Hello & a few questions from a complete beginner

[Where-Madness-Lies]

Hello,

I'm a new member here and also new to film photography. I've done a bit of digital photography in the past but nothing very serious at all. I have a couple of questions that I hope you wont mind me asking on here.

Recently I've been able to make use of my fathers old Canon EOS 650 (with a 50mm lens) and I've thoroughly enjoyed getting through one film of Kodak Gold and Kodak Colour Plus in full auto mode.

Firstly, I would like to be able to do all of my photography in manual mode so I can understand and learn how to do it properly. Are there any online guides or learning resources that anyone would recommend to a complete beginner?

Secondly, I need to get my film developed but I don't particularly want prints done. From looking around it seems that many companies offer a scanning service. I assume its common practice to have your negatives returned to you? It doesn't seem to make it clear on many websites (for example https://www.ag-photolab.co.uk/c41-process-only-35mm120220-optional-scan-463-p.asp)

Many Thanks,

WML

 

[Ben johns]

There’s a lot of stuff on YouTube about using a camera fully manually. I can’t really comment about the best way to learn on film as I learnt in digital, I was able to see the effects of what I was doing as I did it. The problem with learning on film is you could make a mistake and you wouldn’t know about It for a week or so. Having said that using a film camera on manual means you only have to worry about the shutter speed and the aperture, the iso is set when you put the film in

All labs that develop film will send the negatives back to you, they are yours at the end of the day.

 

[Harlequin565]

Hi there, welcome to TP!

Regarding your 2nd point, places like AG Photographic & Filmdev do return your negs. If it's another place, just give them a ring and ask. It's an analogue thing to do, and probably not an unusual question. Both AG and Filmdev will send you a link to download your images if you pay for the scan option. Your negatives arrive a couple of days later (pre-COVID).

As to the first point, having an understanding of aperture and shutter speed (ISO is fixed* with film!) will help a lot. Going fully manual though is not really "doing it properly". Having the understanding is the first step. Controlling your camera to make it do what you want is the second (and often more difficult!) step. Fully manual is just one tool.

These 2 videos are excellent simple introductions into what Aperture and shutter speed are. Oddly, Nick Carver is primarily a film photographer but these videos are aimed at digital users. Principles are the same... Skip forward a bit to miss his "these are sameples for my online course" bit if you're not interested.

Link to Shutter Speed
Link to Aperture

Once you've got your head round what they mean, it's about understanding how your camera controls them. Downloading the manual for your camera would be a great start. If you don't have it, you can get it here.

That's your starter for ten from me. Others will chime in I'm sure. Good luck with your film journey and feel free to post your images here to share!

*mostly...

 

[ancient_mariner]

Firstly, I would like to be able to do all of my photography in manual mode so I can understand and learn how to do it properly. Are there any online guides or learning resources that anyone would recommend to a complete beginner?

Welcome to the forum.

It's probably worth saying that there is no virtue and no magic to using manual mode, and because of the delay between taking pictures and getting to see the images there's a strong chance that you'll learn little while generating fewer good images.

As Ian says above " As to the first point, having an understanding of aperture and shutter speed (ISO is fixed* with film!) will help a lot. Going fully manual though is not really "doing it properly". Having the understanding is the first step. Controlling your camera to make it do what you want is the second (and often more difficult!) step. Fully manual is just one tool. "

Most of us use a semi-automated mode most of the time. Typically use aperture priority to control depth of field of focus around our subject, or use shutter priority to ensure the shutter speed is suitable to control subject or camera movement in the way we want. Also unless you have a separate light meter then you'll be relying on the one built into the camera anyway, so much of the time there's no reason not to let it twiddle the settings for you.

The time to use manual is when an auto setting will result in an exposure different to what you think the picture needs, and that's usually when the situation will fool the meter in the camera. Examples? Photographing a bird against a bright sky, taking pictures in snowy or other reflective conditions, photographing a spot-lit subject in otherwise dark conditions etc. Then you should set the camera manually to give the required exposure whatever the meter thinks. However if conditions are changing quickly then you had better keep an eye on light levels.

