Need SLR camera advice

[mtnbkr]

I'll remember all of these comments when someone asks about a film camera and gets the "buy digital" recommendation from everyone.  Don't say it doesn't happen because I can pull up the specific threads and show them to you.

Now, keep it polite and get back to the original topic.

Chirs

[Brad Johnson]

*EDIT TO ADD*  Looks like I was writing this when mtnbkr posted to drag us all back to the topic at hand.

For the sime price as an entry-level DSLR, the "high-end" compact P&S gives you
-Comprimised optics
-Slow focus
-Less control (or less easily controlled)
-No ability to mount accessories
-No expandability
Brad

Most of what you just listed is wrong.

A) The optics are adapted for common shooting situations, but optimized for none (comprimised optics)
B) The smaller objective lens means less light gathering.  That, in conjunction with a smaller sensor, means it takes longer for the focusing sensor to lock (slow focus)
C) The size of a compact necessitates the fewest surface controls and buttons as possible, meaning many functions be menu-driven (less control, or less easily controlled)
D) A compact is, by definition, self-contained.  Though some do have a tripod mount plate, they will normally not have ways to mount external flashes or battery grips. (no ability to mount accessories)
D) Short of adding extra memory, a compact, by definition, is physically locked into its factory configuration. (no expandability)

So you see, all of what I listed is exactly right.  Try again.

Well, if you want to make (real) photographs, you are going to need film. Digital doesn't help with that at all. Digital image capture is not the same thing as real photography. If you think digital is a substitute for film, and you are happy with that, that's great. Shoot it then. It's not the same thing though. And regardless, it is drastically cheaper to get into shooting film with nice cameras, which benefits the beginner. Digital makes sense if:

-you never need to take very long exposures
-you don't mind being tied to a workflow that is dependent on computers, charged batteries, and inkjet printers
-you don't mind the drastically higher startup costs in the form of disposable consumer electronic 'cameras'
-you only work in color (because digital B&W is a joke, please, just say no)
-you don't care about traditional photographic process/having tangible negatives/physical media
-you actually like using modern digital cameras, compared to far nicer, quality built, better looking, and more satisfying to use film cameras that can be had at 1/10th the price
-you have no soul, and don't understand the emotional appeal of slides or silver prints

Zach, please, enough of the film snobbish rhetoric.

The tired phrase about "digitals don't really take pictures" is such a pathetic joke.  Even film cameras "don't really take pictures".  They create a negative, which is analogous to the digital's image file.  Either of which can be used to make "a picture".

And the rest of your assertions?  Well, sorry, dude, but I'm going to have to rip them apart address them one by one...

-you never need to take very long exposures
A DSLR has the same long-exposure functions as an FSLR.  They always have.

-you don't mind being tied to a workflow that is dependent on computers, charged batteries, and inkjet printers
Take your film to the local lab and in an hour you have prints.  Take your memory card to the local lab and in an hour you have prints.  Looks about the same to me.  Batteries?  Last time I checked most FSLRs needed 'em too.

-you don't mind the drastically higher startup costs in the form of disposable consumer electronic 'cameras'
How much is "drastically"?  You can buy digitals now for about the price of a decent used FSLR.  And a real photo knows the money isn't in the camera body, it's in the lenses.  Which can be used for either digital or film.  Never mind that clicking the shutter on a digital means you can look at the photo before doing anything with it.  Clicking the shutter on film means you have A) bought a roll of film and B) now need to pay to develop it.  Oh, and you need to pray that the image might actually be usable.  As for "disposable" consumer electronics cameras, well, last time I checked you can buy disposable film cameras.  By the case, if necessary.

-you only work in color (because digital B&W is a joke, please, just say no)
Uh, what? 

-you don't care about traditional photographic process/having tangible negatives/physical media
I have bad news for you, bud.  Most people don't care.  They never did.  Even many die-hard photogs hated the process.  It is smelly, messy, time-consuming, and thoroughly inconvenient.

-you actually like using modern digital cameras, compared to far nicer, quality built, better looking, and more satisfying to use film cameras that can be had at 1/10th the price
Okay, they both take pictures.  Your point?  You do realize, don't you, that the digitals you are berating are, in all probability, built by the same companies as the film cameras you are so lovingly embracing?  And the digitals are better sealed and more rugged than their film counterparts because they have to be in order to protect the delicate electronics inside.

And the most important assertion of all....

