why film is superior to digital

[weetsie]

just thought i would make a thread explaining why i use film over digital sometimes, you can share too

on holiday, i find film far superior to digital in nearly every way which is why i always take a hexar AF.

people say that film is expensive as you pay $5-20 for every roll you buy and get developed, but i usually only use a single roll on a week long holiday regardless of how many rolls i take.

people also rightly say that digital is higher resolution/quality which is true if you compare the same sized media but what digital camera can you get for $400 that has an insanely fast AF, F/2 lens that's as sharp as a summicron 35, 35mm DOF control and huge exposure latitude? sure, if you spent $1000 on a DSLR+35mm prime you will out-resolve 35mm film and do most things my film camera can do and more, until you try and put it in your pocket. a 4/3rds or APS compact will still have decent DOF control and it will definitely fit in your pocket and exposure latitude will almost be as good but it will be nowhere near as fast in operation, maybe 100 times slower when you consider with my film camera i can be walking along, lift the camera to my eye fully depress the shutter and an exposure will be taken within 1/4th of a second, with a digital camera i have to turn it on, wait for an image to appear on the LCD, stop walking so i can hold it still half a metre in front of me then half depress the shutter and wait a second for it to focus before finally taking the photo. to some people it might sound that i am over exaggerating the difference here but that alone really is a huge deal to me.

next thing that i love about film is the keeper rate, which is normally 100%. mainly because the shots i take are shots of things that i know i want a photo of, not just things that i could take a photo of but also the chances of wrong exposure are far less likely even with slide film. to give an example i was on a tour in amsterdam and the tour guide announced that to the left is the mayors house, everyone rushes to the left with there cameras to take photos, some people took 1, some people took more like 4 then sat back down to hit the review button on there camera to check the photos they just took. it happened with basically everything the tour guide mentioned, when he said about how the port has a deep channel dug in it for container ships to use then pointed at a container about 20 miles out to sea and yet again everyone is up taking snaps of this ship which is barely dot on an empty ocean. now with digital you could argue that these photos could be deleted at no cost to you but what got to me the most is no one was taking photos of stuff that wasnt mentioned by the guide. i guess this is more to do with how people use cameras but if these people took 40 photos of stuff they wanted a photo of instead of 400 pictures of everything that might be a good thing to take a photo of they might just end up with more photos they really like and photos they would potentially of missed.

and i guess finally the thing that alot of people dislike about film is probably the thing i love most. i point my camera at something and take a photo, then i get on with enjoying my holiday, no looking at an LCD or taking more pictures of the same thing. i also then go home without seeing any of my photos and its a bit like reliving your holiday as you go through your photos as you have yet to see them.

another example of where film is still very useful is at a concert 2 nights ago i was stopped and searched at the door, he took the camera out of my bag and said "sorry, no professional cameras/photography". i was quite surprised that he considered a hexar AF a professional camera but then he sees the two canisters in my bag and says "oh ok its just a film camera"

its quite common for any SLR regardless of how amature a model it is to be what is classed as a professional camera at an event but as he wouldn't let me in with a hexar AF until he realised it was film im guessing he wouldn't of let someone in with a G1, GF-1, EP-1 ect so i dont think there is a digital camera that you could get in that would perform as well as my camera with an F/2 lens, spot meter with superia 1600 and tmax 3200.

other than that i shoot film because i enjoy it more, cant really say why but the above is real world advantages i find to using film in today's digital world.

 

[CSG123]

I wouldn't say it's "superior" but the thing I'm enjoying about shooting film on occasion again is that I slow down and think more. When I have one of my digital cameras I take more photos with less thought but I'm a cheapskate so film makes me think more.

I will still shoot mostly digital however because it does everything well except to provide a physical negative. However, all the cool gear is still film. Even the digital Leicas are a shadow of their film forerunners.

 

[user237428934]

I will never get it why the keeper rate is so import for some people. Let's assume you went to the horse race and won. Your friends ask how much you won and you tell them "I won 2:1". "Come on, how much did you get". "2 $ because my bet was 1$". "Oh".
What I want to say is, that most people are not interested in ratios but in the total sum of keepers. You take one film in a week long holiday? I would be disappointed to come home with only 36 keepers of one week of holiday.

 

[Fraser]

I shoot film for fun I like old cameras, that's it. I think anyone who says film is superior is kidding themselves. I tried and tried to justify shooting film to myself but I couldn't except for the fun of it.

 

[capito]

For me it's settled down to:
Digital is for photos I "need", when I need the results quickly, for the web, for difficult situations where I need to be able to verify the results.

Film is for playing around, for shots I do not "need", a hobby. But I greatly enjoy that and shoot most of my stuff in film.

I totally subscribe to your usability aspect, though. I've not found a digital camera yet with the simple and immediate usability (and consistency in operation) of the Hexar.

The real eye opener was when I initially was let down by the high-ISO performance of my Ricoh GX200. But then I realized that ISO800 film isn't any better!

