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Haselsh1
29-06-2009, 15:51
You know, I’d like to understand why it is that apparently everyone has this belief that the latest technology is always the best technology. I do understand why new technology comes about as I spent twenty seven years working in the science industry so I grasp the basics that new technology is invented as it becomes available through progress but I just cannot grasp this common belief that it therefore has to be the best.

I can see and hear with my own eyes and ears that there is still a demand for vinyl and its associated playing equipment. I can also see that there is still a demand for large format cameras and sheets of film that have to be processed in dishes and drums. I just don’t understand the apparent misnomer that because a new device is digital it is therefore the best. Where does this nonsense actually come from…?

Digital cameras have a ridiculously small latitude with which to allow over and under exposure of areas such as the sky and therefore tend to burn out large areas of sky. Colour slide film, known for a small and limited exposure latitude responds much better to areas of sky. Black and white film like Ilford FP4+ has around six stops of error compensation so how come digital is so superior…?

CD has now been around for twenty six years and is still the butt of jokes and complaints. If it were so superior, surely everyone would be only to happy with it and would not be looking back to older technologies…? It is a truth that these older technologies produce a more acceptable sound to most ears as this is borne out on forums such as this one so, once again, who says digital is so superior…?

DSJR
29-06-2009, 16:01
Apologies in advance, but the whole problem with good digital isn't that it's *digital,* it's that it potentially opens the window wider to fugg up the music production.

Studios today seem to have millions of production tricks up their sleeves compared to thirty years or more ago. I bet that if someone who knew what they were doing used a good 1970's mixer and a digital recording system with no "add-ons" the sound would be amazing, the sound only limited by the mixing desk used. Likewise, if the current digital recorded system was replaced by a multi-track analogue machine, but all the limiters etc were retained, I suspect the sound would be worse than it currently is - and that aint good IMO!!!

Good digital is stunning and 24 bit mastering seems to allow some carefull tweaking in the digital domain (thus avoiding phase-shifts and other analogue nasties) with no audible ill-effects if this is done right. Good analogue can also be stunning, but calls for a simpler and very different approach. It's not the tools, it's the chap(ess) who's using them and the current numpties that seem to work in the industry just do what the bigger idiots in the record companies tell them. THAT's the problem IMO....

Haselsh1
29-06-2009, 16:08
DSJR, I am very quickly gaining the opinion that there is no better or worse merely different. Each technology has its particular merit or merits but they are inherently different. Not good, not bad, different...!!!

Beechwoods
29-06-2009, 20:02
I think that one of the benefits of new technology applied to the areas of audio/video reproduction are to minimise the inconsistencies seen in earlier analogue technologies...


Digital cameras remove the hit and miss technical elements that often caused Joe Public to ruin a shot.
Compact Disc is less susceptible to problems with media damaged or dirty through handling, and the sound per pound value versus modern mass produced turntables at the same (or twice!) the price of an entry level CDP is very obviously weighted in CD's favour (I'm thinking of those horrible USB turntables). Second hand you can obviously find some giant-killers for not much money, but convenience is king these days, and who wants to be worrying about plinths and arms and cartridge compliance!
There's no contest between Blueray and VHS, but DVD and S-VHS? It's the convenience and reliability thing again - a disc that never gets 'eaten' by the player and doesn't get worn out by repeated playings? S-VHS has a nicer picture than DVD (with all it's jaggies) but like Elcaset, S-VHS was VHS's last gasp.

The gap between basic good performance and the high-end has been narrowed by a lot of these technologies, but the High-End hasn't necessarily moved out as well - in some cases the High-End moved Lower - think Cassette versus Reel To Reel.

DSJR
29-06-2009, 20:10
I thought the "jaggies" was a TV/monitor problem and apparently, the up-sampling style DVD players seem to improve dramatically on a standard DVD player (whatever that may be...)

A writer friend of mine (who wrote the respected eighties "Robin of Sherwood" series) used a form of super-16mm film to shoot it. It was so effective that people who know about these things thought it was 35mm apparently. There's a "quality" to film over videotape that has nothing to do with analogue/digits - it's the style of presentation apparently.

