Besides dynamic range, that’s a real stretch to say color negative film is more flexible. That sort of film arguably does a better job of preserving highlights, but I don’t see a plausible argument for any other aspect being better. Just getting the white balance right alone…
In the end, it's about faithfully recording which parts of the site got hit by photons. Digital sensors do that more accurately than any practically-sized strips of plastic with silver grains on them do. Both in terms of location (resolution) and amount (dynamic range).
It's true film handles blown highlights better, but not that much better, and digital handles underexposed shadows significantly better.
Which is quite subjective. I would say that a Mamiya 7, Fujichrome and drum scans easily match today's digital medium format. And I would say that 120 film is 'practically-sized.
4x5 transparency, good lenses and drum scanning is still unmatched in terms of overall image quality.
But there is at least one: the resolution of 4x5 film easily exceeds any commercially available digital sensor, with pretty much any halfway decent lens.
Digital sensors also require collimated light, so digital lenses correct for this, where film can produce a sharp image from simpler lenses.
Additionally, I personally prefer the colour reproduction of film.
Theoretically perhaps, but you have to look at the whole imaging system (including the inevitable loss from scanning or optical printing in the case of film). Even five or ten years ago the best digital systems were able to capture about as much detail as you could realistically squeeze out of a 4x5 negative. If you disagree, I'd be interested to see some comparison shots backing this up. I shoot 4x5 as a hobby, but I've long ago given up any illusion that it has practical resolution benefits over the best digital equipment.
It's also worth mentioning that for realistic large format photography, accurate focus and camera shake start to become significant limiting factors. The actual experience of using a 4x5 camera (outdoors at least) tends to consist of taking your best guess at accurate focus while squinting at a dim ground glass through a loupe, and then hoping that you triggered the shutter at the precise moment when the wind stopped blowing.
Finally, one has to take diffraction into account. Typical apertures for 4x5 landscape photography are around f22-32. A good chunk of the theoretical resolving ability of the film and lens is lost once you're stopped down to that extent.
Agree 100%.
To match actual resolution of something like a PhaseOne 150mp sensor with 4x5 film, you need to be getting ~55lpm on film. Which is not difficult with decent lenses at working apertures.
Scanning the resulting negative or transparency at that res (~2800ppi) without any loss is also not difficult with a drum scanner. Not everyone has a drum scanner, sure, but then the comparison is between digital sensors and consumer scanners, not sensors and film.
I've measured image detail on drum scans of 6x9 Tri-X negatives I shot handheld, and as far as I can tell 40lpm was the lower bound of detail. So, I'm confident I could produce as 4x5 colour neg/transparency that exceeds any PhaseOne sensor in terms of resolution.
I read so many posts online extolling the theoretical resolution of large format film, but these are almost never accompanied by actual comparison shots. I really think you might change you perspective on this if you tried using a 4x5 camera in realistic conditions (which it seems you have not?)
You can google for real world comparisons of 4x5 film and high res digital backs. There are very few such comparisons actually made, for all the confident pronouncements one can read in forums. Even 5-10 years ago, the resolution advantages of 4x5 were marginal at best in comparison to 50MP digital sensors.
https://luminous-landscape.com/iq180-vs-8x10/
https://petapixel.com/2020/03/19/8x10-film-vs-150mp-digital-...
Given these results on 8x10, it seems highly unlikely to me that 4x5 film could offer any significant advantage over a 150MP digital sensor in practice.
Overview - https://www.onlandscape.co.uk/2011/12/large-format-vs-digita... Test Chart Image - https://www.onlandscape.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/mir...
Comparing the 4x5 Provia & IQ180, the digital sensor detail degrades into a blue and yellow maze of perpendicular artefacts as the lines converge, where the film degrades more gracefully (in my opinion). The digital image (in this test) appears to produce an image that is not faithful.
It's reasonable to suggest that the graceful loss of detail on film offers a not-trivial advantage in high-contrast detailed scenes (especially high-resolution black and white films). In overcast low-contrast scenes digital clearly produces better detail.
Perhaps this maze-like tendency of some digital sensors is why people look at their film and think it's sharper or provides more detail.
It would be interesting to see a test of current 150mp sensors, perhaps this has been corrected and the advantage disappears, but maybe digital artefacts like the blue-yellow maze are just moved further right.
Yes, I suppose you're likely right. And like I said my opinion probably isn't worth much.
At the end of the day they're just different, and have a lot or nothing to do with each other depending on how you frame things.