-you have no soul, and don't understand the emotional appeal of slides or silver prints
Translation ...  "Digital is for you peasants and losers who are too stupid to know better.  Flms is for us more elite, cultured types who know what opinions you underlings should have."   



Brad

[Brad Johnson]

Since I cross posted while mtnbkr was telling us to get back on topic, I'll be the first to try and get back on track.


Balog,

I've got thousand of images I've shot through my D-Reb.  I'd be happy to answer any questions y'all might have, including showing you all the images you can stand.

Ask away.

Brad

[ronnyreagan]

Either get a Nikon or a Canon

As a Sony DSLR owner I have to agree with this. Sony made sense for me (Minolta legacy) and I love my camera but you'll have a much easier time finding lenses and accessories for a Canon or Nikon especially anything used. The only advantage Sony really has that I'm aware of is the in-body image stabilization, and others may have adopted that by now too.

[Brad Johnson]

Didn't I see somewhere that another company has teamed up with Sony to rebrand the body, but with a slightly different sensor setup?

Also, I think some of the kit lenses are now available with integrated IS.

Brad

[Harold Tuttle]

use a lomo or GTFO
 

[Balog]

Since I cross posted while mtnbkr was telling us to get back on topic, I'll be the first to try and get back on track.


Balog,

I've got thousand of images I've shot through my D-Reb.  I'd be happy to answer any questions y'all might have, including showing you all the images you can stand.

Ask away.

Brad

Do you find a substantial difference in terms of ease of use between the various makers? What are your opinions on used bodies? I'm always a bit nervous buying used electronics as I'm not aware of an easy way to inspect them beyond a surface level. With the rapid advances typical in electronic tech, would getting a several year old digital be a good idea or would the picture quality suffer?

[Brad Johnson]

Do you find a substantial difference in terms of ease of use between the various makers?

Not really. Most of the mfgs have the control layouts are pretty intuitive.  I went with Canon because I already had a stable of Canon glass for my film bodies.  The only thing I can caution is that if you start buying lenses, do not buy the digital-specific lenses.  If you have a standard lens you can use it on any film body you might happen to purchase, and it leaves you open to buy a full-frame DSLR should you ever want to.

What are your opinions on used bodies? I'm always a bit nervous buying used electronics as I'm not aware of an easy way to inspect them beyond a surface level.

Crap shoot, honestly.  I bough mine on e-Bay, but I bought it from an individual who answered my correspondence immediately, gave forthright answers to my questions, and gave me his home address and phone number right away.  He even went so far as to proactively tell me about a couple of cosmetic dings on the camera.  There were a couple before that which I didn't get the warm fuzzies from.  I guess one indicator is if they will accept PayPal.  At least with PayPal you get the option of disputing the transaction should things not be as they seem.

There's always the big shops - Adorama, B&H, Abe's of Maine, Camera World of Oregon, etc.  Most of their used equipment has some kind of guarantee.

You can even get new units through places like New Egg now.

Getting one several years old is not an issue.  It's the shutter count that will tell the tale.  If the unit appears clean and has a low shutter count, it's probably okay.  Most entry-level DSLRs are good for anywhere from 20k to 50k shutter cycles.  I wouldn't bat an eye if something had 500-1000 cycles on it and was reasonably priced.

Brad

[Balog]

Getting one several years old is not an issue.  It's the shutter count that will tell the tale.  If the unit appears clean and has a low shutter count, it's probably okay.  Most entry-level DSLRs are good for anywhere from 20k to 50k shutter cycles.  I wouldn't bat an eye if something had 500-1000 cycles on it and was reasonably priced.

Is that like an odometer?

[zahc]

To be fair, I'm not totally up on the latest technology, what with it advancing so fast.

A DSLR has the same long-exposure functions as an FSLR.  They always have.

They might now, but they definitely haven't always. I've taken multiple-day time lapse photos with my film cameras. Last I heard DSLR cameras were limited to like 30 minutes before the sensor overheats, not to mention the batteries will probably go dead eventually.

How much is "drastically"?  You can buy digitals now for about the price of a decent used FSLR.

You can buy DSLR cameras for less than $50 with lens? Things really have been changing.

Uh, what?

You can't make silver prints from a digital file. Inkjet printing B&W is a poor caricature of traditional B&W printing, and I don't understand why you would want to do it anyway.

The tired phrase about "digitals don't really take pictures" is such a pathetic joke.

