The simple answer is yes. Digital cameras are now up to the task. Moreover, they are cheaper, and provide a better method of selecting, enhancing, and displaying photographs.
This, however, comes with a couple of major provisos. First, it is no good starting with any digital camera. Secondly, if you do not have the computer gear to back-up a digital camera then you will be in for a frustrating time.
I guess that within 10 years film-and-paper photography will virtually disappear.
Cost will drive it. If you multiply a film of 36 shots at a cost of $17 a film, the costs mount up quickly. Shoot off 100 films and you have paid for a very good digital camera. Shoot off another 30 films and you have paid for it the largest capacity memory card available – – a card capable of taking 500 photos at the highest definition.
Take another 100 films and you can buy a top end liquid crystal display screen for your computer which you can use for slide shows. Or you can show them through the TV for nothing.
So even for a mildly snap-happy traveller or family chronicler, the future is clear.
The costs of all of the camera and computer gear for are coming down all the time. Whereas the cost of paper, and film and labour that go into the production of photographs is going up all the time.
Those special shots can always be printed up to A4 size at home or poster size at a photography shop. But to get good reproduction you need a four megapixel camera – about $1500. But there is no need to go to the high end unless you want to blow your photographs up for framing or use them for publication.
Another great advantage with email is the ease with which you can e-mail pictures to friends and relations at a vastly cheaper cost than posting photographs.
During recent trips to Alaska and PNG my Canon digital with underwater housing for diving performed as well as my film cameras (a Minolta SLR and a Nikonos).
Digital has some downsides. If you want serious telephoto you have to go up to an SLR equivalent with interchangeable lens. This costs serious money – up to $9000. But some smaller digitals have teleconverters. You lose a stop of light and the glass viewfinder does not work, but the digital display does.
Another disadvantage of smaller digitals is the delay after opening the camera lens cap and further delay in pressing the shutter. Newer versions are working on it, but it can be a serious disadvantage for action shots or capturing expressions.
The great beauty of digital photography is that you can see a small version of the picture on the viewing screen and if it is rubbish you can delete it without paying for the cost of development. Moreover, you get the chance to frame-up the photograph again, to correct the exposure, the framing or the expression on the faces of the people in the photograph. For example, you could have as many attempts at a photograph on a social occasion as your friends or relatives will bear until you get it right. To do the same thing on film would be much more costly and there would still be no guarantee that when you returned from the photograph shop that even one of the prints was satisfactory. With digital you can cull the rubbish as you go with no cost.
The digital display has some other advantages. You get a genuine two-dimensional view which helps non-professionals frame a lot better. With a glass view-finder the eye is still seeing three dimensionally and fails to pick up things like power poles growing out of people’s heads, large empty gaps of sky or ground or the subject matter being too far away.
Another advantage is that the digital display is genuine WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get). If you under- or over-expose you can see the effect on the display before you take the picture.
A significant advantage of digital is that pictures are stored in computer files which contain the image and a lot of information about it: date taken, aperture, shutter speed, camera make and model, any digital enhancements and any caption or filename you might add. Photos can be sorted easily and shown as a slide show with captions on your computer or TV.
For travelling, the compactness of both the camera and the memory card with replaces film makes digital cameras ideal. They are also terrific for showing people the photos you have taken of them, making them more willing subjects.
But if you are using a digital for travel, buy two spare batteries and have two large capacity memory cards.