Things What Makes Me Go Digital

Approximately one month ago, I traveled Europe and Tokyo for 34 days. During the trip, I visited a lot of wonderful sites, historic places, and met nice people. Like others, I tried to take photos as many as possible to save remembrances, so I brought 1 SLR(film) camera and 1 digital camera as a sub camera. The reason why I use the SLR camera is that I like the film feeling which is consisted of film grains, its ratio of size, the special characters every film has, and the procedures.(of course, I do not do that by myself, however, I also like the expecting whether the photos are good or not) So, I have took important and worthy photos by film camera. But thesedays it's getting harder and harder to use film cameras.

The main reason is not the inconvenience and high cost of film but the lack of reliable photoshops. In fact, it's almost impossible to develop and print at home because the procedures need a lot of time and toxic chemicals, therefore, people should go to photoshops. About 10 years ago, there were at least 2 or 3 photoshops in a block but nowadays, it's hard to find one. Furthermore, it's much harder to find an expert who has skills, a good knowledge, wide experiences and pride. There are only amateures who just bought a printing machine. They do not understand how much a photograper cares about his/her photos and do not do their best when they treat film. There is one same thing between time and photo. They never comes back. If a film treated unproperly, there is no way to save the image. So skilled expert is very important.

A few days ago, I placed an oder to develop and cut my films. I gave him 9 rolls that I took in Europe. When I received the films, I couldn't check the condition of the films so I paid all. Today I checked it and SHOCKED! There were a lot of scratches on the surface and the cutting was a disaster. He didn't cut straightly and even cut over the frame! I will not be able to print or scan several frames perfectly again. I will nerver go to the photohop again and I will advice my friends not to go there. Today I felt a tad of the current situation of photography industry. Anyhow, I will not give up taking film photos but I will buy a digital SLR camera because of the lack of reliable experts. That's the point and that's why I'm sad.