Since most of the positive film replies on this thread come from low volume or casual enthusiasts, it's obvious why there is a film bias in these replies and it makes sense.
Think about it. How many plug ins, software suites, inkjet paper is designed to give a "digital look" to an image? Now how many promise a film look?
So like it or not, a dozen years into heavy digital acceptance, photographers are still emulating film looks on their digital capture.
Then again, if I did not shoot for commerce, I would also shoot film and not because of "superior image quality" or ease, just because there is such a wide range of used medium format cameras on the marketplace for pennies on the dollar and like most people, I and the rest of our studio is into computer overload, especially since we've moved a great deal of our business to motion imagery.
Early on digital did very well for my business as it opened up new revenue and artistic streams of offering concept to final press ready delivery. It also kept us in front of the client longer, which as most business people know, the more your imbedded with your client, the more work comes your way.
Today it's different. Now we shoot 2 or 3 times the volume we ever did with film and the most obvious aspect of digital is how long imagery stays in the pipeline. Nobody asks for 1 year use, it's now 2, 3, or 4 years. Same with talent because with digital it's common for 6 months after shooting a project, the client/agency has requests to move subject A behind subject b, swap a head, move a prop, even outline the subjects into a totally different scene. 6 months later the requests come again.
With film, that very rarely happened. I guess one reason is film was less accessible, harder to judge if a subject A would look good behind subject B and post production costs were much higher today than in the past. For the cost of scanning, matching, swapping and retouching film based images, along with reliscencing talent and the photographer's use made it cheaper to just design a new concept and shoot something fresh.
Digital changed all of that, at least in the world of commerce. After all how long do you see campaigns running? I see them go in and out of the media for years and I don't think a week goes by where we don't get one of these requests.
Digital also changed the way we work on set. Never with film did a client sit in front of a polaroid and talk about it for an hour, or even dream of seeing every frame in 27" wide glory. Never with film capture did a client become so "involved" with a shoot that their committee direction was somewhat overwhelming.
Today the photographer needs a strong personality to keep the project on track and into an interesting style, given the amount of "suggestions" we all receive from a client.
Looking forward and back I would have done things a little different. To begin with, I never would have progressed in still cameras past the original 1ds1. That camera today continues to shoot a file that is probably more "film like", than the $100,000's of dollars of cameras I have bought subsequent to their 1ds1.
I know this will drive the mucho megapixel photographers on this forum crazy but when it comes to large prints everybody thinks a large print looks good. In fact early on when shooting a 6 or 11 mpx camera, if a client had a question about the quality I'd just pull a couple of 40" prints and send them out.
At this size everyone would go wow and never question digital again. In fact looking back at the original 1ds1, our workflow was twice as fast as today, our expenses less, our turnaround faster and our knowledge of the file more intimate.
When I think of how easy our workflow was, vs. how complicated it became with processing every frame for web galleries, working with expensive systems that produced moire and color cast, I kind of laugh at myself for spending so much time and money to get a result that nobody was asking for.
Like everyone I got caught up in bigger is better and the thing I noticed that people started talking about sharpness and lack of grain, instead of the artistic values of the photograph.
If I had to classify the last decade of digital I'd call it the decade of over sharpness.
(At least that is my experience).
So, as we've moved to motion imagery we've learned our lesson and those past still experiences are the reason I bought a second RED One, instead of a new Epic. We might eventually go to an Epic or a motion camera with a smaller form factor, but it won't be for "ultimate image quality" because today the RED Ones' (much like my original 1ds') shoots a file that is equal to our beyond anything a client is asking for.
Personally, I believe the level of digital capture has hit a plateau and new cameras may make your happy, (after all everyone loves new stuff), but today I see more and more clients concerned with the photographer's concept, the beauty, the reality, the style of the image much more than they value the actual detail or sharpness.
I've found the best solution is the most proven, the one that works, produces the look I'm after and the system I'm most familiar with.
IMO
BC