Of course digital cameras take pictures, in a completely different way. The only thing I argue is when people make the mistake that it is equivalent. "My digital camera can do exactly what your film camera can do". No it can't, my camera focuses light on silver halide emulsion, and yours doesn't. Mine doesn't (directly) make digital files or instantly change ISO either. They are different, but one does not replace the other, and most of all, film is not irrelevant as a photographic medium. Few, even lay, people argue that watercolor is the same thing as, or completely replaces oil painting. Most people realize it's just a different medium. But the same people do this all the time with film and digital. Digital is a radically different imaging technology. I only correct people when they make the mistake of thinking that one can substitute for the other. And I stand by my analysis that the best and cheapest way to start making high-quality photographs is with a second-hand film camera and a $2 roll of film.

[Brad Johnson]

Is that like an odometer?

Yep.  Digitals have a shutter count feature.  Sometimes it's buried in the menus, but it's there.

I did a little digging on evilbay and found this...

http://cgi.ebay.com/Wow-Canon-EOS-350D-8-0-Meg-Plus-Many-Extras-Free-Ship_W0QQitemZ160314863158QQcmdZViewItemQQptZDigital_Cameras?hash=item160314863158&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=72%3A1234%7C66%3A2%7C65%3A12%7C39%3A1%7C240%3A1318%7C301%3A1%7C293%3A1%7C294%3A50

The camera looks to be in good shape, but the accessories are junk.  No-name batteries and cheapo cards.  The cards will probably be okay (though I'd download the images immediately after shooting) but the no-name batteries have an unfortunate reputation of going south rather quickly.  At the current bid it's a pretty good deal, but I wouldn't go much over $300 for it.  It would be an excelling starting point for future growth.

Brad

[Balog]

Browsing on New Egg I found this. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16830120278 A good deal?

Also, for the kits that include lenses, what should I be looking for lense-wise? I'll cop to a total lack of understanding of the nomenclature for lenses, so please talk slow and use small words. 

[Gewehr98]

To be fair, I'm not totally up on the latest technology, what with it advancing so fast.

Obviously not, or you wouldn't be spouting a particular style of tripe in this thread...

I'll get Oleg and Monkeyleg to throw their professional knowledge into the mix.

Balog could use their inputs, too.

[AJ Dual]

AJ, I'd be careful.  Those "no-name" memory cards have a nasty habit of failing at the wrong time.  Check the photo forums for example after hearwrenching example of irreplaceable photos being lost because of a few bucks saved on a card.  Spend the money for good memory.  And (and this can't be said enough) BACK UP YOUR PHOTOS!!!!  Often, and on multiple sets of media.  Nothing like losing a couple thousand shots because your hard drive decides to eat itself for breakfast.

Brad

We dump the camera religiously. And we keep the picture folder mirrored between two PC's over the local house LAN for redunancy.

We also have archived CD-roms burned by month and year, offsite is triply redundant, since all we ever take pics of is the kids or family, so the grandparents have full sets of the CD's should our house burn down. So we're never at risk of losing more than a day's worth of pictures. And sometimes we forget to take the damn camera...   such is life. With all the divorced grandparents, we wind up having multiple holiday events anyway. We just take a bunch of kid-only shots so the various exes' don't get offended.

And it's also quadruply redundant because all the really "good stuff" (i.e. the best pic out of 10-15 in a series of the same people or subject) is hosted in places like Photobucket and the Picasa site.

Actually by "no name card" I mean it's a Trancend 8GB SDHC card. I did look up reviews on multiple sites besides Amazon, egghead etc. and the only substantive difference I could find was a helpful DPreivews mini-article which showed there is still about 30% better write speed with a SanDisk. You will get a few extra FPS in the fast sports mode or with high ISO's.

OTOH, that SanDisk gives you about 30% better performance for 200% of the price. Also, SD and micro-SD card counterfiting is rampant right now. If you go through eBay or other multi-vendor site like Amazon or Buy.com for an agressive price, you don't know what you're getting. You stand a very good chance of getting a non HC SD card, that's not even Sandisk or other top-tier brand. There's a certian amount of security in that nobody bothers to counterfit the generics.

You can also test and verify read/write speeds of your media, thumbdrives too, with this great utility. http://www.heise.de/ct/Redaktion/bo/downloads/h2testw_1.4.zip It's in German, but there is an English option easily visible when you launch the application.

