Well, gentlemen,
You opened a can of worms and I will try to respond. Just recently I have read this very influential Russian photographer on this very topic. Here is his website:
Photographer Pavel Kosenko
I read his article here:
Цхалтубо. Пару сканов с отпечатков
It is in Russian, but this interests me enough that I took the liberty of translating it into English. I apologize if you find grammar bugs in it; I think I conveyed the meaning well enough. I am very much interested in opinions and reactions.
TRANSLATION:
No matter what, I like showing scans made from prints more than those from negatives. First of all, when I show a print, it has to do with a physically existing photograph. One that you can see, touch, frame, sell, show in a gallery, hang on a wall, etc. Moreover, that is the only way in
which the photograph exists (and none other). For when we are showing scans from negatives, it is no more than a bunch of pixels. Of course, this bunch of pixels can well be visualized, but after printing their interpretation will be different anyway. And as to the manual prints made from negatives, no two photographs will ever be the same. They may look very similar, but will always be different. Therefore, it is a bit strange to declare to the world that you have taken a shot and show the unfinished master (scan from the negative). Though many are quite happy with a demonstration of something that later theoretically could turn into a photograph (but almost never does).
Second, a scan from a negative always has a high processing reserve, which is not good.
That’s because digital post-processing is the imitation of printing. You could not avoid doing it, for otherwise the shot will turn out too weak. While doing it, on the other hand, always means estimating how the shot will be printed. Great if you have a good scanner/software and you have a wealth of experience with manual printing. If not, then the likelihood of recreating the image you see in the monitor is decreased considerably when/if it comes to its manual printing in the darkroom. Of course, it is possible to print it in the digital minilab or on an inkjet printer, but in that case we get into a hybrid process of film/digital, where it is easy to get lost, and which is not true (I think it is not a secret to anyone that many galleries treat analog photos with a particular piety, while some do not even accept digital or hybrid photographs.)
Third, a print costs money (and a manual print costs a lot of money). That means that the author will think twice before printing a photo. Thus, printing is one more level of selection, one more stage of weeding out unnecessary shots. It is one more level for increasing the quality of a photo – not only of technical quality (though that as well), but primarily of esthetical and meaning quality. The very fact of shooting film forces the author to treat what he is doing differently on principle. It has great influence on the primary selection in the course of shooting. The second level of selection – shooting in medium format, which greatly increases responsibility (while shooting in large format means boundless creative responsibility to oneself). The third level is manual printing proper. If the photo survived as far as this stage (in fact, as far as realization), that signifies that it really means something to the author.
However, naturally slides from negatives also make sense. They represent preview, archive, just snapshots, and the process of thinking over the materials shot. I also show scans from negatives, but they have a more intermediate, applied, and sometimes, even everyday function (which, of course, is not bad).
