Digital Photography FAQ by Karen Simmons

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I have seen a lot of questions, guesses, misinformation and myths on digital recently - many of them posted on wedding planning boards. In order to provide a more clear, accurate, and objective resource, I have create this FAQ on professional digital photography. I hope the information is useful!

Myth: A photographer who uses digital will print your pictures on an ink jet printer
Myth: You cannot create a print on archival fiber paper
Fact: There are actually two parts to these myths; one is that you can only get ink jet prints and the other is that ink jet prints are inherently bad.
Part One: It is not true that a photographer using digital can only provide ink jet prints. Any decent photo lab can provide a photographic print from a digital file – a REAL photographic print just like one you’d get from film. Even Wal-mart and Sam’s Club and places like that have the machines (called mini-labs) that can create photographic prints from either film or digital simultaneously. Professional photo labs that cater to professional photographers can provide a variety of different types of prints from a digital file – ranging from a “real” photographic print on photo paper, to a black & white print on fiber paper, to a fine art print on watercolor paper, using a giclee process.
Part Two: Not all ink jet prints are bad. Professional quality printers (which run to $1000 or more) using archival inks and paper will create prints that are archival and of outstanding quality. Giclee prints are made using an ink jet technology to create a super fine spray of archival inks. Many museums use Giclee prints to hang reproductions of works of fine art. And many museums consider Giclee prints in and of themselves to be works of art. The Metropolitan Museum (New York), the Guggenheim (New York), the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), the National Gallery for Women in the Arts (DC), the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts (DC), the Smithsonian Institution Libraries, the New York Public Library Print Collection, and the High Museum (Atlanta) are all hanging Giclee exhibitions today. If these museums trust the quality of the Giclee, shouldn’t it be perfect for wedding photography?

Myth: You cannot create a print that looks like film with high contrast and grain
Fact: Digital has the ultimate flexibility in that someone skilled in a professional quality photo editing program like PhotoShop can make any digital file look just like any film you choose. An image can have increased contrast, increased grain, more or less saturated colors, or can even be made to look like a watercolor or oil painting.

Myth: Digital photographs are flat and have lots of “pixels” or jagged spots
Fact: Low-grade consumer digital cameras will create images that show pixelation (those square “jaggies”) at even minor enlargements. Those consumer digital cameras record images at 1 or 2 megapixels. The resulting digital image is less than 1MB, which is just about the right size for a pretty good quality 5x7. Professional quality digital cameras create very large files – anywhere from 5 to 12 megapixels – and trust me, that’s a lot of megapixels. The average uncompressed file size produced by a professional grade digital camera is going to be anywhere from 17 to 40 MB for EACH photograph. That means that when enlarged, the photographs will not show pixelation or be flat or lacking contrast. The depth of color and tone allowed by these larger files is equal to or greater than that of film.

Myth: With digital the pictures are on a memory card and those cards are easily damaged or destroyed. Then all the pictures are lost. The only advantage of film is that it is a hard copy you can't erase it on accident!
Fact: There is equal risk to using either medium to photograph a wedding. Professional photographers who use digital use either Microdrives (MD) or Compact Flash (CF) cards. These are not inexpensive, low end memory cards, but state of the art digital media storage and not prone to random failure if properly cared for. Yes, both can be damaged if improperly used: A MD or CF card can be destroyed just as a canister of film can. Either media is damaged by exposure to high heat or to magnetic media. A MD or CF card can be dropped and broken. A spool of film can be dropped and it can unwind, therefore ruining the film. No method is foolproof and there are no ultimate guarantees, but the likelihood of any of it happening is fairly slim. And a good photographer will take precautions with either medium. For example, with digital the photographer can (and should) create backups of the files immediately so that there will always be redundant originals to work from. With film the photographer might create high resolution backup scans at the time of processing.
What's most important here is to ask your photographer how he or she handles backing up files to prevent loss of data. You'll find that most digital photographers are exceedingly careful with their digital files, often using multiple storage devices and backing them up periodically during the wedding to insure that no images are lost.

Myth: If the photographer's hard drive crashes, you can lose all of your photographs!
Fact: Most photographers who work with digital burn 2 or more copies of the files to CD immediately upon completing the wedding in order to have completely original backups. Some photographers burn the CD's on site at the reception (if they have an assistant who can do that). No photographer I know who is a working professional leaves images from weddings on their hard drives for any length of time. Aside from the security issue, when you shoot 1 or 2 weddings a week, you simply physically don't have drive space to keep all the weddings on the hard drive. They are archived to CD immediately and space is freed up for other weddings.

Myth: I asked my photographer about digital and she said she doesn't think it's quite there yet
Fact: Some (not all) photographers who don't shoot digital have a lack of knowledge about the technology involved with digital cameras and will make negative comments about it, despite never having used it. If your photographer says that digital isn't "there" yet, ask him what his experience with digital is that leads him to make that decision. If he or she has not had hands on experience with digital, then he or she cannot make that claim. Many photographers are afraid of the technology and the learning curve involved and will therefore dismiss digital as not valid based on that.
That said, there are photographers who still shoot film for VERY VALID reasons that have nothing to do with fear or ignorance. Many photographers who have been shooting film for a while are comfortable with it and know they can get GREAT results. For them moving to digital would be time consuming and might result in a drop in quality as they got used to the new medium. Just as a photographer shouldn't be dismissed for using digital, nor should one be dismissed for continuing to use film. Both are valid media for wedding photography.

Myth: I can tell the difference between digital and film.
Fact: Honestly, then you're not seeing digital done by a professional who is capable with it. I've been a professional photographer for over 10 years and *I* cannot tell the difference between a digital print and a film print when they are printed correctly. Make sure you're not comparing consumer level digital to film ... ask to see a photograph made with a professional grade digital camera and printed on photographic paper. If you can then still see the difference, then film certainly be the better choice for you. But I'm willing to bet that you won't be able to.

Myth: You cannot get black & white prints from digital
Fact: Any image that is captured in color can be converted to b&w in digital. In fact the conversion process is so much better using digital than using film because there is much more control over the tonality and contrast in a digital file. When a color neg is printed in b&w there’s often a significant loss in tonality that doesn’t happen in a digital conversion. Additionally there are professional grade digital cameras that *do* have a b&w capture setting as well. That’s very convenient for the photographer who can switch from b&w to color on the fly w/out ever having to change films or cameras.

Ultimately no one can make the selection as to which is the better format except you, the client. But make an *informed* decision based on the correct information and on viewing images created in both digital and film. Don't let false or inaccurate information distort your decision making process.

This FAQ was written and is maintained by Karen Simmons (http://www.ksimmons.com / karen@ksimmons.com). It is © 2002, 2003 and may be reproduced and distributed in it's entirety as long as this attribution and copyright is retained.

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