Digital vs. Film Photography
Digital cameras were first developed in the 1970s by technicians involved with the NASA space program who were seeking ways to transmit images back from probes in the cosmos. Since then, digital photography has become widespread as a public medium for taking photographs. The application of digital photographic techniques to consumer cameras has prompted debate about its characteristics compared to traditional film cameras. Both have advantages and disadvantages.
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Resolution
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Resolution for digital cameras is measured in pixels per square inch. Pixels are areas of the image sensor that each contain electronic information about the image. The more pixels, the more information and the better the resolution, or crispness and clarity, of the image. Measuring pixels for film is more difficult. A review by technology website PC Tech Guide suggests that resolution in film cameras of an equivalent size to their digital counterparts is better. Film image resolution is increased by using larger format film, a fast shutter speed and a quality lens.
Color Balance
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Digital cameras appear to have an advantage in capturing color. While both digital and film cameras can capture color resolution equivalent to that which the human eye perceives, digital cameras have no bias toward any part of the spectrum of component colors (red, green and blue). This makes the image more balanced. Film tends to have a bias toward some point in the spectrum, depending on the type of film and the manufacturer.
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Patterns
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The pixels on a digital image tend to be arranged in a grid pattern. Without sufficient resolution, this can lead to images being affected by patterns, making the image seem “blocky.” Film, by contrast, uses silver halide crystals on its surface to capture the image. These are arranged randomly, reducing potential patterning and making for a crisper image at low resolutions.
Review
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Digital cameras have the distinct advantage of the photographer being able to see the results of her image capture a fraction of a second after having taken the image. Almost all digital cameras have an integrated LCD screen that displays the result. The photographer can then decide to keep or reject the image. Film cameras do not have this ability and the results of the image capture are not known until the film is developed.
Numbers
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Films for traditional cameras only come in rolls of up to 36 exposures. This means you can take 36 photographs before you have to change the film. Digital cameras, because they store images electronically, are capable of taking and storing countless images. Images are stored on the camera's memory card, which comes in various sizes, but even the smallest ones can hold several thousand images.
Alteration
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Images from a digital camera are available to an almost endless variety of image manipulation techniques. As computer files they can be transferred to design programs, such as Photoshop, iPhoto or Picasa, that enable you to control and alter the image, from rotating and cropping it to adding visual effects and changing colors. Film does not allow this kind of manipulation, although there are a few ways you can change the outcome of a film in the darkroom, such as using different light sources. But this only can be done once per frame. However, it could be argued that this gives film images more integrity, containing only information captured through the camera's aperture.
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References
- Photo Credit film-camera on camera-bag image by Andrii Oleksiienko from Fotolia.com