 

[muf]

We have a photography club at the place I work. Each year we run a calendar. We each submit a maximum of 10 photo's and the members all vote for their favourite 12 out of the total submitted. I think this years was well over 100 photo's. We are not allowed to vote for our own of course. The top 12 get in to the calendar. I only submitted 6 photo's and 2 of mine got voted in. My pictures both taken on 35mm film. One was with a Rollei Prego 90 and the other a Nikon 35TI. They were from scans done at Costco while having them developed. The scans were only 1.5 megapixel. Some of the gear our 25 members use are quite impressive. Most use semi-pro digital SLR's Nikon D90 and Canon EOS40D are examples. Their images are far higher than 1.5 megapixel.

My point is that I feel that I had a better success rate because I cared about what I was taking. When I took the pictures, I considered them carefully and composed myself to ensure little camera shake. I thought about the picture rather than just churned out half a dozen of the same shot. I feel that film makes me look for more, and makes me spot the better angle as I consider carefully that I don't want something spoiling the shot. I have just invested in a Canoscan 9000f which I hope will provide much better resolution. I own a Canon EOS10D myself, and as good as it is I still prefer the characteristics of the shots taken with film. Either the photograph directly or the scanned image. They just have a color saturation and 3d effect that my canon doesn't provide. Plus the camera's look better, have character, they feel better and mostly all the settings are on the outside of the camera and not locked away in some distant sub menu of the main menu.

Paul

 

[weetsie]

some of you slightly missunderstood me, i should of made a few things clearer 😀

I wouldn't say it's "superior"

I think anyone who says film is superior is kidding themselves

misleading title, im not saying it is outright better in every situations see just giving some real world advantages that are more than just "its fun"

just thought i would make a thread explaining why i use film over digital sometimes

I will never get it why the keeper rate is so import for some people.
What I want to say is, that most people are not interested in ratios but in the total sum of keepers.

yes totally, if you can take 200 photos and get 100 keepers then your doing good in my view, the point i was trying to make is i think trying to take 4 photos of everything without thinking each time "do i actually want a picture of this?" can lead to missing things or missing your holiday for staring at an LCD while you fill an 8GB sd card

You take one film in a week long holiday? I would be disappointed to come home with only 36 keepers of one week of holiday.

no, i useually take 5 rolls or so but last holiday (4 days) i exposed 40 exposures on a roll of some elitechrome 100 and 8 exposures on a roll of superia 1600 but the time before that it was just 1 roll for a week long holiday and i had spare when i was in the airport on the way home.

We have a photography club at the place I work. Each year we run a calendar. We each submit a maximum of 10 photo's and the members all vote for their favourite 12 out of the total submitted. I think this years was well over 100 photo's. We are not allowed to vote for our own of course. The top 12 get in to the calendar. I only submitted 6 photo's and 2 of mine got voted in. My pictures both taken on 35mm film. One was with a Rollei Prego 90 and the other a Nikon 35TI. They were from scans done at Costco while having them developed. The scans were only 1.5 megapixel. Some of the gear our 25 members use are quite impressive. Most use semi-pro digital SLR's Nikon D90 and Canon EOS40D are examples. Their images are far higher than 1.5 megapixel.

My point is that I feel that I had a better success rate because I cared about what I was taking. When I took the pictures, I considered them carefully and composed myself to ensure little camera shake. I thought about the picture rather than just churned out half a dozen of the same shot. I feel that film makes me look for more, and makes me spot the better angle as I consider carefully that I don't want something spoiling the shot. I have just invested in a Canoscan 9000f which I hope will provide much better resolution. I own a Canon EOS10D myself, and as good as it is I still prefer the characteristics of the shots taken with film. Either the photograph directly or the scanned image. They just have a color saturation and 3d effect that my canon doesn't provide. Plus the camera's look better, have character, they feel better and mostly all the settings are on the outside of the camera and not locked away in some distant sub menu of the main menu.

Paul

have you thought about the fact that your photos might be getting picked because your a better photographer? 😎

 

[muf]

have you thought about the fact that your photos might be getting picked because your a better photographer? 😎

That's possible, but I'm on a far inferior megapixel rate and therefore my pictures don't have the sharpness and pixel integrity that the others do. If I do a single zoom on mine the picture is already pixelating. I get what you are saying though. Maybe I have a better 'knack' than most but to be fair I think film makes me try harder to squeeze as much quality as possible out of each shot.

Paul

 

[patois]

I'll give my example of my film is better. I went to a local mansion with my Bessa and my Heliar 15. I accidentally arrived with 1 roll of 24. Rather than take 600 pictures of the same thing, I told myself that my roll of 24 had to matter. Each shot was precious and i needed to think about the light and composition. The heliar 15 can be a beast trying to reduce distortion. The end result was highly satisfying. The majority of my roll of 24 was great which would not have been true if I had spent the day filling up a memory card.

