Digital and Film

1. Is digital as good as film?

In short: Yes.

Digital has indeed caught up with film for the vast majority of users. From a resolution perspective, 2 MB will give fine 4x6 pictures, and 4 MB will yield very good 8x10's, and even impressive 20x30 poster prints (albeit not tack-sharp close-up). So the issues are more subtle, revolving around other characteristics of digital cameras, and the "workflow" of digital photography, especially how one displays and stores the images. These considerations are what these articles are about, mostly.

This question may be obsolete for most people; digital is certainly the default choice these days.

The real issue is digital vs. film, whether you currently have a film-based camera or not. While both are for taking still pictures, they feel like rather different media in practice. To some extent, it depends on your desired product: electronic images for web pages, or paper prints (or slides for traditional projection, which has practically disappeared by now).

This is not an absolute distinction. There are various ways of getting electronic images from film: scanning from photos, or preferably, from the negatives or slides themselves using a dedicated film scanner, or most conveniently, getting your photo store or mail-order photo processor to scan the film onto CD-ROM.

And there are various ways to get prints from digital cameras: either printing them yourself on a "photo-quality" inkjet printer, or getting real photographic prints from one of the online outfits and an increasing number of retail outlets.

There are other less obvious interesting differences, in my experience:

• One takes a lot more pictures with a digital camera, since the marginal cost is zero (assuming you have the memory capacity). This can be very liberating!
• There is also an immediacy more akin to Polaroid cameras: one can see one's pictures right afterwards on the LCD screen, and then as soon as one gets back to a computer, see the images in the large and print them out. (Most cameras can also display onto a TV, though I've never tried this.)
• Digital cameras can be quite a bit smaller than film-based equivalents, since the sensors are often much smaller than 35mm full-frame, allowing lenses to be smaller. And one doesn't need room for the film-path.
• You may end up putting more work into displaying photos via a web-site and permanently storing the images, since you don't have a convenient physical artifact to show and store.
• You also have to worry about different logistical issues: running out of battery power and memory capacity, both of which can be quite serious limitations, especially on a longer or more remote trip. (These replace the older issues of buying or bringing enough film.)
• Today's digital sensors behave differently than film, and in particular don't seem to handle high-contrast scenes as well, so skies or deep shadows may have less detail. This is especially true for compact cameras with smaller sensors; it's better for digital SLRs with larger sensors. (This may be a more familiar problem for slide shooters, since negative film has more exposure latitude.)
• Current digital sensors are also relatively "slow", performing at their best between about 50-100 ASA equivalent. More sophisticated cameras can "dial up" a range of sensitivities, but this involves amplifying the output of the sensor, which also amplifies the noise. The resulting effect is fairly similar to the graininess of fast films, with a practical limit around 400 ASA for consumer-grade cameras. (Again, it's more of an issue for cheaper more compact cameras with smaller sensors. More expensive digital SLRs have larger sensors with larger pixels, which mitigates this effect, and offer useful speeds up to 1600 ASA.)
• Digital cameras can take several seconds to "boot up" and be ready to take pictures, so one must prepare in advance for any "critical moment" photography. In consumer-grade cameras at least, there can also a significant lag time between pressing the shutter button and the picture being taken, and between consecutive pictures, which can really hamper quick-action sports or candid photography. (Again, more expensive digital cameras have more sophisticated and faster electronics, larger buffers, etc., to mitigate this problem. Advances in electronics technology generally also are improving this situation over time.)

To digress a bit, one of the most significant differences in the actual user experience of different types of cameras, at least to me, is their viewing systems. Over the years, I'm most used to a 35mm single-lens-reflex (SLR) viewfinder image, which is a large, bright, and clear ground-glass image that helps one visualize what the final picture will be like. One also typically has ancillary information like shutter speed and aperture immediately available around the viewing image. The LCD screens on consumer digital cameras are somewhat similar, which is perhaps a reason why I like them.

I've also used rangefinder cameras a bit, and this is a very different experience. The "see-through" viewfinders of consumer digital cameras give you a small, relatively inaccurate, but accessible image in situations where the LCD isn't that great, such as strong lighting on the screen. Even a top-quality optical viewfinder, such as in a Leica M, just doesn't look as much like the final picture. It does have its advantages though: you can see stuff outside the frame, so can anticipate what's going to happen. And in some situations, like candid or street photography, you feel closer to or more in the action, whereas an SLR viewing image gives you a somewhat more objective or detached stance, like looking at a picture of the subject rather than the subject itself.

And then there is completely different stuff, like "look-down" roll-film single- or twin-lens reflex (TLR) cameras, with laterally reversed images which make following action pretty painful, or even large-format view cameras, with bidimensionally-reversed images! And yes, there are digital backs for these, but now we're wandering pretty far afield...