Digital

WHAT TO BUY - A DIGITAL OR FILM CAMERA?

Numerous times in the past individuals have asked me “What is better and what should I get – a digital or film camera?” As time progresses I am now more frequently asked, "What kind of digital camera do you recommend?" For most, the time has come to move away from film and transition into the digital world. Many things such as this subject are debatable and this also happens to be an arguable area depending who you talk with. Anyway, here is my ‘two cents’ worth.

I have used Canon equipment for years and thus I am very familiar with their models. It is sort of like a GM car owner is more inclined to know about GM products due to research they have done before a purchase, versus let’s say what they may know about SAABs. I have researched, owned, and compared the top-of-the-line Canon digital and Canon film cameras, and while Nikon and others make some superb products, I cannot offer a fair opinion for theirs or other’s product lines. I will say this though, Canon and Nikon are the two "top dawgs" in the 35mm equivalent arena. Nikon has new models up to 12.3 megapixel maximum, and although many are a bit better than most Canon models in burst speed, the ISO speed can only be set as low as 100 on Nikons (50 ASA on some Canon models). However, Canon does have the highest resolution digital SLR-class cameras available on the market, the EOS-1DS Mark III. Since the Mark II was the pioneer, I'll use this as a baseline for comparison.

The EOS-1DS Mark II has an impressive 16.7 megapixel capability (4992 x 3328 pixels), but it comes with a hefty price tag to match at about $7,000-plus a copy out the door. The majority of other manufacturers do not yet have digital cameras with this kind of megapixel capability when looking at the 35mm equivalent types. There are some very pricey medium format digital cameras available that fall in a whole different category altogether. Canon now has a 21.1 megapixel (5616 x 3744 pixels) that just came out, however if you wish to take possession of one of those gems it's going to set you back over $8,000. Who knows what will be available in another year or two - maybe 30 megapixels? It is similar as to what happens when you buy your new computer and two months later it becomes old stuff! While the camera world isn’t quite that dynamic yet, its getting there.

The benefits I have found using digital is there is a huge savings in the cost of film and processing, which adds up if you are a professional and do a lot of shooting. Digital cameras may cost more up front, but ultimately you make that cost up in film if you take a significant amount of pictures. Another great thing is you can see how the images turn out on the spot – instant gratification, plus you don't have to wait between one to two weeks to get film back from the lab. Also with digital, you are not at the mercy of the 'lab processing gods', which have been known to scratch and crunch precious originals that may have taken days and tens of thousands of dollars to achieve, and then simply enclose a note with the pictures stating that “Your camera did it and its your fault!” A huge bonus with digital is doing night and indoor photography because digital cameras have AWB (Auto-White Balance), meaning color corrections are made by the camera's brain extremely well, unlike film cameras where you need a color temperature meter and can involve a bit of guesswork using color correcting filters. On the dark side and not obvious at first, there is indeed a lot more post-production work that has to be done when shooting digital.

Digital CF (Compact Flash) cards and SD (Secure Digital) cards , which essentially are digital film, are a one-time purchase and equate to a camera being able to hold multiple rolls of 35mm film. You may have 500-image capability for a single card compared to 24 or 36 exposures on film, so that is a nice convenience simply by not having to reload. You can also delete those ‘less than desirable’ photos in the camera quickly, freeing up additional memory for more storage. Many sizes of flash cards are available and there are matrixes found within the camera specifications as to how many images a single card can store, depending on the resolution you photograph at and based on the card size. A general rule of thumb is the bigger the card in MB/GB, the more photos it will hold, but the more the cards cost some too. Last time I looked, CF cards were up to 16 GB and you can expect to pay under $25ish per GB out the door.

On the other side of the fence, there are a few advantages that I have found using film over digital. Film can be shot much faster and with the EOS-1V, I can continuously blow off a roll of 36 in 3.6 seconds with a robust firing rate of 10 fps (frames per second). Canon does have a new model digital camera (EOS-1D Mk III) that can do 10 fps up to 30 max in RAW files, but that model has a lower resolution at 10.1 megapixel in order to achieve the quicker data transfer time. The digital EOS-1Ds Mark II is slow by my standards in comparison to the high-resolution digital camera burst mode, that is 4 frames a second maximum with only 11 frames of continuous firing before it has to stop, buffer, think, and transfer the data. Depending on what the professional is doing, this can be detrimental – but to the layman it almost always is a non-factor. It also translates into having both photographs and timing must be planned a bit more carefully before initiating a burst.

