss Alps from Rigi Kaltbad, Nikon D4
On the left one of my own images shot at Rigi Kaltbad in Central Switzerland on an October evening moments after sunset.

The fog filling up the valley and covering the lake Lucerne like a fluid, the nice textured mountains with first snow in the background, and the red glowing sky.
Sunset behind Mt. Pilatus from Rigi Kulm,
Hasselblad 500c/m, Fujichrome Velvia 100
The beauty of the landscape just shot at the right moment.

More pictures from the same location at link.


On the right a picture shot on film showing the Mount Pilatus at the horizon the last second before sunset. In the foreground the western side of Mount Rigi and in between sculptures of fog like the sea in a heavy storm.

In these two images the fog gives an interesting structure towards the topological bottom of the captured landscape and guides the interest to whatever remains on top of the fogs' surface.

The experienced weather conditions with lower altitude landscape covered in fog and sunny bright weather at upper altitude levels is very typical for the autumn and winter months in Central Switzerland.

More images from the same trip using my analog film setup at link.
And some digital captures at link.

Another simple search for images tagged with "Mountain Fog" in the landscape photography category of 500px.com yields some very interesting photos of mountain landscape under foggy weather conditions.

Before Sunrise by Martin Vaculík on 500px.com
Before Sunrise by Martin Vaculìk (500px)
Some of them are very similar than the ones presented above with glowing sky, the contrast of the mountains with the sea of fog.










Cloudy Day in Guilin by Mihail Bidnichenko on 500px.com
Cloudy Day in Guilin, Gunxi, China
by Mihail Dinichenko (500px)
And other images show more mountain landscape where the foggy weather condition adds a mystical element to the image.









The Art of Light by Matteo Zanvettor on 500px.com
The Art of Light by Matteo Zanvettor (500px)
The fog gives rise to a visual effect that lets these pictures almost look like in watercolour paintings applying soft tonalities of pastel color and some black to add the necessary contrast of the mountain landscape as silhouettes.





Monday, January 4, 2016

Black and White Underwater Photography

Cessna by Mathieu Foulquié on 500px.com
Cessna by Mathieu Foulquié


Jellyfish by matt west on 500px.com
Jellyfish by Matt West


Lovin the Sun by Leighton Lum on 500px.com
Loving the Sun by Leighton Lum


∆ Big Sucker! ∆ by Thomas Conrad  on 500px.com
Big Sucker by Thomas Conrad