 

[Fraser]

I'll give my example of my film is better. I went to a local mansion with my Bessa and my Heliar 15. I accidentally arrived with 1 roll of 24. Rather than take 600 pictures of the same thing, I told myself that my roll of 24 had to matter. Each shot was precious and i needed to think about the light and composition. The heliar 15 can be a beast trying to reduce distortion. The end result was highly satisfying. The majority of my roll of 24 was great which would not have been true if I had spent the day filling up a memory card.

That doesn't prove film is better it only show you shoot better when you take less pictures. Why don't you get some small memory cards that only have enough memory for a few pics🙂

 

[Neare]

That doesn't prove film is better it only show you shoot better when you take less pictures. Why don't you get some small memory cards that only have enough memory for a few pics🙂

That's what the delete button is there for 😀

 

[Mcary]

That doesn't prove film is better it only show you shoot better when you take less pictures. Why don't you get some small memory cards that only have enough memory for a few pics🙂

Yup some wise guy always has to bring logic into it. Haven't you heard it's physically impossible to take less then 600 digital images an hour.

 

[alcaraban]

people say that film is expensive as you pay $5-20 for every roll you buy and get developed, but i usually only use a single roll on a week long holiday regardless of how many rolls i take.

From my last holidays I got a few nice pictures to put on frame, that's some 200 USD. So figure, if you want your pictures printed, film + processing costs can be marginal.

and i guess finally the thing that alot of people dislike about film is probably the thing i love most. i point my camera at something and take a photo, then i get on with enjoying my holiday, no looking at an LCD or taking more pictures of the same thing.

So true 😉

 

[muf]

I have more confidence in the results from 36 film exposures than I do with 200 pics from a digital. Some of the sharpest digital shots I've taken turned out to be out of focus once I downloaded them to my pc. Those LCD screens really do kid you.

Paul

 

[Dave Jenkins]

I don't think anyone is arguing that film is technically better than digital. I use digital in my work as an architectural photographer and have no intention of going back to 4x5 film.

However, I will continue to shoot 35mm and medium format film for fun and for my book projects because using film causes me to slow down and think more about what I'm doing.

Also, film cameras are loads more fun to use than digital cameras.

 

[jsrockit]

I don't "shoot" any differently with digital than I did with film. I exposed (and wasted) a lot of film in my days. Conversely, with digital, I seem to take less than the average photographer. 3-4 rolls worth on a good day. Keepers? a few here and there...same as when I used film.

 

[akitadog]

Well, this is certainly interesting. I also shoot mostly film, with a little bit of digital as required. Let me explain.

First reason is that I grew up with film. I have the cameras that I like and want. they also happen to be film cameras. My Mamiya 6 and lenses I have had for more than 15 years. My Leica M4-P, M6 and assorted Leica lenses I have had for probably close to 12 years. To get this quality of equipment today is very costly. Also, most of the top of the line digital equipment is very heavy as well. As I get older, I appreciate the equipment I have even more. Then there is the reality that I prefer to take 10 or 20 rolls of film on a trip instead of all the digital bits and batteries, chargers etc., that are required. When I am up North, and hiking back country, film is a blessing. No batteries to worry about. Temperature and moisture are not an issue with the Leica's. A bit more of a concern for the Mamiya 6.

There is also the issue of archiving my images. digital is a pain. You always need to update computer and storage hardware. Disks can crash. data can get corrupted. All of this causes more headaches that need to be dealt with. With film, I simply pull out my archival chrome or film sheets, put them on a light table and look at them. No computer needed. In 20 or 30 years, you still only need a light table, or simply hold up to a window to see your images.

And last but not least....I still love film.

Digital is used for reference shots during renovation, quick family snapshots etc. They get printed, and if the original files get lost, it is not that a big of a deal for me. Usually, anything important is shot on film for archival and other reasons.

Regards

Akitadog🙂🙂🙂

 

[DrTebi]

One reason why I like film is because I can shoot slides and project them on my 7 by 7 foot screen with practically no loss in resolution. Most digital projectors can only do 2 megapixels in resolution (HD is 1920 x 1080 = 2073600), and thus all 10, 12, 14 or whatever resolution images never get their justice because the images are always scaled down.
Sitting just 5 feet away from a projected medium format slide on a 7x7 feet screen and seeing every possible detail is just an incredible experience.

 

[TaoPhoto]

We talk about film and digital in very broad terms here, and that's one problem. Sure, 18mp digital cameras capture about as much detail in a shot as good 35mm film, and somewhat less than good 120 film. For the moment I'll leave aside the question of color fidelity, or the problems of seeing the world in rows of tiny, same-sized binary dots. But I don't own a 18mp pro-level camera, nor would I spend the money on one. The real world isn't made up of high end pro camera vs. high end pro camera, tha's for the photo mags. Thus, the question isn't just film vs. digital, but film vs. digital at the level you can afford or choose to spend. In that equation, film often wins.

 

[btgc]

I don't care about resolution. I just don't like virtually unlimited DOF (I know, secret is to use Macro mode) of P&S's. And I like feel and controls of older cameras.

I shoot film for fun I like old cameras, that's it.

Bingo!