[stevebrot]

I love the look of the different emulsions

So true! I have a stash of Ferrania Solaris that I shoot with primarily because it has a non-realistic color rendering that I cannot easily copy with a purely digital image.


Steve

[OrangeKx]

I'm one of those people who has returned to film but I still shoot more digital. I reserve the film for B&W only. I agree that film does make you step back and think it through. I only go for the good shots on film, but with digital will do test shots now and then. Often times I go out with my digital K-x and my film camera. If I do, I take just a few film shots. I have two plates for my tripod so I can swap cameras quickly.

[keyofnight]

I switched from digital to film about a year and a half ago. The experience has been wild, because I feel like shooting film is exactly the experience I've wanted all this time. When I think about the years I spent shooting on a dSLR (an *ist D), it feel like I spent those years trying to replicate the experience of shooting on my first camera: a fully manual film body that I owned for 6 months and sold for a Canon Powershot S50 (like a fool).

I'm 28, so I don't have too much film nostalgia. No—I shoot film because it makes all the sense in the world for a person like me. Why? Well, tabl10s, you say:

To stop digital cameras from thinking for you, go manual.

I think you're absolutely right! If you want your camera to stop thinking for you, just tell it not to: turn on RAW mode, change the focus to manual, use manual exposure mode, and turn all the other junk off.

But most dSLRs aren't well-equipped for manual focusing. Most use a pentamirror configuration instead of a pentaprism, most aren't very bright, and most aren't very big either. I haven't used a dSLR in a while, but I haven't heard of any that come with a split-prism focusing screen—that's usually a 3rd party upgrade.

…also: a lot of the lenses nowadays, especially the more affordable ones, have shabby focus rings. They are not smooth at all, and sometimes the throw is not quite right (either too long or too short).

…and many dSLRs aren't set up for efficient manual exposure control. Some cameras only have one jog dial; you use it for aperture, but you have to hold a button and while moving the jog dial to set shutter speed. The top Pentax models are great: they have two jog dials. (I, personally, can't afford the top of Pentax's line…I'm pretty broke.) But even in the best case scenario, I had to look at a screen of some sort to control my shutter speed and aperture. I didn't get much feedback either, I had to roll the dial until the right number came up (either in the viewfinder or on the top of the screen). Sometimes that felt fidgety, and other times I resorted to using the green button for quick auto exposure settings.

My point: todays dSLRs aren't always the best cameras for that style of shooting. I have done it (for 6-7 years no less), but my camera gave me many indications that it wasn't the best equipped for what I wanted it to do. I ended up wondering, "Why exactly am I not shooting with a film camera, again?" At some point, I had a 7 year old *ist D with a chinese split-prism focus screen, a Pentax-A lens on the front, and all of the automatic settings turned off. I was making it do something that wasn't its primary job, and I could feel it. I had to stop lying to myself.

Yes. You can "go manual," but at some point that's not going to be enough.

[redrockcoulee]

I never stepped back because I never left film. By counting the number of images I shoot per year digital wins but I often when I go out on a shoot I take no digital camera along. I now have the best darkroom I have ever had at home but also have a scanner and a good digital printer. Lately my wife has "gone back" and is shooting paper negatives in pinhole cameras.

In digital I shoot almost always in either aperature priority or manual. One of the features that I like about my wife's K5 better than my K-r is the lock on the mode button. On the K-r the mode dial is the exact same place and shape as the shutter dial is on my MZ5n or the old Spotmatics hence the errors on my part.

I think of digital versus film the same way that in the 80s there was mountain bike versus road with the former being the newer and better and going to replace the latter and in the end there is a place for both and many enjoy using both types.

Very little of my colour is on film mostly as I do not wish to print colour in the darkroom. Next week I expect to be shooting some Ektar in my Hasselblad for a series I want both colour and black and white as well as being square format in final print. A time and a place for each and neither are the best for everyone or everything. One of my cameras is 90 years old and it is a replacement for an earlier model that only differered in colour and no it is not a Pentax! Seneca Improved black lacquer replaced rosewood

[gofour3]

I never stepped back because I never left film

I never left film either and I’ve never owned a DSLR or even tried one. A Nikon Coolpix I occasionally use at work, is the only digital camera that I’ve ever used. (My workplace owns it, but I can borrow it anytime and I use it for taking pictures of items I'm selling on eBay)

Phil.