"poldy" wrote in message
news
So we had discussions about digital vs. film before.

The popularity of digital, along with the decline of film, came down to
convenience, cost, etc.

I've been happily collecting a lot of digital images of my travels for
years. Part of the explosion in popularity of digital photography is
due to tourism, which was also surging in popularity, at least until the
past year.

Anyways, I see the limitations of digital photography, particularly with
the relatively inexpensive point and shoot cameras. They've certainly
made these things small and made them easy enough to use that people
overlook their limitations.

One limitation is dynamic range, which you can see if you try to
photograph the interior of a cathedral or church where the interiors are
mostly lit by daylight coming in through the windows.

The windows, if they're in any part of the frame, will overpower the
rest of the frame and the result is a shot with a bright source and dark
walls everywhere else. This page contains a picture shot with film,
which would look vastly different with most digital:

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/why-we-love-film.htm

I don't recall film being that bad but then again, a couple of decades
ago, you used to be able to set up tripods and take long exposures
almost everywhere. These days, tripods are not only frowned upon in
interiors but in exterior public spaces as well in many European cities.

In any event, I dug up my old 35 mm SLR and went around trying to find a
battery and some rolls of films for it, after initially searching online
for processing and scanning services (idea is to import it into my
digital photo library, properly tagged with various metadata about the
content of those photos).

Few places sell film these days and I only find one place selling the 6V
battery needed for my old Canon SLR and it's from Germany and it costs
$12.

Online it's about the same after shipping and film also runs $5-10 a
roll, then another $5-10 just for developing and then probably about $10
for scanning.

You're reduced to online options, not necessarily to save money but
because most film photo shops have disappeared. Some photo shops carry
a few rolls and that's about it.

Even if I gathered all these materials, it's not likely the places I
would like to photograph would permit tripods or long setups. Beyond
the costs, film equipment is a lot heavier and bigger, even more bulky
than most DSLRs.

The payoff would have to be significantly better results in order to
justify lugging around the old film camera and associated gear.

Why not just buy a good DSLR and a good light meter and take photos the old
fashioned way?
You can set the "speed" of the sensor and play around with aperture and
shutter speed to your hearts content.

I have taken photos with my DSLR in various cathedrals and churches all over
Europe using manual settings and the in-built light meter and the results
are quite good.

Was told off in no uncertain terms in San Marco, Venice, because they have a
no camera policy. Sacre Coeur in Paris also doesn't allow photography but
that has to do with the fact that they have virtually continuous services
there.

I have just the one camera with a 28 - 200 mm lens (which on a DSLR makes it
the equivalent of about a 45 - 300 lens) and this is sufficient for most
purposes. It would be nice to have a wide angle lens but then the equipment
becomes too bulky. Now if someone came out with a cheap full size (ie 35mm
equiv) sensor then I could just use the present lens on that.
My wife carries a small point and shoot so we have a bit of each.