FWIW today I took out my Minolta 7000 (a camera from the same era as that EOS 650 - one of the guys at work bought the EOS while I owned this minolta) today for the first time in probably 15 years. Only ran off a few frames, so it will be a while before I get to see the pictures.

 

[excalibur2]

Hi WML
For an average scene on manual surely your camera will show, in the vew finder, aperture and shutter speed for an average scene.. the problem you have with the camera meter is it can be fooled. On tv there was a program about places in Greece and the streets were full of white houses (well every building elsewhere was painted white as well) . Simple way out would be to take an exposure of the grey footpath or road and transfer the readings, in your viewfinder, to your camera.
But luckily most shots are of average scenes, but I thought I'd mention it in case you go to somewhere exotic after lockdown
Many of the guys here send films to filmdev prices start at £4 for colour including scan and the JPGs you have to download, also you can select an index which is included with the negs that they post back to you.
enjoy

 

[Where-Madness-Lies]

Thanks for the hints, tips and information chaps.

I can’t really comment about the best way to learn on film as I learnt in digital, I was able to see the effects of what I was doing as I did it.

This is a good point that hadn't even crossed my mind. I'll dig out my old camera and give that a go.

I'll get my films off to be developed, hopefully they'll come out OK.

 

[Ben johns]

Thanks for the hints, tips and information chaps.



This is a good point that hadn't even crossed my mind. I'll dig out my old camera and give that a go.

I'll get my films off to be developed, hopefully they'll come out OK.

Using film definitely made me a better photographer because it made me choose my shots. You only get so many per roll and it costs money so you have to be selective and not just click away. But I don’t think it’s the best way to learn how to use a camera. Especially if your not developing it yourself. I prefer it to digital most of the time now though

 

[Andysnap]

At a very basic level the first thing to understand is the exposure triangle and how changing one aspect affects the other two. The link below gives a good explanation of it.

The Exposure Triangle - A Beginner's Guide

photographylife.com

My advice is don't be disappointed or discouraged if you images aren't what you expected. There is a learning curve and it can be quite steep. Also, the equipment you use does affect the final result, a cheap, old 35mm camera will not produce the technically good images that say an expensive Leica with a very expensive Leica lens will. However the cheap old camera can produce interesting shots that you may find better than the Leica ones.
It is a slippery slope, I was given a Nikon f301 about 10 years ago and now I have dozens of cameras and shoot mainly medium and large format....help me, please....

 

[excalibur2]

For trickly shots it's worth watching this

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34VKMyp6sGU

All of it is interesting but the exposure bit is about 3/4 of the way through...nothing changes much as I've been doing what he was showing for about 50 years
Imagine what the pioneers of photography went through for exposure, each one must have had different notes for their shots.

 

[Mr Badger]

Thanks for the hints, tips and information chaps.

This is a good point that hadn't even crossed my mind. I'll dig out my old camera and give that a go.

I'll get my films off to be developed, hopefully they'll come out OK.

If using a digital camera to see what an image might look like before taking a film shot, then be sure to change the settings so the ISO not on 'Auto' and is set to the same ISO as the film you're using. Otherwise, your digital camera may well change the ISO to correct the exposure if it decides this is necessary, so you won't get a true exposure comparison.

This sounds complicated, but it isn't. With a film camera, the ISO is determined by the film (we'll ignore pushing or pulling the film's ISO for now, as you can lean about that once you've mastered the basics!). Put in a 100 ISO film, and the camera needs to be set to 100 ISO (most 'high spec' modern film cameras usually do this automatically via the bar coding on the film canister, but it's always worth checking the ISO is set correctly!).