[go_bang]

A) The optics are adapted for common shooting situations, but optimized for none (comprimised optics)

The optics are compromised because they need to meet a price point much more so than for shooting situations.  Unless you're spending several grand on SLR lenses, all camera optics are compromised.  However, in the high end compacts the built in lenses are often much better than the SLR kit lenses.  Usually they are as good or better than mid range SLR lenses.  For example, compare the lens on a Panasonic DMC-FZ50 to any of the 18-250mm SLR superzooms.  You'll find that the FZ50's lens is much better with regards to sharpness and color fringing, but they can make it that way because it's a lot cheaper to make a good lens for a smaller sensor.

B) The smaller objective lens means less light gathering.  That, in conjunction with a smaller sensor, means it takes longer for the focusing sensor to lock (slow focus)

There was a time when the compacts were much slower, but for the last several years that gap has narrowed.  The high end models focus as fast as SLR's in this area.  My Konica Minolta A2 focuses faster than many SLR's, and that camera was released back in 2004.  The Panasonic I mentioned earlier and the Canon G10 clock in just as fast in reviews.

C) The size of a compact necessitates the fewest surface controls and buttons as possible, meaning many functions be menu-driven (less control, or less easily controlled)

You stated that these cameras have less control, but the high end compacts often have all the same control functions as SLR's.  They have manual exposure, aperture priority, shutter priority, exposure compensation, etc.  There are less buttons, but on a well designed high end compact like a Canon G10 the difference in ease of use is negligible.  Whether they are less easily controlled is subjective.

 
D) A compact is, by definition, self-contained.  Though some do have a tripod mount plate, they will normally not have ways to mount external flashes or battery grips. (no ability to mount accessories)
D) Short of adding extra memory, a compact, by definition, is physically locked into its factory configuration. (no expandability)

You're playing with words while I'm talking about actual cameras.  Each of the cameras I listed in my earlier post have flash shoes.  Almost all cameras in that class can take wide angle and telephoto adapter lenses.  You said there was no ability to mount accessories or expandibility.  That is simply incorrect.  They are not as expandible as a SLR, but that wasn't what you said.

You were right on point A, but unfortunately not so much on the rest.  Feel free to try again if you like.

[zahc]

I'll cop to a total lack of understanding of the nomenclature for lenses, so please talk slow and use small words.  grin

18-55mm IS f/3.5-5.6

18-55mm: Focal length. Apparently this is a zoom lens. On a digital camera this would go from medium wide angle to modest telephoto. On 35mm and FX digital, a 'normal' lens is 50mm. On most digitals a 'normal' is closer to like 30mm I think. A 'normal' focal length is about equal to the diagonal of the sensor/film.

IS: Image stabilization. Best advance in photography in probably 30 years, IS is awesome.

f/3.5-5.6: this is the maximum aperture with the lens wide open. Since it is a zoom lens, it has a range of apertures from between a fairly slow f/3.5 zoomed in, to a quite slow f/5.6 when fully zoomed out. A fast aperture is less that f/2. Most zoom lenses are fairly slow. This isn't such a big deal on a digital camera since they have IS and good high-ISO performance, which makes up for a slow lens.

A prime (non-zoom) lens will have only one focal length and one aperture in the name, for example, 50mm f/1.7

[go_bang]

Browsing on New Egg I found this. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16830120278 A good deal?

Also, for the kits that include lenses, what should I be looking for lense-wise? I'll cop to a total lack of understanding of the nomenclature for lenses, so please talk slow and use small words. 

That price is pretty good.  You can do a little better from Amazon.

[Brad Johnson]

Zahc,

I don't, and won't, try to print anything on a home inkjet.  The quality just isn't there.  When I want photos printed I have them done commercially, color or B&W (I'mm partial to sepia, actually).

Also, realize that most film developers no longer develop film directly to the print.  With few exceptions they scan the developed negs, using the image file to produce prints on their digital equipment.  A developer is cheaper, less mechanically complex, takes up less floor space, and is less costly to run than a developer/printer.  Plus, why have have film printer and a digital printer both taking up space when you can use the digital printer for both.  In addition to freeing up floor space the shop can sell you the CD of your scanned negs for an extra four or five bucks.  Kinda blows the whole "film is pristine" thing out of the water.

I'd be leery of any camera for $50 with lens.  I don't know of a decent lens you could buy for that.  Much less with a hunk of camera hung off the back.  Good glass is expensive.

As for the digital image vs silver halide light drawing argument, well... in my opinion it is irrelevant, nostalgic semantics.  It's putting more importance on the tool than the result.  That photo in your hand doesn't care if it was digitally imaged, developed on film stock, or drawn by veiled virgins under the light of a full moon.  My quest, my purpose as a photographer, is to end up with a better photo, not to stubbornly cling to any particular technology because of it's soulful realness.  Honestly, I could care less, especially considering that I am a former die-hard film snob that was forced (darn near at gun point) to open my eyes to digital and the possibilities it holds.

