Film or Digital? Why?

[BarbaraB]

I was surprised  to find out that our moderator, Gary Eden  prefers film to digital. I know Gary is a techno-savvy guy so I presumed he jumped to digital years ago. Silly me!

I love digital for lots and lots of reasons, but the two that leap to mind are:

That because digital frees me from film and developing costs I  find that I am more likely to take my camera out of the bag and shoot freely. I take a lot more chances when I'm not worrying about wasting film.

I also love the immediacy, I know right away if I got my shot or not.

So everyone, why do you shoot film or shoot digital? I think it might be interesting to have a poll on this.

[geden3]

I use both but for B&W I still like the look of film.  Digital does give you more control over the conversion process and you can always go back and change things if you want.  I've gotten some bummers with film but also with digital too. I also got great results with digital. For color digital really shines. For B&W the jury is still out for me.  It's a preference.  I like the way real B&W film looks and behaves.  Also for B&W printing a silver gelatin or platinum print from film will leave you breathless.  On the other side it isn't as quick as digital and it is more expensive in terms of film cost and development.  Printing color is an easy one in todays world but B&W is a different story.  I think printer manufactures have done great strides with thier injet printers and inks and claim a long life also.  As good as they are they are not near a traditional silver gelatin print in the hands of a master printer. Of course there is the price issue involved too that has to be considered unfortunately.  San Miguel Photo Lab in Las Vegas NM has a digital enlarger that the say can print a B&W digital file onto real silver paper. A true archival silver gelatin print ( they call it a fiber print) from a B&W digital file.  I have yet to try it but intend to in the near future.  Digital affords many many advantages over film but the final evaluation is the print.  Color printing is wonderfully there but for B&W they're still climbing the mountain.

Regards
Gary

[ronmatt]

I prefer film as well. I have far more control over my good ol' Nikon F that any digital camera I've tried. There are so many things you can do in both the developement and print stage when working with film. I think too, that digital along with an image editor, tends to make one lazy. I've yet to come accross any questions regarding corrective filter use, depth of field issues, Zone exposures etc. on any of the forums. It seems to be, point and shoot and clean up the mess in Photoshop, later. Not that digital photographers aren't skilled in what they do, they are. But something.s missing

[Gare]

ronmatt--

Clearly, there's a "new school" of imagists who prefer hasty shoots then planned-on post. Occasionally, I fix a bum pic that has splendid potential using PS, but mostly I use Photoshop for fantasy compositions that require as much pre-planning as a "regular" shoot to match camera angles, lighting and so on. When I was an ad agency art director, I often heard the saying, "There's never enough time to do it right, but always time to do it over." That ethic is against art, it's wasteful, and therefore sucks.

I abandoned my F years ago; my digital does not produce the quality of a film camera, but it's almost five years old. For my purposes, it's close enough to my expectations to be acceptable, and I cannot ignore the perk that I can physically tell if I got my image on-location.

My Best,

Gare

[ronmatt]

I agree that digital is great for "snapshot" situations. But if you're doing a studio set-up with a 4x5 film back studio camera ( I prefer the Cambo)
then there's the poloroid back to test lighting and fine tune the composition. Please don't get me wrong, I keep my Minolta Z20 with me at all times. you can't beat the convenience of being able to plug in and get instant results. I just think that a digital photographer should have some training in the disciplines that a film photographer has been trained in. RE; the use of strobes and umbrellas, Fill lighting. DOF control, not to mention lens selection. I don't think that the 'one lens does all' really works either. Of course once we get into the more expensive SLR style of digitals, ( I've been refering to the mid-range models till now) things do change. Most people I know have the $300-$600 digitals. I can't see using one of these models for a product or model shoot, the results of which would be used for a collateral or advertising piece.

[NitroButler]

I also prefer film over digital. For no other reason then, it's what I grew up on.
I can remember the days in my youth when I would turn my tiny bathroom into a darkroom and almost passing out from the fumes!
I pay close attention to lighting when I take my shots and without a handheld light meter, well , I've just been disappointed with my Sony Cybershot.               

[geden3]

I just wanted to share this link with everyone.  It is a B&W only 16mp digital back for medium format cameras.  They have taken away the filters so to optimize the image quality for B&W work. 

http://www.mega-vision.com/products/Mono/Mono.htm

Regards
Gary

[Raven Song]

Hey!  I've been away too long!  I'm happy to see a photography area here now -- I would love to learn more in making the most of both the film and digital processes we use in capturing our visions.  I use and enjoy digital cameras very much, and I still use an old Canon F-1 which I bought originally for it's ability to be used without batteries for very long time exposures in astrophotography (I have 5 telescopes and amateur astronomy is a hobby of mine) although these days digital cameras have found their use in this field as well as they have improved so much in their light sensitivity and resolution.  I still love my Canon F-1...but it is a real heavy-weight brick to pack around...extremely durable though.  I still think film offers the best resolution overall but the new digitals are getting better and better, and for traveling and quick shots they are sooooooo FUN!

I'm looking forward to your wonderful insight and knowledge/tips shared, Gary/Frog/    (well, both Gary's -- what should I call you guys now???   

---Crow

[geden3]

Hi Crow.  Hey you can call me frog. It's OK crow    Yeah digital really is making leap and bounds  but I'm not going to retire my Contax G2 yet.   A couple years ago  a friend asked me to help photograph a hindu wedding in Las Vegas NM.  They had rented a resort which included 3 of their photographers.  I had my little Contax with 3 lenses (28, 45, 90mm). They came with 3 Canon 20D digitals with big flash units and  Quantum battery packs.  Lots of lenses. HEAVY.   They must have shot 3000 pictures and I did about 200 using Agfa film.  I was able to work faster and more inconspicuous.  They say digital is faster getting pictures to the clients but mine took a week and I got them out to my friend.  Theirs took 3 months  .  My friend told me the film looked as good and sometimes better then the digital counterpart. And I was able to get shots while they were still changing and fussing with settings on their Canons. Also it was 105 degrees that day and my G2 is light.  They were complaining how heavy their stuff weighs.  Film does have its place.  I know there are lots of debate about resolution and I do like digital too ( I use a Nikon D70s also).  As far as resolution I think film still has the edge but a lot of factors do come into play with that.  Image noise, accutance, film grain, light scatter during scanning etc.  have an effect on percieved sharpness and resolution.  I asked Carl Zeiss how my lenses for the G2 would compare to digital.  The head of the optical division wrote back and said that the G2 lenses can resolve 220 lp/mm on film which is equivilent to 150 MP for digital.  The new Zeiss Ikon lenses have been tested to resolve 400 lp/mm on documentary film such as gigabit film.  Sounds great but that is on film.  Now scan it or print it and that great resolution gets knock down a lot.  For B&W I haven't seen anything in the digital printing realm that knock me out like a real master printed silver gelatin print.  I've seen some of Ansels 8 x 10 prints  and I can tell you it will make you want to tote a heavy  large format camera and smile about it when you get your prints.  His original of Yosemite at 24 x 30 will blow away any digital.  I'd swear the blacks reflected no photons.  Don't give up that beautiful F-1.  Built like a tank. Great manual lenses.  BTW not too many people mention that it is still more accurate to focus a manual lens ( especially wide angle on rangefinders) than autofoucus lenses. 

Regards
Gary