I don’t have the link but remember seeing a video on UTube comparing a Fuji 100mb camera to a view camera using 4x5 color negative. The results were close with the film version being a bit better.
So it came down to which process you prefer since they were so close.
Film renders differently. It's a look. But more importantly it's a process. People who say "it's a tool, whatever" are undermining the object that is film and film camera and our subjectivity to them.
HOWEVER, one should absolutely go for digital if they are after fidelity and if you can't tell the difference in your work AND the film camera itself isn't important to you, go digital!
You can slow down with digital, you can chose cameras that give you the decisive feedback of film cameras and you can just spend that film money in a really good backup system since you can't fall back on the negative (lol).
Or you can be an absolute sucker for the pain and shoot both like me!
I will not try to convince you to shoot film, but I will give you this link, along with my motivation.
I was a happy digital full frame shooter, following the occasional discussions on sensor size, but I often struggled to see/appreciate the difference. Those were mostly discussions on full frame vs crop sensors. But eventually I bumped into an image (or a discussion) thread on medium and large format. Wow! Eye opening. Very obvious differences. So I started to save up for a digital medium format camera because film is _obviously_ dead, slow, stupid, ... . But then the pandemic hit, and I realized I didn't want to spend $10k on a camera. I revisited my assumptions about film and ignored them because folks who were shooting medium format film showed amazing results, sung its praise, and stressed that a second hand film camera could be sold with minimal loss if it truly did not work out for me.
Well, here I am, 6 years later, with ~5 medium format film cameras that are slowly displacing my digital cameras. Film is not dead, slow, stupid, ... . But I admit, it is not for everyone. If you enjoy a deeper involvement in the process and an organic result, then film may be for you.
Edit: And be sure to think through the whole process, including developing, digitizing. I am at an advantage here as photolithography is part of my job, so developing B&W film at home did not intimidate me.
If you're doing it for the pixel peeping then you lost already. Either you like the process and look (Vs the cost) or you don't. I stopped shooting 35mm and doing 4x5 only. There is very little technical benefit to it but the process is therapy.
Unless you are doing large format and all that involves, digital is way ahead in terms of resolution and flexibility. I shoot film because I like the imperfections. Photos are like memories and memories are imperfect. When I look at my old film photos I have a different emotional response than looking at my old digital photos. YMMV.
Geoff D F wrote:
Unless you are doing large format and all that involves, digital is way ahead in terms of resolution and flexibility. I shoot film because I like the imperfections. Photos are like memories and memories are imperfect. When I look at my old film photos I have a different emotional response than looking at my old digital photos. YMMV.
Are your old film photos 40+ years old versus your old digital images that are 10 years old? Obviously nostalgia kicks in when many years pass.
Geoff D F wrote:
Unless you are doing large format and all that involves, digital is way ahead in terms of resolution and flexibility. I shoot film because I like the imperfections. Photos are like memories and memories are imperfect. When I look at my old film photos I have a different emotional response than looking at my old digital photos. YMMV.
Thanks to everyone who replied
I have singled out your reply Geoff as you basically hit the nail on the head… I miss en-prints so bad
I look through old photo albums with 6x4 prints and yearn for that innocence again….just that snap that I grabbed back then with a plastic lens film compact camera…and yet…and yet today with digital almost guaranteeing every single shot razor sharp and pretty much perfectly exposed (mirrorless) I somehow miss those en-prints !!
They seemed to capture a moment that my modern cameras can’t.
God I miss en-prints !!
Who’d’ve thought that!!
It’s just stepping back that’s stalling me…oh and the expense too!! 🫣😳
p.1 #10 · Probably asked a thousand times before….
Pixelpuffin wrote:
Thanks to everyone who replied
I have singled out your reply Geoff as you basically hit the nail on the head… I miss en-prints so bad
I look through old photo albums with 6x4 prints and yearn for that innocence again….just that snap that I grabbed back then with a plastic lens film compact camera…and yet…and yet today with digital almost guaranteeing every single shot razor sharp and pretty much perfectly exposed (mirrorless) I somehow miss those en-prints !!
They seemed to capture a moment that my modern cameras can’t.
God I miss en-prints !!
Who’d’ve thought that!!
It’s just stepping back that’s stalling me…oh and the expense too!! 🫣😳...Show more →
You need to PM Huss (Desmolicious) - I don't think he has ever told us the number of plastic point and shoot cameras he owns, but it must be dozens. The results can be surprisingly good for little money. I'm sure he can point you one within your budget.
p.1 #11 · Probably asked a thousand times before….
