Looking for advice on digital SLR vs. film SLR?

Question

I have been intrested in photography for awhile. I currently have a Minolta x-700 35mm film camera and a Fuji FinePix digital camera. Most of the pictures that I take are with the Minolta. I've been thinking about getting a digital SLR, but not quite sure what to get. I was wondering if anyone out there might have some advice on the advantages/disadvantages of digital SLR to a regular film SLR.

I would also like if you could give me some insight of which digital SLR you would recommed, that would be great. I mostly take landscape/outdoor pictures (main focus is trains). I'm looking for a camera that isn't all that expensive (I know that's hard to find with digital SLRs). Do you think that the price of the digial SLR will decrease at all over the next year or so.

I would like to start selling my pictures and any answers to these questions would help out a great deal.

Thank you.

Answer 1

Unless you have a lot of nice Minolta glass, I would plan on moving to a new system, either Nikon (my choice) or Canon. The new Sony dSLR isn't rated too highly compared to other available cameras, and Nikon and Canon have way more in the line of lenses and accessories, particularly professional equipment. Much more room to grow!
The price will drop on older models as new ones are introduced more than likely.

Answer 2

I used to have the same Minolta film SLR and now have the Canon 10D digital SLR (6 MP). The D-SLR is great. For low cost you can shoot like a professional - many exposures and angles to get the best shot, etc. Also, correct for white balance, change effective film speed on the fly, view the effect of depth of field control, stop action,etc.

As far as quality - I have had professional prints made up to 11 x 14 " and they come out great. Cameras with even larger pixel counts are now available that will allow you to crop and print while maintaining image quality.

Prices of D-SLRs are also coming down - and FAST. Considering that you do not have to pay for film or processing, if you shoot a lot, the digital SLR will pay for itself in a short period of time.

Answer 3

Firstly, don't equate digital with higher quality. It simply means more versatility in some respects.

Many people assume that because a camera is digital it's of higher quality than an old fashioned SLR. That's buying into the same kind of myth that surrounds ideas about sound quality being better on CD than LP.

I've worked with Nikon digital SLRs and have been very pleased with them.

On the other hand, every now and again I throw some BW film in my ancient Pentax K1000 and am shocked by the lucidity and clarity of even the most mundane photos. They have an aura (see second link below) that doesn't seem to surround all the digital photos I've taken.

I've read some of the most thoughtful and careful reviews of digital cameras on Ken Rockwell's site. See source below.

Answer 4

If money is a major factor I would suggest using your film SLR and scanning the film with a high quality scanner. I use an Epson 4490 to scan my film and then make adjustments in photoshop.

I also have a canon digital rebel xt. I love it, but it is expensive. I like not having to buy film though. I would definitely recommend a digital rebel if you decide to go digital. It allows for manual adjustments, and you can even view a histogram right after you take a pic!

Pros for film SLRs- cheaper than digital, same or better quality, many cameras to choose from.
Cons- buying film, and scanning film takes a lot of time and patience.

Pros for digital SLRs- NO MORE FILM!, view a pic right after you take it, easy to import into photoshop

Cons for digital SLRs- much more expensive than film SLRs, sometime inferior quality compared to film depending on camera used.

Good luck!

Answer 5

Well an interesting comparison for you to make would be to compare the costs involved in producing 1000 35 mm slides versus 1,000 digital images.

Then you can consider the variety of enhancements that you yourself could do at home with little more than a computer.

After that if you still need to make up your mind consider the costs involved in printing each of those 1,000 slides/ files. Compare a darkroom that you have to pay for or the cost of labs versus the cost of buying a modern inkjet printer.

As with all technology improvements are being made on a monthly basis with costs falling as you speak.

I foresee that you will have the foresight to plump for something like a Nikon D200 and a couple of professional lenses for it without considering buying another roll of film.

Whilst it may appear expensive outlay just consider that you are laying out the capital costs up front with little or no material costs ongoing.

Versus film it has to be digital everytime from now on....

Answer 6

if you do decide on a digital slr, look at the sony alpha. it is ten megapixel, and will use your existing minolta lenses, which would reduce the cost of getting in to a digital slr considerably.