With a digital camera set to 'Auto' ISO, if the shutter speed and aperture are set manually by the photographer, the camera will change the ISO if its metering system detects that over or under exposure is going to occur (on full auto exposure or shutter or aperture priority, it will also change the ISO to give what it thinks will be the best looking results). With a film camera, the ISO is set/fixed and won't change, so you'll end up with an over or under exposed photo if your combination of shutter and aperture setting is wrong for the lighting conditions!

Changing the setting on a digital camera from Auto to manual (fixed) ISO will stop this happening and make it behave in a similar way to the film camera... but don't forget to change it back to Auto ISO once you've finished with it! Having a third 'escape route' for exposure can make the difference between getting a photo and missing it! That's one of the advantages digital cameras have. That's also one of the reasons you have to think what you're doing a bit more when using film.

 

[Where-Madness-Lies]

If using a digital camera to see what an image might look like before taking a film shot, then be sure to change the settings so the ISO not on 'Auto' and is set to the same ISO as the film you're using. Otherwise, your digital camera may well change the ISO to correct the exposure if it decides this is necessary, so you won't get a true exposure comparison.

This sounds complicated, but it isn't. With a film camera, the ISO is determined by the film (we'll ignore pushing or pulling the film's ISO for now, as you can lean about that once you've mastered the basics!). Put in a 100 ISO film, and the camera needs to be set to 100 ISO (most 'high spec' modern film cameras usually do this automatically via the bar coding on the film canister, but it's always worth checking the ISO is set correctly!).

With a digital camera set to 'Auto' ISO, if the shutter speed and aperture are set manually by the photographer, the camera will change the ISO if its metering system detects that over or under exposure is going to occur (on full auto exposure or shutter or aperture priority, it will also change the ISO to give what it thinks will be the best looking results). With a film camera, the ISO is set/fixed and won't change, so you'll end up with an over or under exposed photo if your combination of shutter and aperture setting is wrong for the lighting conditions!

Changing the setting on a digital camera from Auto to manual (fixed) ISO will stop this happening and make it behave in a similar way to the film camera... but don't forget to change it back to Auto ISO once you've finished with it! Having a third 'escape route' for exposure can make the difference between getting a photo and missing it! That's one of the advantages digital cameras have. That's also one of the reasons you have to think what you're doing a bit more when using film.

Thanks for the tips, I was playing around with the digital camera this lunchtime and could see the difference when I changed the ISO, shutter speed and aperture. I've watched the videos that @Harlequin565 kindly linked and all of the information made sense to me. Just got to learn now to how to utilise shutter speed and aperture measurements to my advantage with the fixed ISO of the film.

 

[ChrisR]

... Also, the equipment you use does affect the final result, a cheap, old 35mm camera will not produce the technically good images that say an expensive Leica with a very expensive Leica lens will. However the cheap old camera can produce interesting shots that you may find better than the Leica ones.
It is a slippery slope, I was given a Nikon f301 about 10 years ago and now I have dozens of cameras and shoot mainly medium and large format....help me, please....

While technically you're right in the first para, Andy, you and others have demonstrated that in film photography there are many, many low cost cameras that produce really cracking shots that (almost) anyone would be proud of. Leaving Leica aside, there are many once-Pro cameras available for under £100...

 

[Where-Madness-Lies]

So I received my first two film scans back from FilmDev today. Very quick turn around by them, super impressed.

I'm fairly happy with how some of my shots turned out but most of them are not straight or flat (I can post some up if that would help?). Not sure what the correct term is but they need rotating which I could easily do in some image editing software. Which comes onto my next, probably very contentious, question. Is it OK to do that sort of editing with film photo's? Some of my photos could do with the exposure slightly altering or to be cropped etc. What are peoples thoughts?

 

[ancient_mariner]

So I received my first two film scans back from FilmDev today. Very quick turn around by them, super impressed.

