BW photo database

October 17, 2005 3:05 PM

The art of black and white photography is not dead, but more and more developers / films are left by the wayside. And then someone comes along, and makes a database of 1500+ combinations of developers and black and white films. If the combination isn't in the database, it uses a series of formulae to calculate a likely developing time.
posted by SharQ (38 comments total)

YES!@&^ Black and white is awesome. I've run into some "black and white" photographers who just grayscale a digital camera image... ugh.
posted by adzm at 3:13 PM on October 17, 2005

Nothing wrong with that; well, ok, that's not true. Just doing a greyscale conversion isn't very good. Takes a bit more than that. Most of the time if it's done right the tool involved of the creation of the image isn't even known.

That said, however, black and white slide film DOES have a much better dynamic range than digital currently does. I am very much looking forward to the breakthrough happens that allows me to replace my digital body with one equaling that kind of dynamic range.
posted by Stunt at 3:25 PM on October 17, 2005

Amazing how many times you can review what you write and yet the second you post typos or missing words come out of the woodwork to ravage your post. Bah I say.
posted by Stunt at 3:26 PM on October 17, 2005

interesting. good post.
posted by tomplus2 at 3:27 PM on October 17, 2005

Using the channel mixer, you can actually get a lot of good black and white data (it emulates coloured filters on your lens) out of colour photos. It's worth a shot - some info about how is available here
posted by SharQ at 3:32 PM on October 17, 2005

... nothing beats a good, fast black and white film (ISO 3200 pushed to 6400? Yummie!) and a high-contrast developer though. Film grain is beautiful.
posted by SharQ at 3:34 PM on October 17, 2005

This is also available over at The Massive Dev Chart.

I use TMDC when I develop, I like that this one uses formulas to figure out what I should be doing if I go off the data sheet.
posted by splatta at 3:38 PM on October 17, 2005

While it is a useful tool, the channel mixer has nothing to do with filters on my enlargment lense when working with b/w negatives. It could perhaps be called an equivalent to the spectral sensitivity of the b/w film I chose when I took the picture.

In the darkroom, it would be similar to enlarging a color negative via a color head onto panchromatic paper, but I've never done that.
posted by Jack Karaoke at 4:02 PM on October 17, 2005

I get a sore head with all that iso and aperture and developing stuff .
Theres nothing quite like taking some real good photos and having dust out of the drying cupboard , water stains from the tank or scratches from the enlarger ....it really is wonderful , lets get honest here and just admit film is a load of bollocks with jargon and a load of idiotic little rituals (shaking the developing tank 6 times a minute anyone ?) designed to keep people away from photography.
posted by sgt.serenity at 4:03 PM on October 17, 2005

Many thanks for the link. As a photographer, I'm about to go from using small format digital to medium format mono as a bit of an experiment. Duly bookmarked. And Stunt is certainly right about the dynamic range; in that respect film continues to hold a lot more information. Even the Mamiya 645 AFD with a 22 megapixel Leaf Aptus back only has about 12 f-stops.

OT: "photographers who just grayscale a digital camera image... ugh." Indeed. Keep your colour information: add a colour balance layer. Then add a Hue/Saturation layer. By reducing the saturation to zero, you can then go back to your colour balance layer and see how it affects the resulting image.
posted by Kiell at 4:11 PM on October 17, 2005

"the channel mixer has nothing to do with filters on my enlargment"

Well, no... It is the equivalent of holding a coloured filter in front of the lens at the time of capture, really. See it as retrospective application of filters.

Or summat.

No discussion from my side, though - black and white has a special place in my heart. ISO 25 black and white film, combined with a set of sharp lenses? Oh, yeah - any time.
posted by SharQ at 4:17 PM on October 17, 2005

sgt.serenity, if you think about film in terms of how much information it contains, you'll quickly realise that it's much more efficient than digital, even if it is quite a hassle to develop from start to finish. It's not like there's a conspiracy to keep automatic developing and processing machines under wraps - go to any CVS and see if their method is "designed to keep people away from photography."
posted by odinsdream at 4:18 PM on October 17, 2005

lets get honest here and just admit film is a load of bollocks with jargon and a load of idiotic little rituals (shaking the developing tank 6 times a minute anyone ?) designed to keep people away from photography.

