DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FILM AND DIGITAL WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHY
Choosing a wedding photographer to capture your wedding can be an intimidating task. Your wedding photos last a lifetime, a reminder of one of the most important days of your life, long after your wedding day is over. Getting your choice of wedding photography style, whether it's artistic or photojournalistic, digital or film, is probably the most important decision you'll make when it comes to your wedding.
Below I would like to explain the difference between film and digital wedding photography.
The advantage of film wedding photography is how film cameras record light, shadow and color. Film has just "that look." Film photos look buttery and soft, the colors are just beautiful, and there's just something qualitatively different about the look of the film. It's softer, it's more dreamy, and the color palette is a little more defined. The skin tones look terrific. Honestly, I'm in favor of the color tones and skin tones that come from my film.
When I shoot a film, I slow down and shoot every frame with purpose. With the couple, I feel more present. You need a lot of years of photography experience with film. It's much harder to get every photo perfect, because film forces photographers to understand light and to know exactly where the subject should be positioned in order to get the best images possible.
The downside is that film wedding photography is expensive. Due to the cost of filming and developing and scanning, brides will receive fewer images compared to digital photography. Digital cameras don't have these extra costs so they can take an endless amount of photos. Practically, you can shoot the whole day as long as you have memory cards and batteries. Thousands of images can be saved to a dime size memory card.
Generally, film photos are less sharp. I don't think it's necessarily a downside, because it adds to the dreaminess of film photography. Overall, digital is generally sharper than film and lets you get a very crisp final product if that's what you're looking for.
When it gets dark, I need to use more of my digital cameras because the colors and shadows disappear around and after sunset. Digital cameras can be kept on shooting at night with minimal or almost no light. Digital camera makers, Canon, Sony Nikon, are continuously increasing their digital cameras' low light capability and are now far beyond film in that respect. I shoot at wedding receptions with my digital cameras and it gets dark. Honestly, I have to admit that, in certain circumstances, I still think digital can be a more effective tool. This photo I took below with my digital camera. Unfortunately, it would not have been possible with a film camera.
In general, film has more grain than digital film. It may be a disadvantage in some cases, but in my opinion it adds to the beauty of film photography.
Movie photography requires more time during weddings. The film had to be loaded after the film had run out of 36 or 12 photos. It takes time to load the cameras, and I need to do it a couple of times during longer wedding ceremonies. Loading the film can take 10-20 seconds and sometimes requires stopping the sessions. Also, after loading a roll of film, I'm bound to that particular film speed for the rest of your roll. On the run, you can't change ISO. Digital cameras are designed to adjust to shifting light conditions all the time and are continually improved when you read this.