I still like film.  I'll drag down my Elan or, if I'm feeling especially nostalgic, my ancient K-1000, and shoot a rolls of Velvia or Tri-X.  But my days of film are long gone.  Digital is the way to go.

Brad

[Brad Johnson]

Browsing on New Egg I found this. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16830120278 A good deal?

Also, for the kits that include lenses, what should I be looking for lense-wise? I'll cop to a total lack of understanding of the nomenclature for lenses, so please talk slow and use small words. 

Not bad if they throw in shipping.  B&H Photo has them for $479 with free shipping (see the first link I posted somewhere around the first of this thread).

Like Zach said, there are two components to the lens description.

Zoom (expressed in millimeters, and technically known as a variable focal length)
First, keep in mind that the human eye sees what your camera would see with a 50mm lense.  That's why many of the older cameras came with a (surprise) 50mm fixed focus lens.  18-55 goes from wide angle (think wide interior shots and landscapes) to just past what you see normally (like zooming up to get just two people in the crowd).  It makes for a great "walkaround" lens, covering the majority of your everyday shots. 

Most people will also sport a second lens that's a 70-200 or similar (200mm is four times the 50mm "normal" lens, so think of it as a 4x zoom).  This is where the faster lenses can really come into place.  The longer tubes and relatively small objective for most budget consumer zooms means there is a falloff of light transmission.  That makes the lenses slower than their higher priced cousins.  By slower that means you will have to use a slower shutter spead to get the same exposure as a lens that transmits more light.  Long focal length plus slow shutter usually equals blurry picture.

The best zooms feature a constant aperture.  Instead of 18-55, F/3.5-5.6 you will see something like the Canon 24-70 F/2.8L.  That means that the lens will focus from 24-70mm, but has a constant F2.8 aperture all the way through the zoom range.  That means you don't have to change shutter speeds with changes in focal length.

I talked about the digital only lenses before.  Here's why.  The sensor on a digital is smaller than a 35mmm film frame (technically it's called APS-C).  The digital only lenses are designed so the image coming out the back of the lens is the same size as the sensor.  If you tried to use the lens on a film camera, you'd get a print with an image in the middle and a black border around the ourside.  Now the fun part - using a film lens on a digital means the image coming out of the lens is slightly larger than the sensor. That means the sensor is really picking up the center two-thirds of the image that would have been printed on a frame of film.  The net effect is that you are zooming in to the center two-thirds of the image.  Most film lenses have about a 1.6:1 magnification ration.  That means the 24-80 F/2.8L lens I mentioned earlier will actually function like a 38-128mm lens.  The fun part is your 70-200 zoom is now a 112-320mm zoom.  The downside is you lose some of the wide-angle capability at the lower end of the zoom range.

F stop (sometimes referred to as how "fast" the lens is)
Zach did a pretty good job of explaining it above.  I'll add that this is where the more expensive lenses come into play.  More expensive lenses use better glass, more precise production criteria, and more and better coatings.  This results in less lens flare, less chromatic aberration, and more light transmission.  The net effect is a lense that will allow the camera to capture the a clearer, more vivid image at a faster shutter speed.  Since faster shutter speeds usually mean less problems with blur, better performance at low light, and slower ISO's (less noise), the faster lenses constitute an all-around improvement in image quality for a given shooter's abilities.  Whether or not you want to spend the money for that extra performance is up to your particular wants and pocket book.

Confused yet?

Run down to your local bookstore and pick up one of John Hegcoe's beginner photography books.  They are a great place to start.

Brad

[Gewehr98]

Inkjet photo technology, unfortunately, hasn't caught up to digital photography, without a lot of additional expense via photo ink and fancy paper.

I'm not particularly impressed with the longevity of photos printed by that technique, either.

It's why I have several photo-quality color laser printers here at the home office/business.

And sometimes, I'm just too lazy, and take the CF card down to Walmart, where they transfer the images onto photo paper for me. 

[zahc]

I don't know of a decent lens you could buy for that.  Much less with a hunk of camera hung off the back.

