Now I am really confused

I took Womble's advice and searched monitor calabration. after reading a few posts I gave up. It is beyond my knowledge at this time. If I am not able to capture an image and print it without having to "tweak" it how is this better? If you spend 30 minutes on a photo shoot and 2 hours "tweaking" how is this faster than film. Then when you are done you still dont have the quality print that you get from med format film. I will probably figure it all out sooner or later, but I will never surrender my film. And when a client wants quality instead of "hitech speed" I will still shoot film in the studio.

Steven

It's true it takes some time to set up the first time since everything needs to be match with each other but after that matching isn't needed and if you do it the smart way you can even batch process images. If you shoot at a constant whitebalance and exposure and nothing really change concerning those you can easily handle 20 or more files at a time, I want to see you do that in a dark room

Also you're not comparing lightroom with a darkroom but that's what you should do.
If you want you can shoot in jpg and bring your sd-card straight to the printer like you did with film, no difference there.

The chances are that if you have got the white balance correct in the camera it will probably print OK. If your monitor is giving you dodgy colours and you "correct" the colour on screen, it will then print out incorrectly.

It isn't really that different to film. You would make sure you had the right film for the lights you were using. If the image ended up with a colour cast you didn't like you would correct it by filtration during the printing stage. Different film/paper/filtration combinations would give different results so you would learn which you prefered. To someone used to digital this all seems like obscure alchemy whereas to you it is bread and butter stuff, and the reverse situation is true as well.

The main issue is that provided you are using much the same set-up (same printer, same monitor, setting white balance manually) you only have to crack the problem once. Once you have got a working set-up that you are happy with, job done!

Some people never calibrate their monitors, John for one. They have been lucky enough to have a monitor which is close to "true". If you are unlucky and have a monitor which is not giving true colours and/or contrast you need to adjust it. The easiest (if not the cheapest) way is to use something like a Spyder. Install the software that comes with the gizmo, plug it in, run the software and follow the on-screen instructions. Once a week or so the software will ask you if you want to check the calibration.

I agree all the literature can be over-whelming at first (my head reels when people start discussing colour spaces and printer profiles) but it really is something you just do once. Well, until you buy a new printer or a new monitor so it is worth taking notes!

Not sure this helps that much.

Best wishes, and good luck, Kris.

... well, it's true. You calibrate once and check that what you think is correct on screen is what gets printed. Preferably also not just on your printer, but also your favorite print house.
When you've adjusted once (and Whitebalance, for example, can *always* be adjusted if you shoot RAW) then it's really simple.

This laptop has from the factory a serious red deficiency. When I first printed a decent batch of photos with "no processing" attached, I got red prints. I was so annoyed! After calibration, it was much clearer what and why this was the case.

I've not touched film in the last 20 years or so, but digital is right up my street.

I took 400 images on Sunday; within 2.5 hours I had them all processed, copied, sorted, processed initially, the 40+ "keepers" selected, edited, WB-corrected, bordered, dust cloned out and uploaded. I could also drop that to 1.5 hours or so with a quicker machine.
If I have a consistent WB, I could also go a step further and just process them automatically with the white balance, green level and other minor adjustments. It's all possible, but you absolutely must argue with and preferably understand the software first.

I just realised, you're a purist, right?

So dump it in auto and see what it does for you. You need to get the software before you can really get everything out of an image; but it also means you can screw up more and still get a usable image. No, it's not heresy

Bret

I'll guess the real question should be: How long does it take before I am able to master all those important things that make:my output as good as I used to have working film.

Answer; Probably as long as it took you to master the in and outs of film and printing traditionally. Don't expect miracles because digital seems faster.
It is, but getting to the point were you are happy about the output and have developed
a logic and efficient work-flow just takes time......A lot of time.

Being colour-blind I could do with having my eyes calibrated but you can't do that at present.