A sad day it will be when the last image is captured on a photographic emulsion. The transition from chemical photography to digital photography is well underway. Indeed, it is clear by a simple visit to a big box store that the amount of shelf space given to film cassettes vs digital cameras & accessories is rapidly tipping in favor of the digital. Consumer demand is well past the cautious early-adopter stage in its evolution. Many people are several generations into digital photographic equipment.
I own a low end Hewlett Packard Model P.O.S. digital camera with a 4.1 megapixel chip. I suppose I’d be happier with it if it still worked. Even when it did work, it was a P.O.S. As long as nothing moved, the image was sharp and the colors were true. But given the slow shutter response, the slow shutter speed, and the heavy power demand on the battery, using it was a maddening experience. Evidently a capacitor has failed because the flash fails to fully charge.
Printing is still a chemical process, one way or other. Printing consumables like paper and inks/dyes are a major cash cow for all of the manufacturers of printers.
I do not consider photocopier xerography to be strictly digital imaging. I consider it to be a form of chemical photography because, despite the use of computer driven laser arrays and electrostatics in image formation, there remains a deep and intricate art in the chemistry of the toner composition. I have actually done some color toner R&D and can attest to the high art required in that field.
Th’ Gaussling laments the demise of chemical photography, at least on the camera side, because of the highly advanced color chemistry knowledge that will inevitably be lost. Lost because skilled practitioners in the manufacture of color films will retire, labs and plants will be shuttered, and the use of color films will dwindle to low volume. Soon, say 20 years from now, only eccentric purists and “hobbyists” will capture images on emulsions. Drug stores will sell off their developing equipment to people who drive VW Beetles in Guatemala and fill the space with racks of diabetic candy, NASA diapers, and $4.99 DVDs.
Soon, the experience of dodging a poorly exposed image under the projector, swishing print paper in developing solution under red light, and experiencing the magic of seeing an image appear will be lost to future generations. The smell of acetic acid and the darkroom clutter of wet film hanging from string will be but a distant memory of the “old ones”.
When I get to the nursing home I’ll regale my fellow geezers and codgers with harrowing tales of nights spent outside at the telescope shooting time exposures with hypersensitized Tri-X. They’ll nod off in boredom and I’ll switch on a Star Trek rerun and fall into a deep slumber while Kirk and Spock contend with the Tholian Web. ZZzzzzz.
Lamentations on Chemistry 
Gaussling, if you’re nostalgic for chemical photography, you should check out APUG.org (Analog Photography User’s Group). It is a completely digital-free zone, and extremely active. I have a few recipes posted there too.
What worries me more is the demise of companies that were once heavyweights in chemical photography. Agfa is the prime example (no longer in business, though its developers have been picked up by another manufacturer). Forte, a Hungarian company that produced really nice B&W papers, went out of business earlier this year. Ilford had a close call last year. Kodak has been discontinuing some of its more obscure emulsions (like Technical Pan).
At the same time, people report that interest in chemical photography is on the upswing in some quarters… new fine-arts students who have never used film before are often forced to to do so in mandatory darkroom classes and end up liking it. This is apparently what is keeping demand up.
On APUG there is a fellow who posts under the name “Photo Engineer”. He is a retired Kodak chemist who worked on, among other things, a Kodachrome 400 that never got released. His posts are fascinating, if you’re into the chemistry of photography.
We could obviosly write a whole book on the digital/analog discussion. Some disjointed thoughts on the ads/disads:
My wife recently needed to become a more skilled photographer (she’s puting her Ph.D. in analytical chemistry to work as a Realtor). It was great that she had a digital camera because she got immediate feedback, especially when bracketing the exposure. She learned in a few minutes things that took me months to learn with the traditional shoot-and-develop process (assuming that I still had the notes as to what the various settings were). Her pictures are great, but it still boggles the mind how many people still take bad pictures because they rely on the camera to do it all. She also has greater respect for all the gear that photogs carry around.
Last year I was involved as an expert witness on the yellowing and degradation of some fiberglass outdoor products. The other side was trying to use photographs to show how much yellowing had occurred over time. I had a blast knocking that argument into the bleachers. They raised the issue during discovery, they never raised it at the trial. Thank goodness they were analog pictures. With digital pictures, it would be a whole new ballgame.
I ran across this on Monday and can’t wait to try it. I was always pushing the latitude in my pictures.
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I’ve returned to Film photography. One reason was that I got my dads old SLR, lent and I can’t afford a digital SLR. But I really enjoy it. The pictures have different quality. Now if I could only find a dark room …