I hope you're kidding. There might be some ritual involved, but that's to add a bit of control into a relatively unpredictable medium. Digital is much easier than film, just as film is much easier than say, the wet collodion process. While the accessibility of digital has already changed photography, there's no denying the depth and beauty of film that no megapixel can reproduce.
posted by still at 4:33 PM on October 17, 2005

I just sold my (staggeringly expensive) Canon 1Ds digital body and went back to film. A pair of Fuji 6x9 rangefinders and a Linhof Technika 4x5. The results are still orders of magnitude better than digital.
posted by unSane at 4:55 PM on October 17, 2005

Sorry, Luddites, but digital is here to stay. I've got four high-end 35mm cameras and all they do anymore is occupy time in a drawer. Even Kodak is concentrating their time on digital and has abandoned any further improvements in film.

Yes, Tri-X and D-76 was fun 30 years ago, but those days are over.
posted by skeeter1 at 5:51 PM on October 17, 2005

lets get honest here and just admit film is a load of bollocks with jargon and a load of idiotic little rituals (shaking the developing tank 6 times a minute anyone ?) designed to keep people away from photography.

Try altering the pattern of agitation and see what happens. With appropriate test shots, you'll discover that it actually matters and is not just an 'idiotic ritual'.

Even Kodak is concentrating their time on digital and has abandoned any further improvements in film.

But this says nothing about the advantages of film vs. digital -- only about where Kodak expects to need to spend money in order to make money. Their profits still come largely from film. For now.
posted by Slothrup at 6:02 PM on October 17, 2005

This is cool. There's no correction for water temps, tho.

I shot a ton of b+w years ago, and it was great fun. Mainly Ilford FP4 and HP5 and I'd often push the HP5 to 1600. The whole technical jiggery-pokery recipe dev stuff was part of the fun, I thought.
posted by carter at 6:26 PM on October 17, 2005

What a great resource. I am not very adventurous regarding film choice, but I'll keep this in mind if I ever get crazy and feel like trying new things. I enjoy the developing ritual because it means my obsessive attention to detail is actually a good thing -- of course, I have ridiculous little superstitions that needlessly complicate things, too.

When I smell developing chemicals it's 50% "eww, chemicals" and 50% "YAY!" I like having a... tactile? process. Digital is just too removed for me to get into, though I've certainly seen nice digital results.
posted by Marit at 7:48 PM on October 17, 2005

For anyone who is sick of the complexity of developing your own B&W at home, might I recommend Diafine developer.

Advantages:

any temperature between 70 degrees F and 85 degrees F

Development time makes no difference provided the film gets at least three minutes in each bath

Films of different speeds can be developed together in the same tank at the same time

last almost forever, and can be continually reused

posted by splatta at 8:06 PM on October 17, 2005

oop, sorry forgot to mention it's not good if you routinely push/pull your film.
posted by splatta at 8:06 PM on October 17, 2005

lets get honest here and just admit film is a load of bollocks with jargon and a load of idiotic little rituals (shaking the developing tank 6 times a minute anyone ?) designed to keep people away from photography.

Wow, that is seriously retarded. You wanna talk some jargon? How about "Which RAW converter is best?" or "Which is the best way to do curves, in LAB color or in RGB?" or "Is it better to sharpen once at the end of your workflow or several times during your process?" or "Man, I can't wait to spend another 500 bucks on top of my printer cost for custom profiles for each paper I need so that I can actually get my output to look like my monitor". If that doesn't scare people away from photography, dust in your drying cabinet surely won't.

There is JUST as much complexity, if not more, in digital, and just as much to go wrong and f up, as in film. And I'll take a medium format film print over any digital output, any day of the week.
posted by spicynuts at 8:13 PM on October 17, 2005

spicynuts, yes!

I just went back and took a look at some slides I shot with a medium format camera a few months ago and I'm completely blown away by the high-quality, color and detail. Digital is many years away from that kind of reproduction quality.

I say all this as an ex digital photographer (not really voluntary, I lost my camera) who's exclusively film now. It's much much more time-consuming, and the gratification isn't as immediate, but I like having to work at something I love, and I find that I appreciate the photos a little bit more. It's not so easy to discard photos as it was with that little trash icon on the camera.
posted by splatta at 8:39 PM on October 17, 2005

the gratification isn't as immediate, but I like having to work at something I love, and I find that I appreciate the photos a little bit more

I totally agree, and there is something to be said for making a picture come to life using various tools in the real world, rather than just clicking and dragging with a mouse.

I feel that when developing film I have shot and enlarging the good stuff, discriminating between which shots to develop, and working with it from start to finish, I end up having a stronger sense of ownership of my work. The end product is something that is the result of doing some work and getting my hands dirty. I am forced to be far more picky because time is a factor, as opposed to digital where I can arbitrarily point and shoot at anything with almost no cost to my time (which is a great advantage, admittedly). There is more of a craft there, I think.
posted by tweak at 10:21 PM on October 17, 2005

more of a craft working with real film
posted by tweak at 10:21 PM on October 17, 2005

I've devolped plenty of E4 and E6 Ektachrome and Fujichrome, and lord knows what chemicals I was flushing down the drain.

I'm a digital convert. A friend publishes a magazine [www.ealonline.com] and has largely switched from a 6x6 Hasselblad to a 6.2 megapix Canon, and once it goes through printing, I can't tell the difference.
posted by skeeter1 at 12:17 AM on October 18, 2005

skeeter1: In terms of sharpness and contrast, there probably isn't a great deal of difference. A 6.2 megapixel camera will produce images that will enlarge acceptably to give prints of around A3 size. For magazine purposes, this is more than sufficient.

Medium format 6x6 uses 3 to 4 times as much film surface as 35mm (which the 6.2 megapixel is replicating) and will print much, much larger. To gain digital results that replicate medium format, you currently have to spend in excess of £10,000 for a full set up.

The idiosyncrasies of film will always be much loved by those who have used it. I now use both - film to give shots a distinctive feel and, shortly, in my medium format work; and digital to speed up my work flow and increase flexibility when shooting.

One of the biggest criticisms that digital receives is that it robs a photographer of style as distinctiveness of various film types is forgotten and the homogeneity of digital increases.
posted by Kiell at 1:13 AM on October 18, 2005

ok ok , i'm bitter , i did some landscapes in hp5 and then panf , about 360 shots , going back , waiting for the clouds , the light , the whole thing over four weeks and then coming back and seeing all these blobs and scratches ...(you can still see a mark in the top right corner of this photo and the original is here) its true when i got one right in the darkroom i got a real buzz out of it , its bloody hard to get into for this clumsy guy though , i had to ask my tutor to let me scan the images in the end and have them printed digitally as i was pretty stressed out with the unfamiliarity of making a film print.
You can have tons of different styles with a digital camera , you can use low tech and high tech cameras much like different types of film.
I've just started using med format bronicas in the studio we have , i've got the roll of film still here , i know some of the shots are good but i'm wary of developing it myself and i don't see the point of a medium that makes you feel intimidated to use it.
posted by sgt.serenity at 3:01 AM on October 18, 2005

EVERY medium should make you feel intimidated to use it, creating art is hard!

It wouldn't be special if you didn't have to get over a few things to use it, if it was accessible we'd all be Ansel Adams.
posted by splatta at 5:54 AM on October 18, 2005

creating art is hard!

Tell it to the punks, baby.
posted by sgt.serenity at 6:02 AM on October 18, 2005

wait, are you saying that the art of punk music isn't hard? Sure it's three chords, but you have to spend like five hours in mom's bathroom soaping up the liberty spikes, also, tattoos hurt, you gotta work on that sneer like 20 minutes a day in front of a mirror, gotta get that attitude just right
posted by splatta at 8:17 AM on October 18, 2005

its the anyone can do it ethos that i like about punkand i like the availablilty and ease of use of digital cameras , i'm quite looking forward to a visual revolution , digital cameras are the new rock and roll quite frankly.
ease of use , no pharisees blockin the temple entrance and as for things all lookin the same , thats true of film too , the some boring tonality , sunsets , landscapes , the pristine , artificial cleanliness of a 'well produced' photograph.........they bring to mind the prog rock dinosaurs of the seventies........the greatest hits of huey lewis and the news and the worst of celine dion.
Well , all that sneering snuff isnt really punk , is it ? You're looking at the caricature rather than the archetype my dear friend.
I'm wondering when someone is going to post a link to the latest washing times of zanussi's latest spin dryer and what kind of soap powder we should be using to get that piece of clothing exactly right.
posted by sgt.serenity at 9:33 AM on October 18, 2005

It is not that extensive really, and only contains the common info which is rarely why you need a look up table. When you are stuck with some strange developer or can not get the temp right, or need to push the film 2 stops, that is when you need help. I've been compiling something like this for the past year but it is a lot of typing. The massivedevchart remains the place to look for real info, but the times lack provenance which is another issue. At least the MDC shows PMK Pyro.
posted by polaroid at 10:15 AM on October 18, 2005

Eh, I don't really agree with you there, splatta. I know quite a few photographers who use all the confusing photo-talk to act elitist and sort of scare others away from that path. In my opinion art should be VERY accessible. If everyone could do it, there we'd just have more art, and that's never a bad thing.

Besides, just because someone can do it doesn't mean they can do it well. There are tons of photographers who know what they're doing, and they certainly aren't all Ansel Adams. There are plenty of painters in the world, but every now and then one does something to stand out. I feel photography is the same; with a bit of practice anyone can learn how to point a camera at something and take a technically good photo, but being a good photographer is more than that.

A camera is just a tool, analog or digital, it's not knowing how to use it that makes you special, it's what you do with it.
posted by Stunt at 10:34 AM on October 18, 2005

Two things are being confused here: the ability to take a technically good photograph and the production of art. Digital makes photography more accessible to some, but it does not make art "easier".

Those who are currently taking up digital photography and getting pleasing results with their home snaps were never denied access to photography because of the technical challenges presented by developing and printing. High street labs have been doing a sterling trade for many years.

ease of use , no pharisees blockin the temple entrance and as for things all lookin the same , thats true of film too , the some boring tonality , sunsets , landscapes , the pristine , artificial cleanliness of a 'well produced' photograph...

I'd have to to agree with Stunt. On Sunday afternoon I randomly bumped into Diego Ferrari snapping away with his modified disposable camera. Very punk - and on film.
posted by Kiell at 1:31 PM on October 18, 2005

Stunt, well put. Thank you for giving your opinion, I agree.

In my own personal experience, starting out towards creating something with a new medium has always intimidated me, no matter how accessible it was. I can't tell you how intimidated I get to this day when I'm holding a pencil over a blank sheet of paper. FOWP.

I guess my statement of "creating art is hard" comes from those experiences.
posted by splatta at 2:37 PM on October 18, 2005

were never denied access to photography because of the technical challenges presented by developing and printing. High street labs have been doing a sterling trade for many years.

slr's used to be jolly expensive you know , and the cost of processing is actually rather high , i think we're talking about 8 quid a go for film plus processing here , if you're on a low income , thats a pretty expensive way to find out your mistakes.

anyway , it's true that anything new is pretty hard and challenging creative wise , even the pencil and paper.
posted by sgt.serenity at 3:52 PM on October 18, 2005

I don't know that the gargoyles guard the film temples, I think they guard the "art" temples. Kodak didn't become the company it is by adopting an elitist attitude, in fact they've often marketed their materials as being easier to use and more foolproof than they actually are. (1890s Kodak ads, 1970s Kodak ad) Seems to me, most snobbery found in photography is either inherited from the art world, or a result of technical obsession. Both of these wil continue to be present in the digital medium.
The most exciting aspect of digital to me.. is the general movement towards a critical mass of photos and display options that will subvert ideologies before they have a chance to take root.

"No plastic expression can ever be more than a residue of an experience. The recognition of an image that has tragically survived an experience, recalling the event more or less clearly, like the undisturbed ashes of an object consumed by flames, the recognition of this object so little representative and so fragile, and its simple identification on the part of the spetator with a similar personal experience, precludes all psycho-analytical classification or assimiliation into an arbitrary decorative system." - Man Ray, The Age of Light
posted by Jack Karaoke at 9:26 PM on October 18, 2005

sgt.serenity: SLR cameras haven't suddenly become cheap with the arrival of digital, though. The top of the range Nikons and Canons are still very expensive, just as they were 20 years ago. Pro-sumer and consumer models haven't changed much in price either. If anything, the arrival of digital has made film more accessible - I can now buy medium format film equipment at a fraction of the price.

In the commercial sector, it is being found that whilst shooting on digital is easier, it isn't proving to be much cheaper. The time and money spent in post production, touching up images and making them distinctive, is balancing out the fact that film has been removed from the process.
posted by Kiell at 12:45 AM on October 19, 2005