What do you think of digital photography?

Answer 1

The good points are that you can see what you have taken instantly, but I still love film, I think that there is a element of just shooting a lot of pictures and hoping for the best with digital photography where as with film you had to think more about what you were doing.

Answer 2

Personally I think it's great. I would say I've become a better photographer as a result of using my digital slr because I feel able to take more risks with composition. I can try new techniques and not have to worry about wasting a roll of film. I can see my pics in colour or black and white and decide which I prefer. (black and white for the most part) Basically, I feel less afraid.
Having said all that, I did learn basic photography using a film slr and it has one thing that digital cannot reproduce. The feeling of working with something real.
Using film, from start to finish you're working with things you can touch and in a bizarre way, it does make one hell of a difference.
Yes, developing film can take a while. Printing may not be as straight forward as it is on a computer......but it's a lot more fun.
I love my digital slr, I really do, but my Canon AE-1 program and a roll of Illford HP-5 feel like my babies and that's the difference.
I suppose it's all a means to an end ultimately. Those who wish to learn how to take photographs properly will do regardless of equipment.
Using film will encourage a person to learn good photography skills and good technique but using digital will help to encourage creative freedom.

Answer 3

I spent a small fortune on camera and lenses for a film SLR. Then I found it was too expensive to keep on taking pictures and having them all processed and printed. Eventually I stopped taking pictures because about 4 or 5 out of a roll of 36 were just what I wanted. Now I have tried digital photography and there is no going back. I started with a basic point and shoot Praktica which I have given to my grandson. It takes good pictures , even for a five year old. I progressed to a better Kodak digital camera but it ate up the batteries and was not as versatile as I wanted. If you can afford it - go for a Nikon D40 or even better the D40x (which is what I recently bought).You can crop and re-size the pictures in the camera, make black and white or sepia pictures from your original colour photos, put filter effects on your photos, take pictures at 3 frames per second etc, etc etc. I LOVE IT!!!

Answer 4

IMO, digital cameras encourage what I call the "Shotgun Approach" to photography - take 300, 400 exposures and hope 10% to 15% are worth keeping. It also tends to discourage, in many cases, actually learning about photography - how light, ISO, shutter speed and aperture all interact to make a good exposure, what good composition is and how to visualize your photo before releasing the shutter. I'm also of the opinion that sometimes people think a digital camera is somehow "magical" - that buying an expensive DSLR will suddenly make them a competent photographer or enable them to make night images w/o flash.

Obviously its an easy way to enjoy a form of photography. This is not a bad thing.

Answer 5

With a good digital camera, good computer with editing software and a good color printer, you never ever need the old film photography again. Remember one thing, price does not equate to quality, so check the digital camera reviews, some midrange cameras might be better than buying an expensive one.

If you made a good choice, you love never having to go to develop your photos, and you can do much more with them transfered to your computer than traditional photo prints.

To date I had three digital cameras, and they served me well, the best one I own is a Canon A95 which is currently an older camera but at 5MP it still works better than a 6MP newer camera I own, which I bought because it was more compact.

Also be sure that you buy a big card (compact flash or SD or whatever your camera uses), the internal memory of most digital cameras suck.

Answer 6

Digital photography has opened up a whole new dimension to photography....it is absolutely superb.
Even an average photo can be cropped and manipulated using software to produce a much better image for printing.
In addition no longer do we pay out to get 36 photos with thumbs covering the lens, over exposed, under exposed, red eye, blurry images and people walking in front of the camera....just print the photos you want.

For free enhancing, cropping and adding effects to photos I can recommend www.picnik.com.

Anyone else know a good website for image editing?

Answer 7

I started loving photography again because of it !
Before I had 36 chances max with each cassette and... it took 2-3 weeks before... I'd see the results. I never really got into photography because of that.

Now... I shoot a picture and see the result immediately. If I don't like it, delete it and make another one on the spot.
This gives me enormously more space to experiment.
I can go for sharp pictures, pictures with a little movement-blur, take 10 shots/sec. in high resolution mode or use it for film.

When I used to see something that perhaps... could... be interesting I often did not take a picture because of the costs, now... I even take pictures of things I don't really find interesting and sometimes they turn out as nice pictures as well.

I think more about light now, shutterspeed, ISO etc. etc. and I learned more in 5 months as I did in 20 years before.

Of course, I still make tons of photos that aren't worth saving, but who cares ? It only costs me a bit of power of my rechargeable batteries, nothing more...

When I do like a photo, but there's also something ugly on it, photo-shop on my PC... helps me to make it a perfect again. It can even be used to transform the picture in all kinds of art.

So, I'm _very_ enthusiast about it.

Answer 8

Instant gratification, eh?
Beats the heck out of buying film then waiting a few days do be developed. You can bracket cheaply and manipulate images much more easily; how long does it take to crop a photo now?
I like digital MUCH more, but there is something about the warmth of film, all other things being equal!
.

Answer 9

at the top end its almost as good a large format low iso film scanned on a drum scanner or like

at the bottom end its great because everyone can play with cameras, however it has lead to the proliferation of terrible images everywhere - which is good because great images really shine next to the run of the mill macdonalds photography which is far to common now,

so yeah its great on so many levels

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Answer 10

It's great for the amateur and professional alike, letting the average person get better 'happy snaps' and it allows a professional the ability to do in a few clicks what used to be take hours in a darkroom. That said, I still shoot my most important stuff on film because I KNOW I have a permanent record.