Last one I bought was last weekend, a Pentax ME Super in good working condition with a SMC-M f/1.7 lens, a fairly highly-regarded lens. Here's one review:
http://www.kenrockwell.com/pentax/35mm/lenses/50mm-f17-smc-m.htm

Kinda blows the whole "film is pristine" thing out of the water

I don't see why. With film you can scan it and have digital files also, which makes it more versatile. Digital editing and printing is the way, the truth and the light when it comes to color; you don't have to convert me on that one. Like I said, I'm tradigital all the way when it comes to color. But I can still pop my slides in a slide viewer or projector too. Digital cameras don't make slides or negatives.

irrelevant, nostalgic semantics.

Many in the art world disagree. In fact, why should anyone paint pictures anymore; wasn't photography supposed to make painting obsolete? Plus we have wacoms now, and photoshop. When new technologies come around, new options are on the table, but the old ones remain options. People still paint pictures on canvas, even though we have better materials now.

Clearly, the process is relevent to many people, as is physicality. I suggest, as an experiment, that you take a high-resolution image of a famous painting, and try to sell it. I doubt it will bring the millions of dollars that the original painting will bring. Why? Isn't it the same thing? You can push the 'Emulate Kodachrome' button on your photo editor, and what you will get is something that looks just like Kodachrome...but it isn't Kodachrome. It might be an irrelevant semantic point to you, but clearly many people (and I for one) recognize that there are differences in artistic media and recognize the worth of a physical original.

[Brad Johnson]

Zahc, the worth of a physical original of the Mona Lisa, or any painting for that matter, and a "physical original" of a film frame are not comparisons.  You aren't buying the Mona Lisa for the way it was produced, but for what it is and who did it.

Look, I know you like film.  I do to.  But the world has passed us by.  The only reasons to hold out for a physical frame of film is nostalgia and an appreciation for the process.  Unfortunately, those who are into photography for the process alone are in a small minority when it comes to photography as a whole.  "Many in the art world" is a pretty small number when it comes to the overall number of people who snap photos.  The majority, the VAST majority, of photographers could care less how a photo was produced as long as it is the picture they had in their head when they tripped the shutter.

In all objective senses the finished photo from a film camera and a modern digital camera cannot be told apart.  In terms of use, viability, storability, and processability digital has film beat hands down.  That's not a subjective argument.  That's just the way it is.

Brad

[zahc]

In terms of use, viability, storability, and processability digital has film beat hands down.  That's not a subjective argument.  That's just the way it is.

Of course it's a subjective argument.

use:film cameras are way easier for me to use. Have you ever seen the users manual for a DSLR? I saw one at frys one time. Ugh.
viability: I don't know what you mean by that. Obviously newspaperrs and such are going to use digital. I'm not a newspaper, just a photographer.
storability:3 years of negatives fits in a 1-inch 3-ring binder. I don't see the problem here, and I don't worry about hard drive crashes, although I have the scans on the hard drive too, not to mention prints and the web. So I'm triply archived.
processability: Shooting film, you can have your original negative for optical printing, or your original slide for projecting or viewing in a slide viewer, plus you can have the full digital workflow, digital editing and printing if you want. You give up nothing. With digital you MUST use a computer and software and you get NO physical original; with film, I can develop and print it without ever using a transistor.

Of course it's subjective. I happen to like shooting film, and some happen to like digital. I like shooting digital sometimes too. I'm not exactly sure why we are arguing, except that people keep trying to make objective claims of superiority.
I'm not the only one in the world that likes to shoot film either. If you still don't understand why anyone would want to use that stuff, maybe this article will help explain. It IS subjective.

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/why-we-love-film.htm

[Balog]

And maybe you all could stop shitting up an informative thread and take your little pissing contest to PMs?

[Brad Johnson]

Balog, you might also check your local junior college or any camera shops in your area.  A lot of them have some great "Getting Started In Photography" classes.  Check the forums, too.  Places like shutterbug.com and photocamel.com are great resources for stuff like that. Sign up and intro yourself as a newbe.  They are (usually) pretty helpful about pointing you to local sources for training, tips, get-togethers, etc.

Oh, almost forgot.  You can get a photo account with many places like Walgreens, CVS, Walmart, and several national photo finishers.  Dump the shots onto your computer, pick and/or edit the ones you want, and send them via your account.  Around here Walgreens seems to be the best about keeping their equipment calibrated.  You won't want to do it with hundreds of shots, but for fifteen or twenty, or for that 5x7 or 8x10 enlargement, it's super easy and fairly inexpensive way to have your pics printed.  FYI - an 8x10 runs about $4.  You can even do fancy-schmancy stuff like postcards.  They can print posters, too, though they done at a national facility and mailed to you.

Brad