A Question About Film vs Digital - NO WARS PLEASE

"PGG" wrote in message
newsan.2005.01.09.23.17.38.933000@NO_SP_A_Myahoo .com...
Another consideration is that sub-$2000 digital SLRs have a 1.5x cropping
factor. So your 28mm wide-angle lens is no longer a wide-angle lens.

The biggest consideration is how your friend wants to work. Does he want
to work digitally with photoshop in front of a computer? Or does he want
his negatives/slides and have a lab handle all the work of printing?
Of course you can slide negatives and slides for digital work, but if that
is the goal, then capturing with digital is the way to go.


That's a good point. He is definitely not a computer person. Even if he
went to digital, he would just take the memory card down to the lab.

Walt

Walt Hanks wrote:
At the risk of starting another flame war, I would like some actual
discussion and advice please. Here's the situation.

A good friend, who is an amateur photographer with significant latent
talent, has asked my advice in replacing his camera. His F-70 has
bitten the dust. We have been discussing Film vs Digital for some
time and have come to the following conclusions.

1. Digital is an excellent choice for well-lit scenes at moderate
temperatures and the best choice for studio work.
2. Digital cameras are still inferior to film in low light situations.
3. Digital is still inferior to film when conditions are less than
ideal, such as on a winter camping and hiking trip with temps below
30 degrees, or a Canyon Lands bicycle tour with temps over 100
degrees. (Both Nikon and Canon say that the operating temp ranges of
their top cameras are 30 to 100 degrees F.)
4) Canon makes superior digital cameras, but inferior film cameras.
5) The advantages Canon provides over Nikon in the digital realm are
not significant enough for an amateur, even an avid one, to toss out
a well developed Nikon system (He has 6 lenses and a lot of other
equipment).
So, we are planning to go down and buy an F5 or F6 tomorrow. Is there
something we missed in our considerations?

BTW, money is only a minor issue for this situation.

Sorry, but I can't fully agree with any of your five conclusions.

I will suggest that #6 is not wrong or second rate, but it is a toss up
between C & N.

--
Joseph Meehan

26 + 6 = 1 It's Irish Math

You don't count in the cost of film and processing and consequently come out
with a completely wrong answer. I average 150 rolls of film a year - at
cheapest that would be 4.00 per roll of slide film and another 5.00 for
processing -- 100 ISO only. I could buy a digital camera and a couple memory
cards for that money and anythign after the first year is all gravy.

--
http://www.chapelhillnoir.com
home of The Camera-ist's Manifesto
The Improved Links Pages are at
http://www.chapelhillnoir.com/links/mlinks00.html
A sample chapter from "Haight-Ashbury" is at
http://www.chapelhillnoir.com/writ/hait/hatitl.html

"Transparency" wrote in message
...
The truth of the matter:

Digital is more convienient in terms of speed, but much more expensive
to get equivalent quality - DSLR, computer, all that time messing around
in Photoshop, oh, and then the pricey inkjet prints. But at least you
can see the results straight away.

But get a decent slide projector for a fraction of the price and take a
few rolls of Fuji or Kodak or whatever on a camera costing 1/3 or 1/4
the price of an equivalent DSLR and compare those translucent results
with you "please don't smudge them" inkjet prints.

And the enlargements of the projected slides are much bigger than those
costly A4/A3 Epson prints .....

Pity I have to wait a week to get the slides back from the lab ...

Take your pick

Which is no problem. All the people who claim you HAVE to use a computer a
lot with digital seem to think that labs don't exist for digital. Every one
hour photo place I've seen in the last year or two has a big sign saying
"Prints made from you digital files"

--
http://www.chapelhillnoir.com
home of The Camera-ist's Manifesto
The Improved Links Pages are at
http://www.chapelhillnoir.com/links/mlinks00.html
A sample chapter from "Haight-Ashbury" is at
http://www.chapelhillnoir.com/writ/hait/hatitl.html

"Walt Hanks" wrote in message
...
"PGG" wrote in message
newsan.2005.01.09.23.17.38.933000@NO_SP_A_Myahoo .com...
Another consideration is that sub-$2000 digital SLRs have a 1.5x
cropping
factor. So your 28mm wide-angle lens is no longer a wide-angle lens.

The biggest consideration is how your friend wants to work. Does he
want
to work digitally with photoshop in front of a computer? Or does he
want
his negatives/slides and have a lab handle all the work of printing?
Of course you can slide negatives and slides for digital work, but if
that
is the goal, then capturing with digital is the way to go.


That's a good point. He is definitely not a computer person. Even if he
went to digital, he would just take the memory card down to the lab.

Walt

Walt,

If your friend has six nice Nikon lenses that he wants to keep and keep
using, I would say the choice is between the F70D/F100D or an analog Nikon
house. So, why bother with speculations about Canon?

Rather, I would focus on these points:

- Would his lenses work on either F70D or F100D?

- Has he tried handling the different cameras?

Just my 2 dimes..

Henrik

PS: I hope his talent is not _too_ latent ( = well hidden)?
"Walt Hanks" skrev i en meddelelse
...
A good friend, who is an amateur photographer with significant latent
talent, has asked my advice in replacing his camera. His F-70 has bitten
the dust. We have been discussing Film vs Digital for some time and have
come to the following conclusions.
snip
5) The advantages Canon provides over Nikon in the digital realm are not
significant enough for an amateur, even an avid one, to toss out a well
developed Nikon system (He has 6 lenses and a lot of other equipment).

On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 01:30:56 +0000, Tony wrote:

You don't count in the cost of film and processing and consequently come out
with a completely wrong answer. I average 150 rolls of film a year - at
cheapest that would be 4.00 per roll of slide film and another 5.00 for
processing -- 100 ISO only. I could buy a digital camera and a couple memory
cards for that money and anythign after the first year is all gravy.

