digital, according to one of my instructors, is far above film both in quality and ease of use
This is truly not true, and I can prove it easily.
Digital excels when it comes to speed and convenience. When you think about it, why is Polaroid always on the brink of bankruptcy?
Digital is a godsend for professional photographers. It can be printed quite large, but to do so, it exploits mathematical magic in Photoshop filters. To get very large images, it is common practice in printing to lower the dpi setting according to the distance the image is viewed at. In the printing industry, 300dpi is considered the point at which the eye doesn't distinguish the individual dots when viewed at a normal distance (about arm length). The further you step back from the image, the bigger the dots can be without noticing it. So, with Digital, you can "cheat" on the quality of the print. To give you an idea of what I'm talking about, check out the Rasterbator (
http://homokaasu.org/rasterbator/). It allowes you to take a standard low-res picture and blow it up really big using the process I talked about. I even posted my experiment on the ToyCamera forums (
http://www.onfal.com/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=6&topic_id=47537&mesg_id=47537&page=) where I took the lowest resolution camera I could find and printed it 30inches wide.
A few years ago, I read that Kodak evaluated the minimum MegaPixel count a camera should have to match the resolution of a 35mm frame. They came out with 33 MegaPixels! I still am looking for such a resolution from the big companies at a decent price (a Leaf or PhaseOne back for a Hassy doesn't even give that much resolution). My scanner, which is just an off the shelf model, nothing special (it's an Epson) will yield 31Megapixels from a 35mm frame. With a single 6x6 frame, I can scan a photo quality (no visible pixels) print that's over 37 inches wide...
Now, I hear that some will say that film never gave such high resolution... Think again. Those who have been around photography long enough will remember the much loved Kodak Technical Pan. At a resolution of 320 lines/mm, a 35mm frame had about as much resolution as a 4x5 sheet of film. Kodak did pull the plug on this film but another company still makes something that's about as good (if not better). The company is GigabitFilm (
http://www.gigabitfilm.de/html/english/menu.htm). They make only one type of film: slow and sharp. If you have spare change, order one of their kits (it uses a specially formulated developer) and give it a try. Showing the negatives will blow the pants off any would be expert. Given it's B&W, but it still kicks.
So, you pretty much have it there:
1) Digital will save the professional photographer big bucks and time given he does everything himself... I heard some professionals say that Digital actually ends up costing them more as they have to hire another person to get every image hand corrected, which can cost a lot. The only place where money is saved is on having no re-shoots. But archiving the images is a nightmare.
2) Film costs more up front. Re-shoots are always possible. But once the film is properly exposed and sent off for processing, the problems are already over. Easy to archive. Can be printed wall size without any trouble. Can be scanned for cheap if needed. It is the best choice for artistic photography in my mind.
I hope I clarified this issue. Any question is welcome.
