Photography

Photography today is so much simpler with these digital cameras.  You get instant results, that's the big thing.  No longer having to deliver the finished film cartridge to the drugstore or photofinisher, order the required number of prints to be made, and then go back down to pick up the finished product some days later; all these steps are now history with the digital revolution.

There are also the many ways now that allow you to share the photos via the Internet — by e-mailing them to friends and family, or by putting them up on a website for all to see.  Is it any wonder that film, superb as it was, and still is for some applications, is quickly disappearing from the scene?  It won't be long, is my guess, before fine-grain black-and-white film will be as hard to come by as regular 8mm movie film.

Commercial movies are still made on film, though. I remember reading that Spielberg has been trying hard to push for multiplex theater owners to switch to digital projectors, but there is resistance because of the high initial outlay required to make the conversion.

No question in my mind that the cinema business will end up in the digital realm before long.  Already there's a lot of digital special effects in films.  For example, most crowd scenes are easily computer-generated.  No need these days to pay and to provide catering services for all those extras from central casting.  A small team of computer artists can fill the screen with a cast of thousands with a few clicks of the mouse.  Well, maybe more than just a few clicks.

But to get back to amateur photography and the sharing of images online.  It's really easy to do, and any average computer newbie can handle it.  A broadband Internet connection helps, as it would take a long time to upload pictures, especially large ones, with a dial-up service.

For posting your photos online, you don't need a fancy superduper multimegapixel camera.  A run-of-the-mill 3 or 4 megapixel camera will do the job.  That's what I've been using most of the time.