Are film SLRs worth buying?

[und34dcow]

For me shooting with film or digital camera is not as important as the comparison of SOFTWARE -vs- DARKROOM

OP, once you've been working in the darkroom, photoshop feels like a bad crap. Just started to scan film, however it will remain an activity just for the sake of posting on web.

 

[Buckster]

For me shooting with film or digital camera is not as important as the comparison of SOFTWARE -vs- DARKROOM

OP, once you've been working in the darkroom, photoshop feels like a bad crap.

:lmao: Man, how I love opinionated internet experts!!

This is gettin' good...

 

[ghache]

Photoshop bad crap? hurm, somebody is having too much blow or film devlopper.

 

[und34dcow]

I have a hunch that you sir, are the one so opinionated that you don't even allow yourself to understand the sentence in a way it is intended to. It's about the experience of having a bad crap not the crap itself (I love all of mine, no matter shape or consistency)

and photoshop is a fine piece of software worth the damn money they ask for

 

[burgo]

okay, I'm going to don my flame-retardant protective gear and give you my .02

pick up a film SLR, don't listen to these kids here shooting digital who've never got behind the wheel of 35mm I bet you half of the digital nutswingers here would be clueless if you gave them a full manual Nikon F from 1959 or a Canon rangefinder from the 50's. tell me I'm wrong.

It's a global market, you're from India you should know this by now, most of the 35mm gear I have I purchased locally from pawn shops and flea markets, Craigslist ad's, but my entire Kodachrome project used Kodachrome film from eBay. There's lots of 35mm equipment available on that site you could have it shipped there. I don't know where you would get it developed, but I'm sure you could mail it out.

Film image quality shot through a decent SLR is only surpassed by the most expensive digital SLR's, I'm talking about your Canon 5D's, Nikon D700's and above, you could build a full professional 35mm outfit with good lenses for half of the cost of digital and if you get the right lenses and decide to go the digital route, you've already got some nice glass to shoot with. I have a Canon Digital Rebel XTi and two 35mm's, an EOS 650 and an Elan 7e and they all use the same lenses with the exception of crop format lenses for the XTi. Everything else works.

Developing costs aren't as expensive as everyone says, you would have to shoot hundreds of rolls to break even with the cost of operating a high-end DSLR. And NOTHING has the look of film, not even any of this horse**** in CS5 it just doesn't look the same.

It's too bad you didn't get into this earlier you could have shot Kodachrome.

Film is NOT dying off as some would say, it's actually coming back, go out and find a decent 35mm, Nikon FG is what I started on (any of the Nikon's from the 80's are good learners) get a couple lenses and post up in the film forum when you got something. If you go Nikon, the 50mm 1.8 Series E is one of the best manual lenses ever made, also grab a 105 f2.5, best portrait lens ever. Kodachrome may be going away but new films are coming out, Kodak released Ektar 100 not too long ago and it's pretty decent.

Don't get me wrong I love my digital and being able to put 1000 images on a memory card is awesome, but except for the highest-echelon digital SLR's, that's just about all digital is good for compared to 35mm format. :thumbup:

Before I get flamed for this post, I'm not some old man who has shot film his whole life, I'm 25 and started on a DSLR and picked up the 35mm format soon after. BOTH formats have their advantages no doubt but film is still a great format to shoot and it's coming back.

great post mate. You have inspired me to get my old canon eos 3000 out. I agree that you can get prints pretty cheaply these days as well.

 

[JoeDanBeck]

Well if you develop your self the cost shrinks instantly. You can get kits to develop c41 for about twenty dollars. These are good for about twenty rolls. So for twenty dollars you have around 480 negatives. And with a inexpensive scanner, like any epson with a negative slot, you can digitize those negatives. The quality you can get with a film SLR for $50 can often rival a digital SLR that cost $500.

 

[dxqcanada]

Pentax k-mount ... manual focus lenses can be used on and auto focus SLR's ... both film and digital.
So start with that ... and if you want to get a DSLR you can continue to use the same lenses.

 

[swimswithtrout]

For me shooting with film or digital camera is not as important as the comparison of SOFTWARE -vs- DARKROOM

OP, once you've been working in the darkroom, photoshop feels like a bad crap. Just started to scan film, however it will remain an activity just for the sake of posting on web.

So what troll is this ?

I built my first darkroom in ~ '1967.

Processed my B&W's through the 90's

Bought a scanner in the 90's and started using PS at the same time.

