Film lovers like to point out that film, especially color slide film, is inherently very stable; especially as compared to various sorts of digial media. For example, CD-ROM disks can go bad on their own or become damaged through handling.
However, these people fail to realize one basic concept, which is known in the computer world as ‘Single Point of Failure’ (SPoF). A single slide or negative is a SPoF, because a) it is impossible to make an identical copy of it, and b) if it is destroyed, that’s it.
A digital file can be copied an infinite number of times and through an infinite number of generations. Each copy is absolutely identical to the previous version, assuming the copying mechanism is not flawed (for example, opening a file in an editor and saving it with a new file name causes lossy compression degradation if the file is saved in that sort of format, like JPEG).
Copies of files can be kept on many devices, and in many locations. This reduces SPoF. If one copy is lost or destroyed, there are other copies, and they are identical to the original.
Some film lovers have pointed out that it is a pain and a bother to make copies of digital files. Yes, it is. That’s the name of the game, though, if you want to protect your files. Some say it’s too much trouble. If so, then I would respond that you have put a limit on your desire to protect your photographs. That’s fine; they’re your photographs, after all. But don’t complain when the go missing if you did not take steps to protect them. Pain or not, it is up to the owner to decide how much effort they want to put into protecting their images. If they don’t want to do it, then that’s fine. If they do what to do it, that’s fine too. But it is not the fault of digital technology if one ignores the known risks of digital storage. Digital doesn’t owe you anything.
So that’s the rant. If you don’t back up, it’s your fault. If you think film is inherently safer than digital, you’re wrong.
Feel free to argue with me.
You’ve made this same rant so many times already.
Why do you feel the need to continue?
I’m just getting started by running over some old ground. Getting warmed up, you might say. I’ll have more to say that I’ve said before later. Then maybe I’ll come up with something new to say, eh?
OK.
If ever you do find anything new or worthwhile to say, give me a call eh?
Ciao.
Hey, you came by here. Nobody twisted your arm, did they? I’m even giving you the space to be snarky. I’m a seriously nice guy.
Bill – I shoot film maybe 50/50 with digital, but your points are valid. I think for some people that the workflow of film today lends itself to a sort of trouble free backup. For instance, when I develop my film I normally get prints and a CD. While the CD isn’t the greatest, it’s fine for me. So, I get three sources of the image: negative, scan, and print. It’s part of my normal routine and it just happens. There’s no reason it can’t be the same for digital. There could be at least three backups: local storage, print, backup storage, and an upload to a file sharing service. Negatives *will* fade. If you are careful with your backups, your digital files can be 100% new forever. I guess to sum it up, it’s just not a big deal if you do the right thing to preserve your images.
I agree, and I shoot some film still too (mostly B&W, which I process and scan myself). I keep my scans just like I do my files from my digital cameras. I also agree with film purists that film is substantially higher quality than digital for some applications; perhaps it always will be. But that doesn’t change the fact that a single point of failure is generally a bad thing. No matter how great the negative is compared to a digital file, if it gets destroyed through some catastrophe, it’s gone. Having a good scan and keeping backups of that is an excellent alternative.