digital or film??

[Ruu]

There is a group of people on this board, and others, who could take better pictures than me with a pinhole camera. Yet even I have still managed a couple that have a certain "wow" factor. How? Digital camera, large media card, persistence, blind luck. And you know what - I enjoy every single second of it. As a rank amateur I just don't see myself getting the same kind of satisfaction from film with only 36 exposures per dive - I can take that many in ten minutes on a whim with my Olympus. If you are in my experience / ability level then join me on the digital dark side, if you have been a prefessional photographer then go film - it may well be worth it.

Dave

 

[PapaBob]

Not so long ago this would have been a flamefest. I bought a Nikonos III in 1984 from a guy who needed some cash to leave town and I have used film underwater ever since. I agree that good slides are better but I prefer print film for the ability to quick process at the local lab and hand out the ones that turn out. I can digitize negatives if need be. I bought my first digital land camera 6 weeks ago and I love it, but still go back to film all the time. If you have film experience, are comfortable with shooting all manual, and have a trusted local lab, then look at some of the good 2nd hand deals on ebay and enjoy shooting film. I have never shot digital underwater but I am convinced from what I read and see on this forum than most beginners will do better and be happier with a digital format. Eventually, I intend to enjoy both!

---Bob

PS Dee, you have a new 5050. Does this mean you are NEVER going to shoot film underwater again??

 

[beeman]

Thank you all for all the great information. It was good to see the ideas from both sides. I'm abit torn on which direction to take. I just bought a canon rebel 2000 2 months ago. I thought that I might as well just get a housing for it. But after some thought I think a digital would be better suited for my experience level. I,m more of a point and shoot kind of guy. Wouldn't the auto functions on the canon take just as good pictures as above water? As far as digital cameras go what camera would be a good buy. I've heard lots of people talk about the Olympus c-5050. Anybody have any recomendations.
Thanks for all the help.

 

[Dee]

The Oly C-5050 would be a great place to start. If you want to start out with just point and shoot, the auto modes make that very easy. But as you gain experience and comfort level, you might want to expand your photo abilities and the 5050 will be right there for you.

 

[Cabo]

Beeman.

I started out with film underwater many years ago and got some good (-very lucky-) shots. I loved it. However, after a trip to Belize and then out in the Gulf where I had less than 10% of my shots as keepers I decided to go digital.

I think I fall into your category of point-n-shoot. With digital I can shoot 10 shots of the same thing and not worry about storage. Also with film I always had the issue of having 12 shots left and trying to decide if I should use a new roll or not. Now I don't even think about it. I can shoot as many as I want and delete the bad ones.

Having the instant feedback on the LCD really helps you take better shots. You can see what you did wrong, change things and do it again.

If you follow Dee's advice and get a 5050 your quality should be excellent. I only have the Canon S400, so I'm at 4 megapixel and less custom settings. I'd probably do the 5050 if I could go back.

Either way you go you'll probably get some shots you really like. I just kept getting mad at myself for stupid mistakes when I used film since it was too late to correct anything by the time I realized what I'd done.

Good luck.
I'm off to Cozumel over Thanksgiving to see if I've learned anything from my past mistakes. Hope to get some acceptable shots.

S400 pics
http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=321273
http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=317259
Generic Aquashot pics
http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=223653

 

[Craigus]

Hi, Beeman:

A couple of folks have suggested the Olympus C-5050. You might also check out the Canon S50. They're both 5mpxl cameras, so you'll get great shots with them. Both manufacturers make a relatively cost effective u/w housing for them. The Olympus with housing would run you about $750 while the Canon with u/w housing would run about $50 less. I'm not as familiar with the Olympus as I am with the Canon (I own an S50) - and the S50 is full featured - so you can just set it on auto and have a ball - and then when you're ready, you can begin to expore all the full featured possibilities.

Whatever you do, have a blast!
Let's get wet!! :tree: :tree: :tree:
Eric.

 

[Mverick]

MikeS once bubbled...


I respectfully disagree. There are digital cameras available with much better quality than 35mm film; however they are very expensive. An extreme example is the camera on the Hubble telescope. Everything else being equal dollar for dollar film cameras still provide better quality (ignoring the cost of media). However this is changing.

Well I didn't think I needed to extend this into that realm but here goes...

A 35mm style digital camera still doesn't have the resolution of a 35mm film camera. 11's and 14's are close but still no cigar. Oh, this is using the exact same optics. Cannon lenses or Nikon's...

I'm not comparing Pro level backs or Hubble telescopes. I'm comparing what you buy for underwater use...

And actually, although it doesn't matter. THEY STILL USE FILM FOR RECON. It's higher resolution is the reason.. SR-71..... U2....

But they do have Digital too....

MikeS once bubbled...