So *what* exactly is stopping you from doing that, Mr. Spadaro? You
appear most vocal on a subject you have very little experience with, viz.
digital SLR's.

I have been shooting digital for 3 years and while it works well for
certain applications, a casual photographer who doesn't want to spend
hours in front of a computer correcting photos that looked great on the
little LCD but crap on a bigger screen, would be infinitely better off
with a film camera.

Not everyone is shooting 150 rolls per annum.

Some have reached different conclusions. See below:

"Walt Hanks" wrote in message
...
At the risk of starting another flame war, I would like some actual
discussion and advice please. Here's the situation.

A good friend, who is an amateur photographer with significant latent
talent, has asked my advice in replacing his camera. His F-70 has bitten
the dust. We have been discussing Film vs Digital for some time and have
come to the following conclusions.

1. Digital is an excellent choice for well-lit scenes at moderate
temperatures and the best choice for studio work.

As is film. Larger film formats in a studio setting will outperform digital.

2. Digital cameras are still inferior to film in low light situations.

Uh, have you seen what some of the new digital SLRs are capable of at ISO
3200? Film never looked that good at that speed.

3. Digital is still inferior to film when conditions are less than ideal,
such as on a winter camping and hiking trip with temps below 30 degrees,
or a Canyon Lands bicycle tour with temps over 100 degrees. (Both Nikon
and Canon say that the operating temp ranges of their top cameras are 30
to 100 degrees F.)

I've shot digital down to 0F and over 100F. No problems.

4) Canon makes superior digital cameras, but inferior film cameras.

This is a very strange generalization. Upon what is it based?

5) The advantages Canon provides over Nikon in the digital realm are not
significant enough for an amateur, even an avid one, to toss out a well
developed Nikon system (He has 6 lenses and a lot of other equipment).

Dead on.


So, we are planning to go down and buy an F5 or F6 tomorrow. Is there
something we missed in our considerations?

If you already have an investment in Nikon gear, take a look at used F100
bodies. Great camera going for bargain prices. The F5 is wonderful, but
huge. The F6 is better, but a ton of cash.



BTW, money is only a minor issue for this situation.

:-)


--
Walt Hanks

"Walt Hanks" wrote in message
...
"PGG" wrote in message
newsan.2005.01.09.23.17.38.933000@NO_SP_A_Myahoo .com...
Another consideration is that sub-$2000 digital SLRs have a 1.5x
cropping
factor. So your 28mm wide-angle lens is no longer a wide-angle lens.

The biggest consideration is how your friend wants to work. Does he
want
to work digitally with photoshop in front of a computer? Or does he
want
his negatives/slides and have a lab handle all the work of printing?
Of course you can slide negatives and slides for digital work, but if
that
is the goal, then capturing with digital is the way to go.


That's a good point. He is definitely not a computer person. Even if he
went to digital, he would just take the memory card down to the lab.
Walt

I have no experience with digital but if what I read is true then the worst
possible prints come from digital photos that were left to the lab's
discretion. And it negates the most highly touted advantage of digital
photos which is the ability to modify them on your PC.
Film best!
me

"Walt Hanks" wrote in message
...
At the risk of starting another flame war, I would like some actual
discussion and advice please. Here's the situation.

A good friend, who is an amateur photographer with significant latent
talent, has asked my advice in replacing his camera. His F-70 has bitten
the dust. We have been discussing Film vs Digital for some time and have
come to the following conclusions.

5) The advantages Canon provides over Nikon in the digital realm are not
significant enough for an amateur, even an avid one, to toss out a well
developed Nikon system (He has 6 lenses and a lot of other equipment).

Those lenses will never work as well on a digital capture device as they do
on a film camera.

So, we are planning to go down and buy an F5 or F6 tomorrow. Is there
something we missed in our considerations?

IMO no deal breakers.

BTW, money is only a minor issue for this situation.
Walt Hanks

Film best!
me

On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 08:27:20 -0600, "me" wrote:

"Walt Hanks" wrote in message
...
"PGG" wrote in message
newsan.2005.01.09.23.17.38.933000@NO_SP_A_Myahoo .com...
Another consideration is that sub-$2000 digital SLRs have a 1.5x
cropping
factor. So your 28mm wide-angle lens is no longer a wide-angle lens.

The biggest consideration is how your friend wants to work. Does he
want
to work digitally with photoshop in front of a computer? Or does he
want
his negatives/slides and have a lab handle all the work of printing?
Of course you can slide negatives and slides for digital work, but if
that
is the goal, then capturing with digital is the way to go.


That's a good point. He is definitely not a computer person. Even if he
went to digital, he would just take the memory card down to the lab.
Walt

I have no experience with digital

Stop right there. You have just explained why you are not qualified to
comment on this type of photography.

but if what I read is true

And it probably isn't, or you just didn't understand it.

then the worst
possible prints come from digital photos that were left to the lab's
discretion.

Cite?

And it negates the most highly touted advantage of digital
photos which is the ability to modify them on your PC.

This is just *one* advantage.

Instant feedback.
Processing privacy.
Instantly switchable ISO.
Histograms.
Digital darkroom.
From photo to print or a newspaper-back-home in under a minute.
Shoot 1000 frames for less than 5c.
Total lack of lateral scratches, emulsion defects, static wipe-outs,
and permanently damaging processing errors and film switches.

Film best!

Insert 'was'.

It's time for you to trust the opinions of rest of the world. Tens of
thousands of film SLR users are switching to digital every year and
the vast majority are overjoyed, many of them will never use film
again.

Wake up, and smell the pixels.

--
Owamanga!