Digital or Chemical
By Mark Mayhew
Well this old chestnut has been running around for what seems like years now, and to be honest is getting tiresome. So why am I bringing it up again? Maybe now with the advances in digital over even this year things are seriously starting to look good for pure digital work.
Mind you even now, and with good reason, digital pictures are only
acceptable for newspaper and low quality (paper) magazine work. Even then we are
talking memory sizes of over 8 meg. So if you have plans to shoot a
session on your
digital camera for inclusion in magazines, unless you are using the very best
top of the range kit I am afraid it's a case of forget it.
Now if you are planning to sell your work for CD or Internet then that's a different story. Providing all the shots are of at least 1600x1200 and saved as an uncompressed file then you are talking quality. The problem is it is all very memory intensive. Obviously when the pictures are used they will be compressed probably to a jpeg format and reduced in size, the important thing though is you have originals of the highest quality containing the most detail.
OK that's not at all strictly true. That sort of detail is really only needed if the image is going to be transferred to some sort of mechanical printing process. The truth actually is that for display on a computer screen 1280x960 is more than adequate. This can then be converted and compressed to a jpeg file. Oh one word of advice: The jpeg format is a compression format and providing the original is only copied will be fine. If you keep re-saving it then you will lose image quality like copying video tapes.
So if you intend to sell your work to magazines, or any format that
will require a printing process then unless you are blessed with top range kit,
use Film! 
If you intend to
provide pictures that will be used only for PC's then Digital is fine and
dandy.
Just a note on scanners because I don't really feel the argument
applies to them. Why? Well you have made your 
choice of film and
then decide to load that image onto computer. Maybe you want to manipulate the
image and then print it. Well exactly the same things apply. For publication it
will need to be a very large file only achievable with the very best equipment.
Out of the financial reach of most of us. For PC use only then scans of again
1280x960 will be adequate.
So understand the mediums, what you require from your pictures and make the best use of both. If this digital spot is well received I will be happy to go into greater detail about digital cameras and scanners and how the whole deal works in future issues. Just let me know.
The pictures are of Karen Foster, beautifully lit and shot. Are they film, digital, or digitally enhanced? You decide. Click on the image to see it full size.