The media, film or digital, has less impact on the quality of pictures than the optics. So if you are concerned about quality pay more attention to the quality of the optics than anything else. In digital cameras the number of mega pixels is much less important than quality of optics. A 5 mega pixel picture taken with poor optics is a high resolution fuzzy picture! The number of pixels is used as a comparison only because it is easy to quantify as opposed to optics quality which is not.

Actually, they have pro film that's dated. Use the stuff from Wal-mart if you wish. I don't... And using different film will give you different color casts.. So yea, it has a huge impact on the final print.

a 5 MP blown to 20x30 looks horrible no matter what optics are on it.... At 16x20... It looks bad... 35mm Film will print one out at 16x20 clear as a bell... Same Optics....



This statement is so wrong I don't know what else to say about it.. The media Film or Digital doesn't matter???? Only Optics???? WRONG......... Both matter... If digital wont record a large enough file to work with. How you gonna make a quality print???

MikeS once bubbled...

At this point you pay a premium for the convenience and instant gratification of digital. Additionally the optics options are more limited. I want instant gratification so I have a Sony DSC-F717. It has good Carl Zeiss optics but with a list price of $800 I could have purchased a better film camera with changeable lenses while this camera has a fixed lens.

Yep, Zeiss is good. But Zeiss has also made junk too.. All Hasselblad lenses aren't what they're cracked up to be.. So just cause it say's Zeiss. Doesn't mean it's high quality..

MikeS once bubbled...

Also keep in mind that the underwater housing can cost more than the camera. I paid $700 for the camera and $800 for the Ikelite housing.

Mike

Yep, and they're talking that the new Rebel Digital housing is gonna be around $1300.... That's a reason I want digital.. Housing is $160....

Not that it matters.. My Bronica set up was $2500 for the body.. Have 4. $2000-2500 a lense... 7 of those... Backs $750.... 10 of those..... That's Medium format... Guess what. It's all manual too. No auto nothing... I set up the shot... Not the camera... Funny how most pros do that... They buy the New F5 Nikon and still set up Manual.. Unless alot of movement...

And my 8x10 and 4x5 and 5x7 cameras were more than that..

And for a begineer. I'd still recomend a Digital. 5mp or more.. But telling people in 5 years it will be junk. While the film camera is still taking pics... That's the Digital world.. And why I haven't invested yet.. I'll rent... For Pro work...

 

[-hh]

Dee once bubbled...


Really? I'll have to do some research on that...thanks.

There's also pitfalls in the digital archiving process in terms of data formats: it will cost you time, effort and money to make sure that as your old PC gets upgraded every few years that all of your CD's are forward-compatible for:

1) physical format of the storage media
2) data format of the image file
3) compatibility of the reader application to your OS.

For example, let's take a disk that you saved years ago in Adobe Photoshop 2.0

Q1: Hey, where's my 5.25" floppy slot? Dang! Okay, let's say that it was new enough that you put it onto a CD: what format was the CD done in? High Sierra? Can your current PC even read the CD? Maybe, maybe not

Q2: Okay, you passed through that gate and you can see files on the CD (and they're not corrupted, etc). You crank up your current version of Photoshop, CS. CS is roughly the 8th revision; does it still offer the feature of being backwards-compatible to the ancient Photoshop 2.0 format you saved them in way-back-when? If so, you're still in business...for now: maybe the next revision of Photoshop won't support that format anymore.

Q3: But let's say that it doesn't. Fortunately, you anticipated this problem and saved a copy of the original Photoshop 2.0 Application on the CD with the image files as a "just in case". So you doubleclick the Application - - - Dang, it was a Windows 3.1 application and it doesn't run under your current OS. Whoopsie.

Granted, all of these problems are solvable by maintaining your CD collection with up-to-date formats and applications, but this takes time and money to do. For most of us, its not going to be the cost to do this, but the physical time that's going to be our "gotcha". And if anyone doesn't believe me on this one, I have a photocopier box _full_ of 400KB 3.5" floppies that I'll pay you $.50 per disk to burn onto a CD for me.




Its getting a bit dated, but a good read on this subject is:

"Silicon Snake Oil: Second Thoughts on the Information Highway"
by Clifford Stoll


-hh

 

[Dee]

Things I'm sure alot of folks never thought of.

Since I don't entend to go back to film just for archival reasons, and I'm sure I'm not alone, what do you suggest we do to save our digital photos? Other than copying the CD's periodically?

 

[bandit_TX]

TIFF is TIFF. I don't depend on Photoshop or any other proprietary file formats. Media formats are an issue. I can still get a 5 1/4" floppy if I want, but any data I had on one would have also been on my hard drive and backed up a number of times on other media. For strictly offline storage, you do need to consider revisiting it periodically, but I have had 9" tape reels in storage for 25 years that are still readable (and a few that aren't, that's why we store 3 of everything). The CD's that I have used for at least 10 years are still working. Film degrades over time as well. For anyone that wants long term archival storage, multiple media types is safer than depending on a single copy, single media. CD/DVD is a good starting place.