James Markus wrote:
You need to PM Huss (Desmolicious) - I don't think he has ever told us the number of plastic point and shoot cameras he owns, but it must be dozens. The results can be surprisingly good for little money. I'm sure he can point you one within your budget.
I wasn’t meaning revisiting plastic lenses - that was all I could afford back then
I was meaning en-prints in a flip photo album sat on a coffee table ready to be passed around.
It’s funny because now when I look through those old albums it’s the flaws that pull my heart strings, the slight orange streak from light leak, the snap that didn’t quite freeze the subject yet the back ground is sharp, the green cast from shooting under artificial lights etc etc
All the things that annoyed us back then I now find rather charming.
Flawless Perfection is so incredibly dull and boring these days, don’t you think?
p.1 #12 · Probably asked a thousand times before….
Pixelpuffin wrote:
I wasn’t meaning revisiting plastic lenses - that was all I could afford back then
I was meaning en-prints in a flip photo album sat on a coffee table ready to be passed around.
It’s funny because now when I look through those old albums it’s the flaws that pull my heart strings, the slight orange streak from light leak, the snap that didn’t quite freeze the subject yet the back ground is sharp, the green cast from shooting under artificial lights etc etc
All the things that annoyed us back then I now find rather charming.
Flawless Perfection is so incredibly dull and boring these days, don’t you think?
It has taken me awhile to embrace defective prints. I had to deliver color correct images to clients. When i saw them I knew which were exhausted chemistry, poor technique, cheap or expire paper, etc. Back in the day - they were crap. Then, I guess, some photog decided to say he deliberately screwed it up. Like when a cat trips on a rug, and then acts like they meant to do that. Terms like "cross processing" and the like seemed like invented terms to explain away errors, but they did connexct with people's nostalgia. It gave them the warm fuzzys. So, I've finally learned to appreciate that connection.
p.1 #13 · Probably asked a thousand times before….
James Markus wrote:
It has taken me awhile to embrace defective prints. I had to deliver color correct images to clients. When i saw them I knew which were exhausted chemistry, poor technique, cheap or expire paper, etc. Back in the day - they were crap. Then, I guess, some photog decided to say he deliberately screwed it up. Like when a cat trips on a rug, and then acts like they meant to do that. Terms like "cross processing" and the like seemed like invented terms to explain away errors, but they did connexct with people's nostalgia. It gave them the warm fuzzys. So, I've finally learned to appreciate that connection....Show more →
Getting a sharp picture has never been so easy as it is today
Even my phone gives ridiculously sharp vivid saturated contrasty pictures. I could hand a toddler a iPad and point them to the flowers in the garden, they would return with amazingly sharp vivid pictures everytime.
Which actually always kinda makes me laugh a little on other forums where guys sporting high end camera gear upload RAWs of flowers that tbh look no better than the snaps taken by the iPad clutching toddler !!
A sharp picture in 2026 is a given. Uploading for validation to fuel one’s ego says more than it should tbh.
Not meaning to ruffle feathers and btw I tripped and fell off my soapbox 🤣
But seriously uploading a sharp picture in 2026 is not enough..it’s a given.
p.1 #14 · Probably asked a thousand times before….
I think that digital cameras are better is just about every way. Film photography has analogies with other hobbies. A golfer who grew up in the 70s playing with clubs (persimmon woods and blade irons) that they absolutely loved. Eventually they moved onto better equipment. Then they go back and play the old clubs again. (There are guys that only play with old clubs.) There was a feel, a relationship that was built hitting 1000s of shots with that old set of clubs that's fun to relive. Guys in the foursome can't believe you're still playing those old clubs and that you kick their asses.
Or maybe you were a bike racer in your prime and you hung onto a bike that you really had to stretch to purchase. Bikes are much better now but you loved that bike and when you ride the old bike with the old shoes, something just feels right. It's super smooth and quiet and rides basically as fast as the modern ride.
That's a bit how I feel shooting the old cameras. I find it much harder to get get "quality images" (for a number of reasons), but I really enjoy the sound, the feel of advancing the film, the "k-thap" of the shutter. Developing film also takes some skill. I don't think I'll ever print in the darkroom again unless I use a digital internegative, since Photoshop gives so much power over the image.
p.1 #15 · Probably asked a thousand times before….
