I am a photographer...have been for nearly 35 years...I have digital SLR's and film 35mm SLR's...what is the best in your opinion....digital or film...
I worked in a pro photo lab for 9 years...Film processing, slide processing, machine printing, large scale printing to quality control and spotting pics...dust ect...but then digitization came to the lab and one machine could do the work of 12...so even though negatives were the best...digital has taken over for being a cheaper method...but to be honest now most cameras are really point and click, with the viewer on the back giving TTL so what you see is what you get...depth is automatically adjusted, Camera companies don't want complications...Manual SLR's on the other hand everything was adjustable, shutter speeds, focal depth, film speed....anyone ever push a film...miss those days....sometimes..
The truth is using film is just not practical. I have a fabulous Olympus 35 mm auto SLR camera that cost an arm and a leg 20 years ago, a beautiful camera, but where am I going to take the film? And then what, scan onto my computer? I look at it now with sadness. It's a beautiful relic. I used to do BW print photography back in the 70s. Doing that stuff is wonderful to do. But just like I don't think I could go back to BW TV, I know my film days are over. And film is just expensive.
There was a period when film could be argued gave a better image but those days have gone long ago. You can argue that film gives an advantage in a few rare applications but for years now every shot I have produced is better than anything I did on film before that - now even my phone outdoes my old film cameras. Couple that with the post-processing available to digital images - and things like photo montage / stacking - and it's a no contest.
I've had a lot of great cameras in my life. The one I have now is 24MP and the pictures I get from it all far, far above what I could ever have gotten with film. The ISO aspects,the cost per picture and being able to work on them with a computer using PS just seals the deal.
Simply considering the advances being made in electronic light sensing should answer that question. There was a time when I wouldn't think of using the electronic camera and even did all of my astronomical imaging on film. Mainly because of the control I had in developing and printing. The tide has turned. Control over electronic images has surpassed that of film by orders of magnitude. Further, one can work at extremely high ISO and grainy images are a thing of the past.
There is now, not yet on the market, a technology that will allow high power telescopes without the use of lenses or mirrors, and they say that resolution will be hundreds of times better than anything available today.
more info on this?
@arnies -- I'll ferret it out for you.
@arnies -- Here are a batch of reasons why we can't do this yet.
And here are some reasons from Lockheed-Martin why we can do it.
@evidentialist Thanks, Very interesting.
Who uses film any more? If you do manage to get a photo of a distant bird, it will be tiny on the film, need to be blown up, enhanced, developed, etc, at great expense and time for just ONE picture.
Sort of like keeping a horse and carriage in case cars go out of style.
Digital is convenient, cameras to phones, but development is a cool process that’s getting lost.