Answer 7

I'm in the same boat, and have been doing a lot of research on what to get. Don't forget, not only does shooting (and buying, and developing...) and scanning film take a lot of energy and patience, it takes a lot of money!

I would actually say that that's a big plus in the long run for going digital - not having to spend so much money on film and either processing or the chemicals to process it yourself. In my experience, if you intend to get REALLY good images from your negatives, the scanners can be really pricey, making the relative cheapness of film cameras almost besides the point.

If you buy a good DSLR, one plus is that (especially with Canons), some can pull off clarity at high ISOs that may even be better than film.

Someone told me once that the film megapixel equivalent is around 6-8MP, which would put many of the consumer-level 10MP cameras like the Canon Rebel XTi and the Nikon D80 in a better position in terms of enlargement and cropping. On the other hand, this website (http://www.dansdata.com/20d_res.htm ) puts the figure at 25MP, but this Wikipedia article, which you should almost definitely read, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_versus_film_photography ) has figures much more in line with what I've heard (noting that I usually shoot ISO 200). In general, expect that DSLRs will give you much more flexibility, (of course) instant feedback on how your images look, and they make things much more practical for getting images from the camera to paper or screen.

There are some nagging things that bug me about digital - in general, I just find myself not liking the color in digital images as much as I do with film/photo paper ones. It always seems like everything is either too dull-looking, or (often with "vivid" settings), some colors seem blown out more than others, and probably more than they should be in general. There's a lot to be said for the control you have in a darkroom, but then, there's also a lot to be said for the control you have in Photoshop.

I often feel like digital images lack the sort of clarity of edges that film has - whereas a film image with two sharply defined real-world objects show the items and colors pretty well-separated, limited only by the size of the grain of the film, edges of objects in digital images sometimes have a color "glow" to them, and if this is happening across the whole image, it can do a lot to make the image look flat and homogeneous in appearance, and as I wrote earlier, dull. This shouldn't be so much of a problem for better DSLRs, though.

One thing I'd note, on a practical basis, as much as I'm planning on buying a DSLR and using it for art photography, maybe selling it, is that whenever I see printed digital images up in an art gallery or for sale, I can't help but think, "how cheap" - just the knowledge that the image was just shot, tweaked in PS, and printed out, and that thousands of copies of that exact image could be printed with basically identical results makes the image/print seem that much more disposable, and, well, cheap to me.

But all things aside, a DSLR is a pretty practical and worthwhile thing to get. What sort of DSLR you should get is entirely dependent on what's worth the cost to you, and what will actually be helpful and relevant to what you'll be doing (for instance, being able to take relatively clear 3200 ISO images shouldn't mean much if you're not planning on taking sports photography for a newspaper or the like). Generally, though, Canons and Nikons seem to have the best quality per cost, image-wise, though Sony has some nice image stabilization hardware. There's the first, cheapest level (less than $1000): the Canon XTi and Nikon's D40 and D50 (noting that each of these have wildly different specifications - the XTi is 10MP, but the D40 apparently shoots great 6MP images), then there's the next step up, somewhere between $1000 and $1300 or so, Nikon's D80 and Canon's 20 or 30D (not much changed between the two models - both are actually 8MP, but aren't at a significant disadvantage to the D80, and some compare them to Nikon's D200), then the two that are closer to $2000, Nikon's D200 and Canon's 5D. There are Nikon's D2x/h/whatever and Canon's 1D cameras, at which point for all but the most professional we're getting into total overkill territory.

To note, I myself have been trying to decide between a 30D and a D80, and am leaning towards the D80 for slightly higher resolution, slightly better handling of edges on long exposure streaked-light stuff, a more "film"-ish image appearance, and slightly more realistic colors at natural settings. Finally, I'd 1. advise you to check out dpreview.com (but don't let its forum members talk you into a specific brand or into buying a pricier camera than you need) and 2. do read Ken Rockwell, but take him with a grain of salt - he's been accused of reviewing cameras based only on specifications, rather than actually using them!

Edit:
And yeah, for that matter, if you've already got a decent array of compatible lenses (make sure that they're compatible), a Sony may in fact be worth it - lenses cost a lot!