From: Mitsu Hadeishi (email suppressed)
Date: Thu Mar 02 2006 - 10:46:39 PST
But this is really the point I am making. I mean, to talk about film as
though it were akin to hand-crocheted fabric or whatever --- film is just a
technology, it's just a medium, like anything else. Like I said before, it
seems to me there's just this huge nerd quotient to me behind some of these
arguments (this is what I meant by talking about 8mm vs. HD --- the logical
outcome of "analog vs. digital" is that even 8mm is more "natural" and thus
superior to HD simply because it is analog...) Now, sure, I'm a nerd, too,
but at some point I think a lot of the analog vs. digital thing comes down to
a sort of strange obsession with the intricate details of technology rather
than something that is really connected to art. I mean, VHS is certainly
analog --- but is it really better than digital HD just because it is analog?
I just can't get all that excited about the analog/digital thing. Analog
noise is no "better", in my mind, in any real sense, from digital noise.
Noise is noise, less noise is obviously better, but it's all noise.
M
On Thursday 02 March 2006 13:28, Philip Hood wrote:
> On Thu, 2 Mar 2006, Cari Machet wrote:
> > let me be more specific
> > i was referencing picture quality ...
> > i remember and was referencing in my mind
> > when hd first came out
> > and the little (panasonic) display they had at NAB
> > the screens footage was compared to film -
>
> hi cari,
>
> to me - and I have spent a little time thinking
> about this, but I claim nothing other than
> being able to kinda feel my way blindly
> though it and somewhat be able to express
> what I feel, an analog medium is never
> quite going to ever be the same as a digital
> thing. however, at some point, our senses
> become dulled out, and then we don't know
> the difference anymore, but thats not to mean
> that they don't don't exist.
>
> at the same time, its important to remember
> that the emulsion in film merely contains
> very small silver halides, which are atomic
> in nature, and its possible to get a
> pretty good electronic representation of
> what you're seeing on say a 35mm film frame.
>
> most discussions I've seen of, say, film
> recording, suggest that a 8k scan, which
> equates to about 8192 x 5461 pixels, is
> pretty much past the point where people can
> distinguish whether or not the image is
> at all pixelated, at about the rate of
> size of projection of "conventially" taken
> images on celluloid.
>
> now, when you compare the resoluttion size of
> 8192 x 5461 pixels,
> with say, DVD, which is merely:
> 720 x 480, or even the maxium of HD, which is
> 1920 x 1080, you see that that falls pretty
> short of 8192 x 5461, about 4 & 1/4 along the
> horizontal axis ...
>
> but, if this is "all" we are talking about,
> image quality, between video and film, then
> I really feel that we're talking about something
> that is not going to last too long. I think
> humans will figure out how to digitally
> create images of the same or a surpassing
> "quality" as celluloid filming can ...
>
> ... but the process will _always_ be different.
> Its just a different way of doing things.
> I mean, sure, I can go shopping, for a bar
> of bread, a stick of butter, and a bottle of
> milk, but the _way_ this happens, I think
> is very different ... and I think, for
> film, its all in the process. Theres something
> about a beautifully hand crocheted scarf
> that I can make my girlfriend that no machine
> will ever be able to recreate - even if
> it "looks" exactly the same, theres always
> going to be something different ...
>
> ... and are we really
> talking about the "cheapening"
> of film ... ... I feel that this is primarily
> whats behind so many of these discussion,
> which doesn't quite amount to too much
> of substance, to me.
>
> -ml
> pth
>
>
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