blue skies

Zooming in

In orbit above the blue planet...

... construction crane behind and above the Art Gallery of Ontario 

Kensington Market, Minolta XE-7 loaded with Ilford Delta 400

 using either a Minolta MD 50f1.4 or a 35f2.8

In Search of Kodachrome #3

 

In Search of Kodachrome #2

In Search of Kodachrome #1

If I can only have one film emulsion, let it be Kodachrome (25, 64, or 200). If I can't have Kodachrome, let my images have that Kodachrome aesthetic.

An exercise in my search for the film-look

 The tools:

Minolta 7000, loaded with Kodak Gold 200, set to ISO200, aperture priority at F4, no exposure compensation afjustment for the snow scenes. Film was processed by Grainnation, and they're shown here without any adjustments: straight from the scans.

Sony A99: 24MP, known for it's creamy rendering. set to ISO200, aperture priority at F4, exposure compensation adjusted for the snow scenes. The digital files were adjusted for brightness and contrast to match the film files. Very little adjustment was necessary, since the exposure compensation applied in shooting worked quite well.

Lens used by both cameras: Tamron 20-40 F2.7-3.5

The top image is on digital and the bottom image is with film.

The weather was overcast, like a very thick diffused softbox was hung over the whole scene. Undoubtedly this lack of lighting extremes led to a very close matchbetween digital and film. With a wider lighting range, film will differ significantly from digital, and I suspect, negatively.

No preset was involved in this exercise. I use presets when necessary to get the look that I am looking for; and it's a different look for different occasions. Presets can add grain, halation, edge contrasts, vignetting, etc, all in almost-ready-to-apply packages.

It's essential that I don't define the finished product as a digital-look, or a film-look, or a hybrid-look. It's not even a Dodge-Baena-look. It's just a look that suits the image, for the purpose and the audience it is intended for. Hopefully, it's a pretty picture, too. Presets are tools for specific jobs.

This is my first time using the Tamron, which came to me as a bonus with the A99 from Facebook MarketPlace. One discovery from this exercise is that the Tamron 20-40F2.7-3.5 is an underrated lens, a fine optic with character. Pairs nicely with the Sony a99. I think I'll hang on to both.