Film vs Digital Photography

Maria Ipsen

Prof. Matt Merkel

COMM-1500

December,9 2018
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Film vs Digital Photography

The theme of this study is what are the differences of Film and Digital photographs formats.

It will be briefly discussed how this media has change with time, the history behind it. Furthermore,

we will understand what are the advantages and disadvantages that each format has. Which are

their uses in the modern day, how they are integrated and adapted in our current media.

Differentiating how every people uses nowadays with social media and how it can be handled into

the movie industry, image by image.

Brief History of Photography

We can start at the most well-known beginning of photograph, the “Camera

Obscura”, or the dark room or chamber. this method required a room with no lights and a little box

that permitted the entrance of light form a very little opening. This worked basically as any

projector we know now. Without mention that is not worked by electricity. Since tis object was

describe by Greeks like Aristoteles and Chinese’s like Mozi. This invention was dated around the

5th century B.C, according to The History Channel website. Article called “8 Crucial Innovations

in The Invention of Photography”.

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After this is mentioned the different experiments that took place in the 18th and 19th century,

called “Photochemistry”. “…A major breakthrough came in 1725, when the German professor

Johann Heinrich Schulze found that silver salts darkened when exposed to light. Fascinated,

Schulze cut the letters out of a piece of paper and placed it on top of a silver mixture…”. All these

components had time against them, it was not an immediate result as we know now with the digital.

They would have to wait to have the result of the item photographed. But with the “Calotype” the

new invention took a new meaning with a photosensitive paper. Instead of the silver plates used,

this paper made the item photographed appear with a mixture of solutions, specially hyposulfite,

around 1841. Discovered by the British William Henry Fox Talbot. This was the starting of the

negative, which is the image with the contrast of negative colors, meaning that blacks where

reflected in the paper as whites and items that where white in the moment, revelated as black.

This was just the start. After that we have so many more inventions, but the one that is the

most knowable can be the Autochrome by the Lumiere Brothers. This simple invention added

color to the photograph.

Uses of photography

Since that time people have used pictures to remember something and make it almost

indestructible. Mostly family, and important pictures of an even or person. With this technology

have taken this invention and it has evolved in something that is used on the daily and worldwide,

with the use of social media. And now a days is not only used to remember an event, but to

communicate thought an image. From newspapers, magazines, advertising, to ways that the
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imagination and creativity does not have limit. We are talking about film, that tells a new story

and invites the audience to travel to different worlds and perspectives. That it can inspire others,

provoke certain feeling just with colors, and it can be translated to so much more just adding a

certain sound.

Differences; Film, Analog and Digital Formats

Time & Quality:

Through the year’s technology has advance so quickly that we can have a moment printed

in our hands by an instant. While before, it was a matter of time, patience and wait to have a result

of the negatives. These are some of the different that we can see technology have change with their

formats. In this point, everybody has their own opinion. Some people like the quality of the film,

the light and the vintage look. While some love the definition that the digital formats gives to the

image. Besides this there is a very noticeable point that we need to mention, and it is the amount

of play that you can have with the picture. On the film, you don not have that much space to create

a fic the errors, it is mostly the natural state of the picture, no balances on the contrast, no filters.

Almost nothing to play with. While on the digital part you have a whole spectrum of items and

categories you can choose from to edit the picture on the way you want the feeling or message

portrayed. Besides these points mentioned, there are ones that are more technical, mentioned in a

National Geographic website article, called “The Photo Debate: Six Reasons Why Film is Better

Than Digital”

How they combine nowadays:

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With social media, having cameras in our phones and the digital accessibility taking over,

it is hard to find people that like the analog or film better that the digital. Mostly we can say that

is for a mainstream purpose. On the other side, photographer’s academic of this art and collectors

are the ones that have keep this form of communication still alive. For example; one of the great

directors in cinema, Jude Apatow, Christopher Nolan and Quentin Tarantino, Wes Anderson,

Steven Spielberg are some of the more well-known names that stills use it. Adding to this list there

is the female director Patty Jenkins, that used it in Wonder Woman. This, according to Vadim

Rizov, Filmmakermagazine.com with the article, “31 Films Shot on 35mm Released in 2017”. Or

Sofia Coppola, one of the most famous, who I admire female film directors.

What are the advantages in terms of creativity?

We have mentioned that the vintage look is something that stays with the film. But on the

other side we have the digital format that has allow the photographer or film maker to crake a

whole new world added to the picture in the editing process. From locating items that are not there,

or creating illusions to the viewers. Digital it is definitely something that you can play with. While

the nature element of spontaneity adds a more difficult playground to the author.

As we can see nowadays a picture can be translated and transformed in so many things.

From a simple image of a sunrise to a whole new world that gives space and inspiration to create

new stories that have not been heard. From a collectable item to something we can modify and

learn. I think picture is the richest media in which an image says a thousand words. I make media

as we now it today an indispensable item, that we as audience we often forget. The bright side of

this fast-growing technology is that we see more and more people willing to learn a share their

stories with just a portrait in their social pages.

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A great invention that has inspired thousands in film, photography, editing, desisting news

and to not say more, media in general. Even though I have a lot to learn about film and all this

topic, it is something that I look forward to learn in my career and the vision that I have about the

future. In which I could translated to whoever is watching in images and feelings. Hopefully

making those scenes give the audience goosebumps as Guillermo del Toro does when I hear him

talking about film. For me nothing is more pleasant that have something you can touch, but on the

other side there is the creativity aspect of it that invites me evetime to edit and wants me to add or

find the same feeling of that moment recorded.

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Works Cited

National Geographic. The Photo Debate: Six Reasons Why Film is Better Than Digital. May 30,
2018

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/adventure/adventure-blog/2009/06/04/the-photo-

debate-six-reasons-why-film-is-better-than-digital/

The New York Times. How Digital Is Changing the Nature of Movies. September 06, 2012

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/09/movies/how-digital-is-changing-the-nature-of-

movies.html

Thesaurus. The world's favorite online thesaurus!

https://www.thesaurus.com/

Vadim Rizov. Filmmaker Magazine, 31 Films Shot on 35mm Released in 2017

https://filmmakermagazine.com/105050-31-films-shot-on-35mm-released-in-2017/