I did some testing and compared the EOS-1Ds Mark II to my best film camera, the EOS-1V. Keep in mind I strive for the absolute highest quality product since some of my images have been blown up to even into billboards residing next to freeways. I compared samples of a the highest-resolution photo taken by the EOS-1Ds Mark II pitted against my professional grade film. Both were printed out in a 42x63-inch size segment. In the film example, you can see some grain while in the digital you can see digital noise (the digital jagged look). At this point, it boils down to personal preference and several other individuals were showed the samples to a to get a take on their opinion. The consensus was the film was just slightly more pleasing to the eye. In all fairness they are very close in quality, but interestingly with a different kind of look. There is also noise-reduction software that one can use to minimize grain noise and the jagged look, but care must be taken to not compromise the image in other ways so these samples do not take that into account. On the other side, the digital seems to print nicer and most likely that may have to do with the physics of going from a digital to digital format, rather than an analog to digital conversion.

IMAGE TAKEN WITH A EOS-1V USING 50 ISO FILM AND SCANNED IN AS A HIGH-RESOLUTION TIFF FILE. THIS IS A 100 PERCENT SIZE OF A SEGMENT OF A 42x63-INCH PRINT.

DIGITAL IMAGE TAKEN WITH A EOS-1Ds MARK II SET AT HIGHEST QUALITY AND CONVERTED FROM RAW TO TIFF. THIS IS A 100 PERCENT SIZE OF A SEGMENT OF A 42x63-INCH PRINT.

To summarize, it all depends on what you personally want to do with the images. Probably 99.9 percent of all people (that most likely includes you) never intend to make prints larger than an 8x12 and do not need more than a one frame-per-second in speed capability. For reporters, digital is great for newspapers and they can even return images back to the office electronically from the field, which have more than adequate quality for newspaper use. About all digital 'point and shoot' cameras work fine for 8x12s and below, for family events, and general use. Let's face it - being able to go somewhere on any given day, taking photos, and emailing them to your family and friends that same night is a pretty cool ability.

Almost all prints today are made from digital scans and that is the way of the future. Even my film is scanned into high-quality files when printing, as the photo-chemical processing world is literally dead due to not being ‘environmentally-friendly’. Almost everyone in photography is switching over to digital now even including military photographers. Since I have to digitally scan film in order to print, it would be another huge advantage of switching over to digital since it would saves countless hours of scan and image preparation/clean up time.

Speed and top-notch quality are normally not a factor for most photographers, and digital is 'without question' the way to go for most. Should you happen to be a sports photographer or a professional photographer that requires a great continuous burst capability when taking photos, or if you are creating prints larger than 11x16, or for example if you are taking photos of missile launches from aircraft, sticking with film for now is still a viable option.

We have a digital Canon G6 (7.1 megapixel) for general everyday use and we will never have to buy film for it. It falls into the ‘advanced digital’ category, which is an in-between category of ‘point-and-shoot’ and SLR digital cameras. Our G6 attends all the family functions, does a great job for general use, and has the ability to do some creative photography with just about all standard SLR settings being available. The G6 is lacking in the lens department however as it doesn't reach out very far, handicapping some photos that could be had. Canon now has the 12.1 megapixel G9 camera, and the non-detachable lens equates to a 35 - 210 mm zoom compared to the 35mm world, and that's good range for the average user - an excellent choice if you can live without the array of fancy lenses and have some knowledge of SLR cameras. We also have the Rebel XT, Rebel XTi, EOS-1Ds MARK II, and EOS-1Ds MARK III SLR digital cameras. The XT is an 8 megapixel camera and is quite intuitive - easy to learn if you have a 35mm film SLR camera background.

The XTi is similar to the XT but has over a 10 megapixel capability and a larger viewing screen. The settings are easy to understand and both the XT and XTi have the 1.6 multiplier type CMOS chip, so they lend themselves well for shots taken at long distances. Soon to follow is the 12.2 megapixel XSi (1.6 multiplier as well) with various upgrades over the XTi. The 1.6 cameras are handy for aviation photography such as air shows and the like where the subject may be far away. Objectively, one negative thing about the XT series are the camera body sizes. While small (normally a bonus), if you hold onto the camera for a long time when shooting - ergonomically it creates some hand fatigue since it does not conform to the hand profile well. Lacking camera body weight also can reduce the stability and result in more shake. The XT series buttons on the back panel are not protected, so care must be taken not to change settings during action shooting.

Although I am still fond of film, current trends have forced our path to go nearly all digital at this point. Labs that still do chemical film processing are starting to charge excessive processing rates while providing worse-than-ever processing. Simply put, sadly film is starting to become a "lost art". Strangely, most schools still seem stuck on teaching film for photography classes, but it is my opinion that film has become obsolete for today's students and they need to transition into digital world as well to keep up with the times.

It appears the next generation Canon digital camera due out will be in the higher 25+ megapixel range, but strides now need to be made in burst speed and buffering, and recently some strides have been made in improving image CMOS sensor self-cleaning. The 25+ megapixel SLR cameras may be just a year or two in coming as technology marches on, and I hope this article helped if you have been thinking of taking the digital path or looking for that new digital camera!

Ted Carlson

FOTODYNAMICS
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