Digital BW, The Print

hi, I agree with you in many respects regarding film - and i'm not  
digital camera user (just considering the possiblity, and so am in  
the research phase).

But I don't think that the DSLR cameras are necessarily just consumer  
snapshot cameras --- they do take really good photographs, including  
black and whites (i.e. with conversion software etc.) - so, as long  
you can take really good photographs with your camera, it is not  
obsolete (no matter how much anyone sneers at your camera) However, I  
do agree with you regarding price, and the question about how digis  
are filled up with electronics, and are complex machines.

On the other hand... complexity is relative...

Altaf



On Dec 11, 2005, at 12:19 PM, lours51 wrote:

> Just my feelings about this very important subject.
>
> I am still using film and will for a long while I guess. At
> present if I had to go digital I would only go for a small pocketable
> camera.
>
> - Film is a very mature technic it had never been as good.
> - Film storage is easy and gives no hassle ; it seems that some
> museums make negatives out of digital files due to that.
> - With a neg or a slide you have a picture in hand that you can see,
> no such thing with a digital file.
> - Film forces you to think before you release the shutter.
> - As someone said earlier in this thread, the pictures grow in you
> and the treatment is also part of my pleasure.
> - The camera can be all mechanical, mature technic as well, no
> battery, it is very reliable and straight forward to use.
>
> - Digital is just born, the equipment is obsolete within months,
> there is no second hand market ; we talk now of curved sensor for
> example.
> - It is mainly electronics and that's very fragile, it sucks
> batteries within a whisper.
> - It relies on computer technology forcing you to keep up with both.
> - It is very easy to lost your files, they can get easily corrupted
> or erased.
> - Nonetheless the actual results are promising.
>
> I consider digital to be the typical consumer product, Snap, Look and
> Throw, you consume images. As an "amateur", for the reasons mentioned
> above, I will never deep in four figures $$$$ into a piece of
> electronic equipment, so I eliminate professionnal machines.
> And marketing doesn't help, when will we have just a simple camera, I
> don't want it to be a thermometer, clock, phone or coffee machine !
> I may have one of these toys and use it as such until some of the
> inconvenients are in control then I will reconsider my opinion.
>
> One final word, Mister Everybody who bought a digicam, will realise
> his mistake the day he will turn back and look for his souvenirs,
> there are many chances he won't have any, in return it was so easy to
> open a dusty shoebox and find everything in there.
>
> Michel