Medium Format Photography?

[awall]

Hey all, just bought dslr and have started to get a little more serious about my photography. Recently I have been reading about the different sensor sizes and film formats and I'm intrigued by medium format photography. I've been looking at some of the medium format groups on flickr and have noticed that even some of the pretty average pictures look awesome. My first thoughts were that it was due to the shallower dof when shooting with medium format gear. I checked out this site (Digital Camera Sensor Sizes: How it Influences Your Photography ... scroll down a bit) to calculate what sort of aperture and focal length was required to achieve a similar dof with a regular 35mm or ff digitalr slr. As far as I can tell the fastest 2.8 MF lenses equated to approximately a 1.3 50mm which is not that special given the Canon EF 50 1.2 and the Leica Noctilux. I also looked at the flickr groups for these lenses but even though they have a shallower dof, the standard photographs don't give me the same WOW factor.

I guess my question is, why does medium format give such nice images? Does it have something to do with film vs digital? I've searched but cannot find an answer. I'll try and post some examples to show what I'm talking about.

 

[gsgary]

And you don't get colors like this straight out of a digital camera

and here's a crop from the top

 

[dxqcanada1]

Are you viewing Medium Format film images that have been scanned ... or Medium Format digital images on Flickr ?

 

[Sw1tchFX]

It really depends on the camera and lens. I'll use a 645 becuase they're so popular and I shoot most of my stuff on a 645.

Shot side-by-side, in terms of DOF, you're not going to see much of a difference between an 80mm f/2.8 and a 50mm f/1.4 when both are wide-open. My Mamiya 645AF with the AF80mm looks almost identical to my 50mm f/1.4 on my Nikon in terms of general rendering. What gives it that "medium format look", is the super smooth tones compared to 35mm, and the complete lack of abberation, finging, and veiling flare common with fast 50mm's.

The Fujinon 80mm f/2.8 for the Hasselblad 645's and the 80mm AF for the Mamiya/Phase One cameras are insanely sharp lenses and give a very refined clarity and look to the images. Great for shooting pictures of landscapes and things in a studio. However they sometimes have a hard time really isolating subjects outside.

The Zeiss 80mm f/2 for the Contax however IS the "Medium format look" lens. It's like shooting with a 50mm f/.95, but without the crappy veiling flare. I just recently bought a Contax 645 for that lens.



Also, film has color and dynamic range that digital can't touch. I don't care how much DR your D800 has.


This is what the Contax looks like with the 80mm f/2:

A comparison between the two:

Check out Elizabeth Messina, Jonathan Canlas, and Jose Villa. They all shoot with the Contax wide open most of the time, and what they have on their blogs is 100x better than a search for "medium format" on Flickr.

 

[gsgary]

I will have to try shooting my Mamiya TLR wide open

 

[Buckster]

And you don't get colors like this straight out of a digital camera

You don't get them straight out of a film camera either. In both cases, what the camera did needs to be processed into a photo we can see.

 

[Sw1tchFX]

And you don't get colors like this straight out of a digital camera

You don't get them straight out of a film camera either. In both cases, what the camera did needs to be processed into a photo we can see.

To an extent, but yes you do get them straight out of a film camera. Those pictures above had zero color adjustment on my part. Straight from the lab.

 

[Buckster]

And you don't get colors like this straight out of a digital camera

You don't get them straight out of a film camera either. In both cases, what the camera did needs to be processed into a photo we can see.

To an extent, but yes you do get them straight out of a film camera. Those pictures above had zero color adjustment on my part. Straight from the lab.

Show me how you get it straight out of the camera WITHOUT A LAB PROCESSING IT. Just because you're not the one doing it, doesn't mean it isn't getting done.

 

[gsgary]

Show me how you get it straight out of the camera WITHOUT A LAB PROCESSING IT. Just because you're not the one doing it, doesn't mean it isn't getting done.

Because it has only had developer fixer and wetting solution and i asked for it to be scanned with no adjustments

 

[gsgary]

To an extent, but yes you do get them straight out of a film camera. Those pictures above had zero color adjustment on my part. Straight from the lab.

