What Is Digital Photography?

The answer to the question  What is Digital Photography? is simply explained as a form of photography where images are captured and stored electronically or as a digital file rather than light sensitive film. The image, captured thru Digital Photography, will then be ready for digital processing (corrections, sizing, cropping, etc), viewing and or printing.

Before Digital Photography, pictures were made by exposing light sensitive films. Chemicals were then added to make the image visible and printed on a photographic paper.

Digital Photography has been adopted by amateur photographers because of the convenience of sending images by emails and uploading to the Internet.

Some commercial photographers have been resistant to Digital Photography because they believe that the image quality available from a digital camera is inferior to what is available from a film camera.

In Digital Photography, the photographic film is replaced by a silicon chip which is often called a sensor. A  film is limited in the sense that every exposure results in a photograph and each barrel of film can only produce 36 images. Silicon chip sensor may produces hundreds of images which allows the convenience of  experimenting with the photos which was never possible with the film camera.

What is Digital Photography? Explained Technically

With Digital Photography, as explained earlier, the film is replaced with a light sensitive electronic device known as an image sensor. These sensors are made up of millions of photoelectric devices that convert light into an electrical signal. The strength of the electrical signal depends upon the intensity of the light that exposes the image sensor. These electrical signals are then processed through a series of complex electronic circuits and eventually stored in some type of internal or external flash memory in a standard image file format such as a JPEG file. (JPEG = Joint Photographic Experts Group). When processed by a computer these files reproduce an image which is able to be printed on photographic paper.

Understanding Digital Photography With Natural Light

I have always been fascinated by the natural light and have always wanted to capture the images it create as it brings out different moods.  Digital photography may sound futuristic with fine arts. But not for a great photographer like Scott Frances.

Scott Frances has made it simple to understand Digital Photography as fine Art. As quoted from the Epoch Times:

                Scott Frances: Understanding Digital Photography as Fine Art

                By Lori Harel

Frances feels his work has become “more about the quality of the light than anything else,” as he writes in his book.

When asked for a photo for this article, Frances stood by the window and opened the blinds to let natural daylight illuminate his face from the side.

Frances uses natural light and shies away from artificial lighting. “I am interested in capturing the atmosphere and the effects of nature. Whether it’s time passing or weather changing or seeing how light plays off of different surfaces, I think artificial lighting destroys that,” he said.

Similarly to layering different people from the same place, Frances layers images from the same place but with different light exposure into the final image: “In my case, my camera is on a tripod; it does not move. I am taking multiple images of the same scene.

“Because the contrast is so high, the sky is 50 times brighter than the shadow: One exposure for the sky, another for the shadow, another exposure for the mid-tones.”

While a fine arts painter creates the final image captured in his mind out of different aspects he has seen, the digital photographer takes images of his object with a multitude of light exposures and creates the final image through working with the software.

This photo was taken using natural light.  That’s my son in 2002. I used Minolta SLR and no editing software used.