Pixelpuffin wrote:
Thanks to everyone who replied
I have singled out your reply Geoff as you basically hit the nail on the head… I miss en-prints so bad
I look through old photo albums with 6x4 prints and yearn for that innocence again….just that snap that I grabbed back then with a plastic lens film compact camera…and yet…and yet today with digital almost guaranteeing every single shot razor sharp and pretty much perfectly exposed (mirrorless) I somehow miss those en-prints !!
They seemed to capture a moment that my modern cameras can’t.
God I miss en-prints !!
Who’d’ve thought that!!
It’s just stepping back that’s stalling me…oh and the expense too!! 🫣😳...Show more →
There is a certain nostalgia and romance attached to film photography from those who left it for digital and come back for another try only to find things have changed and it's not as they remembered.
From someone who never left film, it's better now than it was twenty years ago. Most film prices have stayed steady. Prices are drifting downward after the spike during the Great Analog Resurgence of the late teens. There is still plenty of variety of films on the market, companies are finding new uses for older stocks and films from small companies are readily available. New, more environmentally friendly developers have come to market as have older formulas from new manufactures.
Scanning and sharing have never been easier. A cottage industry has emerged to supply equipment and software to support camera based digital capture. Once the negatives are dry, they can be captured, converted and ready to post in a half hour. The new conversion software takes a lot of the fiddling out of making a negative a positive. When Capture One enters the game, you know there are enough players.The photo hosting sites are good and there are enough specialty labs willing to wet print your negative.
The electronic dependent cameras of the 1980's and 90's are aging out but there are companies that are making shoe mount meters making a bunch of high end cameras with dead light meters useful. Pin Hole and plastic cameras offer a less clinical view of the world.
The days of one hour photos offering 4X6 prints and a CD for a tenner are long gone. That's what takes the fun out of someone wanting to pull out the old K1000 and run a roll of Kodadcolor through it without major investment in processing fees.
You asked a very legitimate question with a difficult answer. You can simulate film in a digital image but film will always look like film.
p.1 #16 · Probably asked a thousand times before….
Pixelpuffin wrote:
Thanks to everyone who replied
I have singled out your reply Geoff as you basically hit the nail on the head… I miss en-prints so bad
I look through old photo albums with 6x4 prints and yearn for that innocence again….just that snap that I grabbed back then with a plastic lens film compact camera…and yet…and yet today with digital almost guaranteeing every single shot razor sharp and pretty much perfectly exposed (mirrorless) I somehow miss those en-prints !!
They seemed to capture a moment that my modern cameras can’t.
God I miss en-prints !!
Who’d’ve thought that!!
It’s just stepping back that’s stalling me…oh and the expense too!! 🫣😳...Show more →
Prints are great, I have boxes and boxes of them. On the other hand I always print a few books each year of memorable trips etc that we do. I much prefer those to a box of prints or albums with the little corners holding prints in place and all that.
p.1 #17 · Probably asked a thousand times before….
chez wrote:
Are your old film photos 40+ years old versus your old digital images that are 10 years old? Obviously nostalgia kicks in when many years pass.
I have film photos from the early 80s through to today and digital from 2003 through today. There was a period between about 2010 and 2019 where I didn't shoot any film. I regret that I stopped. Even when I look at my modern film shots or the period to 2010 when I shot both I'm glad I shot film. It's not nostalgia. I'm more likely to want to go back and look at my film shots from any era.
I'm not saying film is better. Digital is better in every objective way. But for me it's how I feel about my photos and I feel differently about my film photos.
p.1 #18 · Probably asked a thousand times before….
Geoff D F wrote:
I have film photos from the early 80s through to today and digital from 2003 through today. There was a period between about 2010 and 2019 where I didn't shoot any film. I regret that I stopped. Even when I look at my modern film shots or the period to 2010 when I shot both I'm glad I shot film. It's not nostalgia. I'm more likely to want to go back and look at my film shots from any era.
I'm not saying film is better. Digital is better in every objective way. But for me it's how I feel about my photos and I feel differently about my film photos....Show more →
Do you make 4x5 prints from your digital images and stuff them into albums like you do with your film prints?
p.1 #19 · Probably asked a thousand times before….
chez wrote:
Do you make 4x5 prints from your digital images and stuff them into albums like you do with your film prints?
I do make 4x5" prints from IR or B&W digital files as Pictorico foil prints from an inkjet printer which serve as digital negatives for darkroom prints. Couple examples of scanned prints in 14x11" from this kind of digital negatives:
