Re: SLR Picture Quality VS Digital Right now I'm actually considering going back from my prosumer DSLR
(Nikon D70) to shooting on film with my trusty F90X for anything that
will be enlarged beyond standard print size. Just a few days ago I made
a series of shots of some cool modern achitecture and the D70 really let
me down, especially in the highlights and in longer exposures.
The 6MP resolution is enough for my purposes and the shadow detail is
pretty good as well, but bright sparkly accents in the highlights are
just plain nasty. It appears as if these highlights are actually burned
into the image, because of a very ugly fringe that appears around them.
This looks like a problem with the digital sensor that doesn't have the
necessary bits allocated to the bright part of the gamma to catch proper
highlights without the nasty fringes. I know it's not a lens issue
because the exact same lens doesn't show this problem on my F90X.
Longer exposures also show 'hot pixels' sometimes. These can be
photoshopped away most of the time, but I personally find them annoying.
The hot pixel issue on long exposures in inherent to the technology used
and plagues all digital cameras at the moment so you can't really just
throw cash at it to make the problem go away completely.
So in short: if you're going to photograph buildings, landscapes and
other stationary scenes: bring a tripod and use film.
The quality of film may or may not be 12Mpix equivalent, that doesn't
really matter much. The 6MP you'll get from a consumer DSLR is certainly
obtainable with any type of film. Also consider price: you'll have to
fork out thousands of $$ to get a 12Mpix DSLR body alone, while a used
Nikon F80 can be had at a tiny fraction of that price and offer the same
potential sharpness as a D2X. Especially with non-moving subjects the
improved handling and controls of the D2X are completely irrelevant.
That's thousands of photos worth of price difference. Plus you'll get
better highlight detail from film.
You've already got your Cybershot for quick snapshots in high volumes.
For 'real' photo's I'd advise you to get a (used) Nikon F80/F90X/F100 or
equivalent from another brand depending on your budget. These are very
dependable camera's that can be found dirt cheap (I saw a F100 body with
a vertical grip for $300 recently) on the used market now that
everyone's ditching them in favor of digital.
Remember that the camera body itself is essentially not much more than a
dark box with a light meter and a shutter inside. Any moderately recent
(the F90X was released in 1999 I believe) SLR body will provide good
metering and decent shutter speeds. If you save $300 on a used SLR body,
you can invest that in higher quality glass that will actually make a
visible difference in your shots. Think vignetting, sharpness, chromatic
abberation, performance in low light conditions.
Also, if you're going to any reasonably developed country, buy your film
when you arrive at your destination and have it processed there before
you return. That way you'll make sure your film passes through customs'
X-ray device only once (and in a less vulnerable processed state) on the
return trip and you'll shorten the time the exposed film spends
unprocessed in your bag.
Lastly some rules of thumb: the slower the film, the less grain you'll
see. And slide film generally gives less grain than negatives. The
tradeoff is that negatives have a much bigger margin for exposure
errors. You have to get the exposure of a slide just right or it'll look
like crap. Negatives allow to be off a stop or two in exposure in either
direction. Slides are much more critical. Half a stop wrong will be
noticeable.
Above all though, enjoy your trip!
Bas
Bas v.d. Wiel
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