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[OM] Digital trends (LONG and RAMBLING)

Subject: [OM] Digital trends (LONG and RAMBLING)
From: "Donald MacDonald" <Donald.MacDonald@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sat, 23 Dec 2000 17:03:53 -0000
CH Ling wrote:

<snip>
On the other hand a digital camera do give us the convenient, cost saving in
film and in future equal or better than film in quality.
<snip>

I dunno about this, CH. I don't think it's the right word (because no-one
likes to be conned, and they get defensive if you say they have been) but I
think the general mass of the point-and-shoot public is being conned into
going digital.

Now 'wanting' digital and 'needing' it are completely different concepts,
and differ from person to person. A lot of people on this list probably say
they 'need' digital, but they need it like they need another OM1 body or
(Zuiko!) 50mm lens. They're justifying it because they want it. And it is
the job of the marketing departments to make us want digital cameras, and
they are churning out 'good' reasons for us 'needing' to change. The
prophecy is self-fulfilling.

Digital adverts push the 'get rid of the ones you don't want/need/like'
mentality. Anyone who has ever gone through their back catalogue knows the
pitfalls of that. Look at the size of the screen you are asked to make this
decision on. They also push the fact that digital is fast replacing film. Is
it? A plethora of manufacturers are tooling up production lines to produce
modern cameras and retro-styled cameras. Suddenly there are a lot more
medium format cameras using 35mm technology and handling. I'm sure they
could abandon this investment overnight, but I don't detect any signs that
they will.

Many people 'need' digital. Those working against time deadlines remote from
where the image will be used, for example. Those who need a quick shot to
evaluate conditions etc (I can think of several scientific, technical and
industrial applications). Mike Veglia and Ken Norton have postulated other
valid schemes. In other words, professional users may 'need' digital.

Better quality than film? I went to the Salgado exhibition in Luxembourg
city a couple of years ago, and the Family of Man exhibition at Clervaux.
Some of the prints were absolutely huge. You had to stand thirty feet away
to view them. 35mm film has more than enough quality for most applications,
the others are covered by 120 roll, large format, and good technique. A well
exposed transparency has more than enough information on it for the vast,
overwhelming majority of users. Any more is like a broken pencil. Pointless.

One more thing about quality. I am blown away by the scans I get at 2700
dpi. God knows what 4000 dpi is like, but I don't need it. Some of my scans
are 50-odd megabytes. Yeah, sure, memory will soon be so cheap and small
that you can get 300 of these on a card no bigger than  a gnat's arse, but
why?

I shove through family snaps and other print jobs in the local chemist. They
offer a next day service, they do a roaring trade locally and the quality is
fine. Most people seem to photograph family, holidays, nights out etc. This
is not a particulary wealthy area, but a lot of people have cable or
satellite TV, a lot have computers (I track this by the use made by my
wife's primary school pupils of computers for homework).

It seems to me that most of these people are served pretty well by film and
fast developing. The one-hour service offered by another local chemists is
not as well patronised (the quality is variable). Current p&s digitals
affordable by families on modest income, say around 8-10 thousand UKP per
annum, are poor value compared with a p&s film camera and a free film on
processing. A lot of people around here probably never BUY film. And they
will have six months' photographs on a roll. They want prints they can hand
round. The marketing men say they can put the digital ones straight into
their TV and see them there. Big deal.

In short I don't think digital at the consumer level will be any more
convenient or of any greater observable quality than film. An E-10 may be a
fine instrument, well made, even 'desirable', but offers ME nothing over my
iS3000. And useful as my iS3000 is, it offers me little over my OMs, and
even then only in specific situations. I want a slide or a print. Lichfield
is going completely digital, but that is no more reason for me to do it than
for me to buy a Colnago C40 just because the Mapei team use them.

As an interesting aside, 'family' photographs of kids with their siblings
taken at the school and sent home on approval to parents have been scanned
in, losing orders. Next year parents will have to come to the school to view
them, and buy them.

Sorry for the length,

Donald.





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