DIGITAL IMAGING

- IT IS NOT THAT SIMPLE - AND EVEN HARDER!!!

From Kevin Craske (CRC Technical Adviser)

Last issue I queried terminology and introduced the terms 'chemical image' and also looked at the projection of images.  Lets now look at the production of the image itself.

 

The image which I wish to convey is a simple caption.  If I obtain a piece of paper, draw on it the suitable caption and photograph it then there is no argument.  If I 'draw' the caption on a computer and print it out and subsequently photograph it to produce a caption I would hold that the result still comes under the definition of a photograph and not a digital image although we have introduced a digital element. Now progress, and instead if photographic a piece of paper we could photograph the screen.

 

We are now getting complicated as the image has not existed as a tangible piece of copy but the end result is that we have a photographic image.  The final step.  Do not display the result on a screen but have a 'writer' put the image directly on to a 35mm slide.  No light, just digits places directly on a piece of acetate.  The same artistic content was put in at the from end, the end result viewed in the same way - but is it photography?

 

So we must conclude that photography must include an artistic element and a piece of hardware which we now have to define as being of a 'photographic' nature.  Perhaps we leave it to the next issue to define a 'camera' and still leave the definition of 'artistic' to an even later issue.

CHROME-SIX 3+ KIT

From George Sparkes (Area 22)

There has been some discussion lately between members of

Area 22 on the use of the above three bath kit, some members doubting the quality which can be obtained. I have been sent photocopies of pages from magazines by Reg Ricketts and Neil Souch ARPS on the use of this_ kit. 

The Paterson Photax Group have been manufacturing this product for eight months and they estimate that over 850,000 films have been processed in this chemistry. The kits range from 600ml to 15 litres, I the latter being used by professionals, where there has been enthusiastic acceptance. 

A Provia film was exposed under controlled studio lighting and was then cut in half. One half was processed in the Chrome-Six 3+ kit and the other in standard 7-bath chemistry. The films were then subjected to very comprehensive tests involving control strips and a densitometer and the readings fed into a computer. The D-Max and overall density was identical in the two processes, confirming that Chrome-Six 3+ equals the quality of the full commercial 7-bath process. Manual processing machines or hand tanks can achieve equal results     but it is essential that that the instructions supplied with   the kit are firmly adhered to.