I'm fairly happy with how some of my shots turned out but most of them are not straight or flat (I can post some up if that would help?). Not sure what the correct term is but they need rotating which I could easily do in some image editing software. Which comes onto my next, probably very contentious, question. Is it OK to do that sort of editing with film photo's? Some of my photos could do with the exposure slightly altering or to be cropped etc. What are peoples thoughts?

It's pretty much essential, and absolutely the sort of thing we'd do in the darkroom.

 

[ChrisR]

I can only think of a couple of folk on here who don't do editing on their computer, ie darkroom only, so yes, it's perfectly fine. You can think of it as a hybrid workflow if that helps.

 

[Where-Madness-Lies]

Excellent. I'll share some for your amusement once I've ruined them some more haha.

 

[Harlequin565]

Lab scans are a great starting point, but most images can benefit from a bit of tweaking.

 

[Where-Madness-Lies]

Ok, so here are some that I shot over the space of about 1 week on my old Canon EOS 650 (on full auto) with a 50mm F1.8 lens.

These are from the first roll I shot which was Kodak Gold.



This one turned out quite yellow which I guess is a characteristic of Kodak Gold. If you squint you can see someone meditating by the pylon .


I'm quite disappointed how this shot turned out as I thought it looked good when I was taking it, Not sure if it was the camera struggling (unlikely) or me being rubbish (highly likely).


This is probably my favourite shot from the roll. I like the shadows from the leaves on the roller


This next set were shot on Kodak ColorPlus

I was quite looking forward to seeing how this one would turn out, I was a little disappointed with it . I doesn't seem very crisp at all.


Really surprised and pleased with this one. No edits done on this one at all and amazed the birds are not too blurry in it.


I like the reflections in this one.






This is my favourite from this roll. The shadows that the peeling paint were making was what drew me to take this one.




I think of the two films I shot the second one, ColorPlus, is the one I prefer the most. Although in both the blues are not very vibrant. Is there a film stock you would recommend that gives "better" blue tones?

Also, all constructive criticism (and non constructive so long as its funny) is very welcome.

 

[excalibur2]

Well the pyramid (and all other shots) need some tweaking in Photoshop, lightroom, Gimp2 or whatever...otherwise there is not much wrong with them for your first attempt (using film?)

 

[Andysnap]

I think that for a first go these have come out very well indeed. I nearly always tweak shots in Photoshop, generally I push the contrast slider to the max and up the black point.
I imagine it won't be too long before you start thinking about medium format......

 

[Harlequin565]

There's quite a few reasons your images may not be sharp. First, the Canon 50mm f/1.8 isn't the sharpest lens when the aperture is wide open. Can you remember the apertures you were on? Also, I find that my film scans can benefit from far more aggresive sharpening than I'd use on digital files. Are these small scans from Filmdev or did you go for medium ones? I find that the smaller scans don't look as good. I've also found that the forums soften images when I post them. Do they look sharper on your hard drive than on the internet here?

Overall I think you've done really well! I really like the colours in these, and Gold and ColorPlus are my favourite colour films... However if you're not a fan don't be afraid to try something different - that's half the fun of shooting film - finding your style with a film you love.

Thumbs up from me!

 

[Peter B]

I find the Filmdev scans to be quite low in contrast so that the photographer can play with the contrast to get their desired effect. That's not a fault, since some photographers prefer fairly low contrast images. If you have access to Photoshop, just try clicking on Auto Contrast as a first step to see if it helps or spoils the photo, then you can use the adjustment sliders to fine tune what you want as an end result.

 

[excalibur2]

Are these small scans from Filmdev or did you go for medium ones? I find that the smaller scans don't look as good. I've also found that the forums soften images when I post them. Do they look sharper on your hard drive than on the internet here?

True.... when I look at the scans from say Filmdev they look much better in Photoshop and of course some of the scans need tweaking as e.g. filmdev do their best to get most of the scans looking right and assume the Fuji Frontier does it's best to get the scans right and assume on auto, but when you consider filmdev return the negs 2nd class that's about 70p so they get £3.30 to dev the film and scan (low) and an index...at that price how can a person spend the time to get each frame looking perfect when the neg could contain different shots at different times and different lighting connditions and different film (could be old stuff as well).

