Thinking about going back to analog cameras...

[LORD M]

Today I sat around looking at old photos I took 4 years ago with my analog camera. Then I realised how much better the colours are in my analog camera photos then in my digital camera photos. And now I was pretty intressted again to use an analog camera instead of my digital one.

I am planning on buying a new camera pretty soon, and maybe I'll be getting an analog camera instead of a digital. But I am wondering, are there any digital cameras with the same colour intensity and colour reproduction out there that can match or even surpass the ones of analog cameras? I have used a Minolta Dynax 303si as my analog camera, and a Sony Alpha 100 as my digital camera.

I know that Sony Alphas aren't the best camera in the world when it comes to colour reproduction (and many other things as well). But I looked around on the net and I got the image that analog cameras have a much better colour reproduction. I am pretty cloven on if I should get an analog camera or not, but if there are digital cameras with great colour reproduction out there then could someone please enlighten me on the subject. I would greatly appriciate it.

[VincentKlijn]

I think you might be falling in a well known trap here.

When you shoot analog, your negatives are corrected by the printing machine. This might improve exposure and color representation. But here you are relying on a machine to make your pictures better than they actually are.

When shooting digital you see what you really shot. You then could (should) correct them yourself in order to get to better results. You need to shoot RAW (digital neg) in order to do that on a maximum basis. Basically you will do the developing and printing yourself, instead of relying on a machine.

If you want to see what you shoot with your analog camera, you need to shoot slides. This will show you what you really are doing. Only then will you know how accurate your metering really was. This is the only way to really learn how to take good pictures.

Digital camera's nowadays are good in representing colors. What I dislike about them is the unnatural sharpness when shooting models. However, for tech- or packshots this is not a problem.
Color representation is a problem for many people, but this is due to working processes, calibration, etc. The camera's themselves are not the problem.

[LORD M]

Originally Posted by VincentKlijn

I think you might be falling in a well known trap here.

When you shoot analog, your negatives are corrected by the printing machine. This might improve exposure and color representation. But here you are relying on a machine to make your pictures better than they actually are.

When shooting digital you see what you really shot. You then could (should) correct them yourself in order to get to better results. You need to shoot RAW (digital neg) in order to do that on a maximum basis. Basically you will do the developing and printing yourself, instead of relying on a machine.

If you want to see what you shoot with your analog camera, you need to shoot slides. This will show you what you really are doing. Only then will you know how accurate your metering really was. This is the only way to really learn how to take good pictures.

Digital camera's nowadays are good in representing colors. What I dislike about them is the unnatural sharpness when shooting models. However, for tech- or packshots this is not a problem.
Color representation is a problem for many people, but this is due to working processes, calibration, etc. The camera's themselves are not the problem.

Thank you so much, this was just what I needed to hear. Thanks!