My first proper digital camera

I’ve just bought my first proper digital camera. I’ve been avoiding digital for some time because I just do not believe that the quality can rival film yet. I have been digitising film for some time: using an Epson Perfection 4870 scanner I can get a huge print from a 35mm frame and something ridiculous (A2?) from medium format. I like being able to experiment with different films: Fuji Velvia, for example, can reproduce gorgeous landscapes but would be best avoided for portraits. I have yet to see a digital camera that can rival a film camera without significant extra cost (and, no, I am not including the cost of the computer).

So, why have I bought a digital camera?

My Canonet QL17 G-III has lost its exposure meter. Now, I know that some people throw a hissy fit at the very thought of such technology but I do not. Indeed, perhaps one of the only pieces of technology I feel that a camera requires is just that. The Canonet was used predominantly for snaps and those places where I wouldn’t want to cart an SLR so my digital requirements were something like this:

• small and pocketable
• sufficient resolution for an A4 print (on the grounds that I am unlikely in the foreseeable future to take a photo so good that I would want it printed larger than that)
• a viewfinder, for those rare occasions when it’s too sunny to see the LCD
• a decent zoom lens (the Canonet has a fixed, fast 40mm/1.4 lens but there was clearly very little reason to expect such a fine lens within my limited budget)
• full manual control when desired
• all for less than £300

So I have bought a Canon Powershot A620. It is a fine piece of kit and I look forward to using it in good light. It does suffer from a certain amount of digital noise. Compare these two shots:

• Taken digitally yesterday at Oldham Athletic.
• Taken on my wife’s Praktica Zoom 110 (which was never an expensive camera)

I suspect that the performance of the Praktica was limited by its lens while that of the Powershot was probably limited by its sensor. Had I taken my SLR (which cost roughly the same as the Powershot) to either of the two games, I suspect I would have managed some far better shots. I would probably not have gone to the pub either. Convenience and immediacy are qualities that I believe I may discover in spades with the Powershot.

There’s an interesting discussion going on over at Flickr about film and digital. For once, some facts are being mentioned.

Because film resolution was brought up:
A 24 x 36 mm piece of film has an area of 8.6 x 10^8 square microns. Film granularity on the order of 5 microns (25 square microns area) gives a digital equivalent “resolution” of just under 34 megapixels (using 1024 pixels as 1 MP as is the standard). Push it to 4 microns granularity and you’ve got just under 53 MP equivalent resolution. Go to 120/220 film and the numbers will go up pretty dramatically.

Most 35mm slide film falls into the first category (~34 MP), and fine-grained films into the second (~53 MP).

Perhaps when a 30 megapixel digital SLR becomes available for a shade under four hundred pounds I will consider changing format for serious photography.

Possibly related:

• Sony to unveil its first DSLR camera next week
• Google Groups: rec.photo.digital.slr-systems
• Sony Alpha lens line-up revealed