There was a TV prog about Linda McCartney's photography over the weekend. I know nothing about taking photos (you lot must have gathered that by now) but having seen the scenes she shot and the moody B&W prints made from the shots, the effect was superb IMO, although nothing like the actual scene as captured by the lens.

All my opinion, but I hope I'm sort of in the right direction..

Marco
29-06-2009, 20:21
Hi Nick,

I'm with you 100%, but this:


...convenience is king these days, and who wants to be worrying about plinths and arms and cartridge compliance!


...is the root cause of so much that is wrong now with hi-fi *AND* MORE THINGS IN LIFE THAN I CARE TO MENTION!! :)

The general public needs to get back to basics and start caring again about genuine quality, placing it well above convenience as their No1 priority, before this dumbed-down, bastardised society we live in today changes for the better...

Marco.

Haselsh1
29-06-2009, 20:25
In photography I use multiple technologies. The final artwork I produce bears little resemblance to the negative as that very negative is scanned and then worked on in Photoshop. Why bother you may ask...? Unlike CD, a negative scanner captures the very essence of the film, the sharpness, the grain and the depth and then maintains these right through to printing onto cotton fibre art paper. All of the aspects of an analogue print are captured here but the digitally produced print is still not as good as a true vintage 'darkroom' print.

When CD was first released it was hailed as an exact copy of the master tape. Clearly this is simply not true as there are too many variables as we now know. This still brings me back to parallel technologies. There is probably no right or wrong. There is though, different.

Beechwoods
29-06-2009, 20:25
A writer friend of mine (who wrote the respected eighties "Robin of Sherwood" series)

You know Richard Carpenter? :respect: That series was superb, never beaten IMO and introduced me to Clannad. Nice one!

And I know exactly where you're coming from re. Linda Eastman / McCartney's photography. Photography is something everyone can do, but it definitely takes an artist to do it well...

Haselsh1
29-06-2009, 20:26
Hi Nick,

I'm with you 100%, but this:



...is the root cause of so much that is wrong now with hi-fi *AND* MORE THINGS IN LIFE THAN I CARE TO MENTION!! :)

The general public needs to get back to basics and start caring again about genuine quality, placing it well above convenience as their No1 priority, before this dumbed-down, bastardised society we live in today changes for the better...

Marco.


Very well stated...!!!

Haselsh1
29-06-2009, 20:28
You know Richard Carpenter :respect: That series was superb, never beaten IMO and introduced me to Clannad. Nice one!

And I know exactly where you're coming from re. Linda Eastman / McCartney's photography. Photography is something everyone can do, but it definitely takes an artist to do it well...


I like that statement and yes, Robin of Sherwood was superb and has never been beaten. Just how the hell could it be beaten by this present sh**e...!!!

niklasthedolphin
29-06-2009, 20:46
There is no problem in letting digital and analog exist side by side no matter if we talk music or photo.

But these described superiorities of analog compared to digital is only revealed on the very best equipment and the quality of the media played or the technical in the photos shown should also be taken into consideration.
And then theres the art factor....................

But Open Reel is superior within reproduction of music and a huge format analog bench camera would probably do the best job (unless the photos are action).

I'll stick to my R2R.
But I will be happily content with my K20D dSLR.

"dolph"

Marco
29-06-2009, 21:00
Very well stated...!!!

Shaun, we've become very superficial in our thinking and judgement of quality, and as such, standards have fallen in all aspects of life.

It's a major bugbear of mine. Don't get me started, for example, on the lack of food culture in this country compared to the standards shown here in France, Italy, Germany (I could go on)...

We're satisfied with downright pish (as they say it in Glasgow) in many areas of our existance - gluttons for mediocrity!

Marco.

Haselsh1
29-06-2009, 21:16
We're satisfied with downright pish (as they say it in Glasgow) in many areas of our existence - gluttons for mediocrity!

Marco.


MEDIOCRITY... How I love that word...!!! It so sums up 2009...!!!