 

[Harlequin565]

Agreed Brian. Their scans are great for a contact sheet, but if I'm printing, I'd want a bit bigger. The smaller resolution means not so much definition around the edges.

Sharpness, whilst appearing to be an objective thing, is actually subjective because everyone's eyes are different. To my eyes, these images look like mine do when I post on here, and it's down to forum compression. The OP though might be looking for something much sharper!

 

[Where-Madness-Lies]

Firstly, thanks for the feedback and kind comments.

Well the pyramid (and all other shots) need some tweaking in Photoshop, lightroom, Gimp2 or whatever...otherwise there is not much wrong with them for your first attempt (using film?)

Yes, my first attempt using film. I did purchased a digital camera (a Canon 40D) back in 2008 but I ended up not using it very much so the only "real" photography I've done is with my phone.

I think that for a first go these have come out very well indeed. I nearly always tweak shots in Photoshop, generally I push the contrast slider to the max and up the black point.
I imagine it won't be too long before you start thinking about medium format......

Thanks! I have taken a look at medium format and have a camera earmarked if I do decide to take the hobby further. Although I feel I need to learn a lot more before I go down that path.

There's quite a few reasons your images may not be sharp. First, the Canon 50mm f/1.8 isn't the sharpest lens when the aperture is wide open. Can you remember the apertures you were on? Also, I find that my film scans can benefit from far more aggresive sharpening than I'd use on digital files. Are these small scans from Filmdev or did you go for medium ones? I find that the smaller scans don't look as good. I've also found that the forums soften images when I post them. Do they look sharper on your hard drive than on the internet here?

Overall I think you've done really well! I really like the colours in these, and Gold and ColorPlus are my favourite colour films... However if you're not a fan don't be afraid to try something different - that's half the fun of shooting film - finding your style with a film you love.

Thumbs up from me!

Agreed Brian. Their scans are great for a contact sheet, but if I'm printing, I'd want a bit bigger. The smaller resolution means not so much definition around the edges.

Sharpness, whilst appearing to be an objective thing, is actually subjective because everyone's eyes are different. To my eyes, these images look like mine do when I post on here, and it's down to forum compression. The OP though might be looking for something much sharper!

No, sorry I can't remember at all what the aperture was on any of these shots. Bit of a novice question here but will it say on the negative? i.e. does the camera expose a value onto the film outside of the main photo?

It seems to me most of the long distance photos I took are not that sharp. Going by the videos that I watched earlier on this month I'm assuming a smaller aperture and longer exposure time may fix this? I'd probably need a tripod though to do that sort of thing properly.

These were medium scans from FilmDev but that said they don't look that much sharper locally on my PC. I can upload the originals if you want to take a look. Maybe my eye hasn't been trained to see the correct signs yet.

With regards to the lens, is there a fairly inexpensive one your would recommend for me to try out on my 650 that could give a sharper image? I'll mainly be doing this style of landscape photography as portraits aren't really my thing.

Also, thanks for the kind comments @Harlequin565. I've picked up some Fuji Xtra 400 to try out....maybe I'll like that some more.

I guess I'll have to get to grips with some image editing software. I've just purchased a licence for Lightroom and so far it seems very similar (although much more in depth) to Googles Snapseed which I use on my phone. Any tips for some good tutorials are very welcome

 

[Jelster]

I have the 650's big brother, the 620 which came out at the same time. They were the first of the EOS era, and first to have the EF mount.

Sadly, I no longer have any lenses for mine but I must sort that out and run some FP4 through it...

 

[Harlequin565]

Bit of a novice question here but will it say on the negative?

Sadly no. There are a few cameras that stamp the aperture and shutter speed on the negative, but AFAIK the EOS650 isn't one!

