I wonder why it is that when we get older so many of us are against change! Usually, but not always, when new products are launched, it's because something has improved, not worsened, in quality, reliability, and functionality. The digital camera and digital photography is no exception to this rule. Yet despite the years of digital cameras being available, I've only just got one for the very first time. That's right, I've been buying and developing film right up until recently. Now that I've got the hang of my new digital camera, I can't ever imagine taking pictures without it.
So just what are the benefits of a digital camera over 35mm film? Well, to start with there is no film! Nothing to buy, nothing to store, nothing to load, and nothing to wait for. Okay, so the 2 hour photo developing shops began to sprout up everywhere, but we still had to make the journey and pay the bill. I've never been a great photographer, and I would say that from a roll of 36 exposures, I'd be lucky to get half a dozen that I'd like. With the digital media you simply delete what you don't want in an instant which brings me on to my next point.
Instant results: So there you are, out all day happily clicking away, and you get to view your snap-shots in the camera's own preview window as you go along. Okay, so it's a small image, but it gives you a good idea of what's to come and whether or not you want to keep it. It if looks naff, hit the delete button and get you storage space back.
Once home, you can simply hook up to your PC, or slide in a Memory Stick (depending on the camera) and view your day's photography on screen.
Storage: If we have a few pics we really like, we can either print them out ourselves or get them professionally printed at the local photography store. Alternatively, we can submit the images to one of the online developing services and get them posted back to us.
Storing photographs on your PC prevents those endless packs of photos that end up laying around in cupboards and draws, often getting lost and ruined. We've learnt how to create folders and categories on the PC so we can store all our pictures. For example, you can have a folder called 'Holidays' and in there you have sub folders for all your trips. One for Greece, another for Spain etc. That's just an example, as we haven't had our digital camera long enough yet to build up a photo archive, but we're ready to do it and it's so easy as A, B, C.
A word of warning though regarding transferring images from your digital camera to the PC. Make sure you keep backups. If anything happens to your hard drive, (the area of your PC that stores all the data), then you could potentially loose every photo you have. We've been advised to simply backup our images onto CD Rom, which is also very easy and only takes a couple of minutes.
Touching Up: This is something I love about the digital camera and digital images. Now even I can turn a bad picture into a work of art. Image too dark? Lighten it. Too Light? Darken it. In fact you can twist it, turn it, color and crop it. What you can do with a digital photograph is limited only by your own imagination.
I've only touched on a few of the more common advantages of owning a digital camera, but if you haven't joined the digital era yet, I think you should at least have a look at just how easy, and how adaptable a digital camera can be.
Richie Pratt is a proficient writer and webmaster for ClickingCamera dot com where he writes on such issues as buying a digital camera and Camera Information!. He also has many other photographic related pieces on the site.
Written By: Richie Pratt