Why would you want to color adjust it thats why we use different films

 

[Buckster]

Show me how you get it straight out of the camera WITHOUT A LAB PROCESSING IT. Just because you're not the one doing it, doesn't mean it isn't getting done.

Because it has only had developer fixer and wetting solution and i asked for it to be scanned with no adjustments

Even that requires that it be processed correctly, with correct amounts of chemicals, used for the correct amounts of times, and at the correct temperatures.

Similarly, digital files need to be correctly processed to get a pleasing result. That doesn't mean they need to get cloning and burning and dodging and all the rest of it. But it does take the basic amount of processing to get rich colors in a very similar way as basic chemical processing produces those you're touting with your image. In point of fact, one could dial into a digital camera the amount of saturation they want, and the color temperature to use, and produce a JPG straight out of the camera that would be just as color-vibrant as what you show in your film example.

Sorry, but this "film is superior for color straight out of the camera" high horse you like to ride around on is not the studly stallion you'd like to pretend it is.

 

[Buckster]

To an extent, but yes you do get them straight out of a film camera. Those pictures above had zero color adjustment on my part. Straight from the lab.

Why would you want to color adjust it thats why we use different films

That's a whole 'nuther aspect to film shooting. By choosing your film for a specific purpose, you've effectively begun to process the end result look of it even before you start shooting. Load it with Velvia and you're going to get crazy rich colors. Load it with Tri-X and you get no colors at all.

 

[awall]

Are you viewing Medium Format film images that have been scanned ... or Medium Format digital images on Flickr ?

I've been looking mainly at 645 and 6x7 shots as i'm interested in getting a bronica or maaaaybe a mamiya. I'm thinking MF would be awesome fun to muck around with and the Bronica's seem like they're great value. I've just had a quick look on the Mamiya website but i'm pretty sure that their digital MF camera's have a smaller sensor size than even a 645. From what i was reading the sensor sizes are ~ halfway between 35mm and 645. They seem to shine with ridiculous resolutions though, which i imagine would be excellent for huge prints.

What gives it that "medium format look", is the super smooth tones compared to 35mm, and the complete lack of abberation, finging, and veiling flare common with fast 50mm's.

I think this must be the main reason. None of it is extremely obvious at first glance, but it seems to add up when it's all together. I'm sure the shallow dof helps but even your mamiya 645 photo has that "look". I know this is a tough question, sort of along the lines of film vs digital, but there definitely is something about medium format that just looks right vs 35mm.

Thanks everyone for the answers.

 

[gsgary]

Even that requires that it be processed correctly, with correct amounts of chemicals, used for the correct amounts of times, and at the correct temperatures.

Similarly, digital files need to be correctly processed to get a pleasing result. That doesn't mean they need to get cloning and burning and dodging and all the rest of it. But it does take the basic amount of processing to get rich colors in a very similar way as basic chemical processing produces those you're touting with your image. In point of fact, one could dial into a digital camera the amount of saturation they want, and the color temperature to use, and produce a JPG straight out of the camera that would be just as color-vibrant as what you show in your film example.

Sorry, but this "film is superior for color straight out of the camera" high horse you like to ride around on is not the studly stallion you'd like to pretend it is.

But the chemicals are only doing what your sensor does any alterations are made at printing stage

 

[Buckster]

Even that requires that it be processed correctly, with correct amounts of chemicals, used for the correct amounts of times, and at the correct temperatures.

Similarly, digital files need to be correctly processed to get a pleasing result. That doesn't mean they need to get cloning and burning and dodging and all the rest of it. But it does take the basic amount of processing to get rich colors in a very similar way as basic chemical processing produces those you're touting with your image. In point of fact, one could dial into a digital camera the amount of saturation they want, and the color temperature to use, and produce a JPG straight out of the camera that would be just as color-vibrant as what you show in your film example.

Sorry, but this "film is superior for color straight out of the camera" high horse you like to ride around on is not the studly stallion you'd like to pretend it is.

But the chemicals are only doing what your sensor does any alterations are made at printing stage

No, the film is doing what my sensor does: Capture photons. The chemicals are doing what my software does: Processing what the photon-capturing medium gathered.