It doesn't look like motion blur to me, but to be safe, when you're taking these sort of shots, try and make sure your shutter speed is 1/125 sec or faster. In bright conditions like you've shown here, that should easily be achievable with 400 ISO film.

Happy to take a look at your scans if you want to put one somewhere for download. Not sure if you need 10 posts for PMs? so make 3 more posts then you can PM me the link Hover on my name and click "start conversation". Obviously if you're happy to put it up publicly you can just paste a link into a reply (is it 10 posts for links too - not sure?)

In terms of another lens, generally "inexpensive" = poor optical quality, and I think the 50mm f/1.8 that you own is pretty good value for money. I know @Mr Badger likes his 40mm f/2.8 pancake which might be a nice step up if you're happier with a wider field of view. The next jump would be to something like the 50mm f/1.4 (£300), or a 35mm f/2 (£480) which is a bit of a price jump. There are zooms, but they are generally inferior to the primes - especially at the lower price points, and also outside my wheelhouse.

 

[Peter B]

I know @Peter B likes his 40mm f/2.8 pancake which might be a nice step up if you're happier with a wider field of view.

Not me Ian, the only Canon EF lens I have is a Sigma 70-300 which I forgot to trade in when I got rid of my 5D. I've got a Tamron Adaptall EF mount though, so can use my Tamron lenses with the EOS 50E.

 

[Harlequin565]

Not me Ian

Yep. I'm rubbish...

Let's try @Mr Badger instead...

 

[excalibur2]

Well JML I'd stick with your 50mm f1.8 for now as the lens optics for the nifty fifties is well know for about 50 years and there are not many crappy ones around and certainly not Canon. I know the Canon manual focus 50mm f1.8 and f1.4 are VG and can't believe when Canon went to the EF mount (from old FD mount i.e. manual focus) they would make an inferior lens, after all they have to maintain their reputation compared to other makes.
As Ian says things like camera shake can affect sharpness and using the lens wide open might reduce sharpness on any nifty fifty but all subjective and would be noticeable in a crop or large print......compared to say lens f5.6

 

[Harlequin565]

I'm replying publicly in case anyone using search might find this useful...

Your scans are pretty good IMO. The camera is good, exposure is.... good... and I'd say shutter speed is good too. This is getting to the sort of issue you might be having by expecting digital camera quality from 35mm film. Although I think you have some wiggle room in editing. The following examples, "edit" is your version and the long number one is my version imported into LR and tweaked a bit.

First, you can see how much the forum blurs images by looking at the LR date/timestamp. It's blurred heree, but perfectly sharp IRL. As it was a screen cap, it should be perfectly sharp.
Your edit is on the right and is a slightly smaller file.

The hazing around the grafitti strokes is (IMO!!) lens quality. We're looking at a tiny chunk of the image here. It's quite easily rescued in LR with sharpening.



Next...
This one suffers from colour noise and again needs a bit of sharpening and noise reduction to "fix". Remember this is a tiny crop of the overall image. I very much doubt you'd see an issue with this at a 10x8 print. I haven't messed with the colour to blue up the sky like you did, and I think your colour work is better.



Finally...
This image is difficult because there's quite a bit of dynamic range in it, and also, it's just a generally dark scene. Colour film likes light (again IMO!!) and in bad lighting I always like to give it an extra stop of light (either slowing the shutter down by half, or opening the aperture twice as much)

My LR edit has lifted the shadow *a little*. It needs a careful hand to avoid removing all the mood from a scene by just removing all the shadows. Again, noise reduction and sharpening have been applied.


The settings I used for most of them (in Lightroom!) were:


As you can see, I went heavy with the sharpening, but reigned it right back in with the mask. If you hold ALT down while you move the Masking slider, it will show you (in white) the area that will be sharpened. It means that things like the grain in the sky doesn't get sharpening, but building edges do.

I've also gone quite heavy on the NR - but particularly on the colour NR as it appeared to me to be quite prominent.

All in all, these are good images. If I had taken them I'd be happy with the quality. They're *not* to the standard my X-T2 & Fuji glass is. If you want to get into the realms of competing with digital, you really need to be thinking medium format or larger. You also probably need to spend some cash! I can get files that are better than my X-T2 from film, but they're all images taken on either my RB67 or Tomiyama Art Pano. I'm not so sure investing in a lens upgrade will give you what you're looking for. Perhaps see if you can borrow or rent something really nice just to see the difference (it won't be much!)

Anyway, that's all my opinion... Nowt to say it's right! But I was interested to see what the problem was.

 

[Mr Badger]

All in all, these are good images. If I had taken them I'd be happy with the quality. They're *not* to the standard my X-T2 & Fuji glass is. If you want to get into the realms of competing with digital, you really need to be thinking medium format or larger.

Or you could try a fine grained film like Kodak Ektar 100 and a high resolution lab scan, but then things start getting more expensive (click on the images to view large in Flickr). Plus, Ektar can look a bit disappointing in some lighting situations unless the exposure is spot on, and the well saturated colours aren't to everyone's taste.

 

[Where-Madness-Lies]

I'm replying publicly in case anyone using search might find this useful...

Your scans are pretty good IMO. The camera is good, exposure is.... good... and I'd say shutter speed is good too. This is getting to the sort of issue you might be having by expecting digital camera quality from 35mm film. Although I think you have some wiggle room in editing. The following examples, "edit" is your version and the long number one is my version imported into LR and tweaked a bit.

First, you can see how much the forum blurs images by looking at the LR date/timestamp. It's blurred heree, but perfectly sharp IRL. As it was a screen cap, it should be perfectly sharp.
Your edit is on the right and is a slightly smaller file.

The hazing around the grafitti strokes is (IMO!!) lens quality. We're looking at a tiny chunk of the image here. It's quite easily rescued in LR with sharpening.

View attachment 286094

Next...
This one suffers from colour noise and again needs a bit of sharpening and noise reduction to "fix". Remember this is a tiny crop of the overall image. I very much doubt you'd see an issue with this at a 10x8 print. I haven't messed with the colour to blue up the sky like you did, and I think your colour work is better.

View attachment 286095

Finally...
This image is difficult because there's quite a bit of dynamic range in it, and also, it's just a generally dark scene. Colour film likes light (again IMO!!) and in bad lighting I always like to give it an extra stop of light (either slowing the shutter down by half, or opening the aperture twice as much)

My LR edit has lifted the shadow *a little*. It needs a careful hand to avoid removing all the mood from a scene by just removing all the shadows. Again, noise reduction and sharpening have been applied.
View attachment 286096

The settings I used for most of them (in Lightroom!) were:
View attachment 286097

As you can see, I went heavy with the sharpening, but reigned it right back in with the mask. If you hold ALT down while you move the Masking slider, it will show you (in white) the area that will be sharpened. It means that things like the grain in the sky doesn't get sharpening, but building edges do.

I've also gone quite heavy on the NR - but particularly on the colour NR as it appeared to me to be quite prominent.

All in all, these are good images. If I had taken them I'd be happy with the quality. They're *not* to the standard my X-T2 & Fuji glass is. If you want to get into the realms of competing with digital, you really need to be thinking medium format or larger. You also probably need to spend some cash! I can get files that are better than my X-T2 from film, but they're all images taken on either my RB67 or Tomiyama Art Pano. I'm not so sure investing in a lens upgrade will give you what you're looking for. Perhaps see if you can borrow or rent something really nice just to see the difference (it won't be much!)

Anyway, that's all my opinion... Nowt to say it's right! But I was interested to see what the problem was.

Thanks for taking a look over the images, its been a big help. Lots to learn especially on the editing side as that is all quite new to me.