Somebodies been "huffing" in the darkroom I think.

 

[swimswithtrout]

Well if you develop your self the cost shrinks instantly. You can get kits to develop c41 for about twenty dollars. These are good for about twenty rolls. So for twenty dollars you have around 480 negatives. And with a inexpensive scanner, like any epson with a negative slot, you can digitize those negatives. The quality you can get with a film SLR for $50 can often rival a digital SLR that cost $500.

I was surprised to even see C41 for sale .

Every link I've found say's the kit is only good for 8 rolls at $20-30 dollars.

Granted you might find a decent SLR and one stock lens for <$100, but then you need to find a film scanner if you want to post your "Cheap" pictures on the web.

Throw in at least ~ $ 400 for a "cheap" film scanner that can "almost" reproduce what the cheapest P&S digital cams can do right out of the camera.

8 rolls of film cost how much ? Times say $4 a roll if you do the processing yourself ?

Color film by the way, is also the most grainy, least sharp medium in photography.

It's a loosing battle trying to compare C41 to digital .

The only thing that can challenge the IQ of a DSLR on a budget is a MF camera shooting Provia, and then only if scanned at 4000 dpi plus.

I just sold my Pentax 6X7 and it's plethora of lenses.

I hadn't used them in 5 yrs since switching to a DSLR.

I can shoot 1000's of shots a day, no film costs, no processing costs, no scanning time/ film clean up.

Trying to justify shooting film as being "cheaper/better" is wrong on many levels.

 

[und34dcow]

So what troll is this ?

I built my first darkroom in ~ '1967.

Processed my B&W's through the 90's

Bought a scanner in the 90's and started using PS at the same time.

Somebodies been "huffing" in the darkroom I think.

I think you been too busy clicking your mouse that you might have lost all the reading ability... (like 90% of US society nowadays). do you have to spell out the meaning of every sentence to people?

Film is NOT better than digital, NOT cheaper either, darkroom techniques are NOT better than photoshop or any other more adv. software for that matter. If one is concerned only about results than film has nothing to offer above digital.

but if OP is considering playing with film he should know that the sheer experience of working in a darkroom is MORE FUN then sitting in front of your monitor adjusting curves.

Of course if you are a kind of person who prefers playing NBA'11 on Xbox live instead of actually picking up the ball... then I have nothing to say.

 

[compur]

 

[JoeDanBeck]

Well if you develop your self the cost shrinks instantly. You can get kits to develop c41 for about twenty dollars. These are good for about twenty rolls. So for twenty dollars you have around 480 negatives. And with a inexpensive scanner, like any epson with a negative slot, you can digitize those negatives. The quality you can get with a film SLR for $50 can often rival a digital SLR that cost $500.

I was surprised to even see C41 for sale .

Every link I've found say's the kit is only good for 8 rolls at $20-30 dollars.

Granted you might find a decent SLR and one stock lens for <$100, but then you need to find a film scanner if you want to post your "Cheap" pictures on the web.

Throw in at least ~ $ 400 for a "cheap" film scanner that can "almost" reproduce what the cheapest P&S digital cams can do right out of the camera.

8 rolls of film cost how much ? Times say $4 a roll if you do the processing yourself ?

Color film by the way, is also the most grainy, least sharp medium in photography.

It's a loosing battle trying to compare C41 to digital .

The only thing that can challenge the IQ of a DSLR on a budget is a MF camera shooting Provia, and then only if scanned at 4000 dpi plus.

I just sold my Pentax 6X7 and it's plethora of lenses.

I hadn't used them in 5 yrs since switching to a DSLR.

I can shoot 1000's of shots a day, no film costs, no processing costs, no scanning time/ film clean up.

Trying to justify shooting film as being "cheaper/better" is wrong on many levels.

Not trying to make the argument that cheap is better. Just trying to say that it can be made more affordable. And i use a epson v330 ($100) to scan my negatives with completely satisfactory results. I don't really care if i can zoom in to the image super far. Also i used C41 as an example as it is the most available film, without having to order it. I have tried a DSLR, for over one year and it got boring. When you can take 1000 pictures in a day and constantly redo shots it loses the passion and the fun.

 

[JoeDanBeck]

Don't get me wrong I love my digital and being able to put 1000 images on a memory card is awesome, but except for the highest-echelon digital SLR's, that's just about all digital is good for compared to 35mm format. :thumbup:

:thumbup::thumbup: