Film is material, digital is virtual. Essentially, these are expressive tools composed of two different systems. So we can determine from principle that: one is a thing, the other is not a thing!

Film imaging utilizes the principle of visual persistence, using 24 frames per second to ultimately make static images move. So film can be touched and preserved long-term. Regarding film imaging, in the current state, my thirty years of film shooting experience suggests that film is closer to our visual perception, especially its perspective relationships. Film is a product of the industrial age.

Digital acquisition is very direct, with formatted exposure effects, so its imaging results are safe but lack personality. Because of the accuracy of formatted exposure, in some sense it becomes closer to our perceptual needs. What the eye sees can be captured. When the eye’s pupil dilates in darkness, digital also automatically changes the exposure index. So the emergence of digital has made human image recording more universal, and images have become increasingly able to simulate human vision.

The birth of digital marked the end of film – the technology brought by industrial civilization. It made shooting more convenient and simplified. Although they are both images that reshape vision, compared to film, digital not only reduced costs but also simplified operational procedures. Thus, image expression greatly reduced production risks and input hardships.

Due to the simplicity of shooting, not requiring strict training and control, filmmaking has become popularized and low-end, essentially bringing about a decline in film quality and the production of more crude works. But this is certainly a process – eventually digital cinema will gradually enter systematized strict training, and its quality and technical content will inevitably improve, thereby changing the fate of digital cinema.

Presentation Methods of Digital and Film

Because film and digital are products of completely different systems, we can also completely use digital thinking for imaging and filmmaking without a foundation in film technology training. The principle of digital image survival is closer to and more similar to the principle of human eye image survival, so digital photography is biomimetic. At the recording level, its technical range far exceeds film, and its possibilities are thereby expanded – this is something film can never compare to. This is not what I’m saying; this is a very basic technical principle. On this point, the space for discussion is not only limited, or rather there is no discussion space at all. But the advantage of film is that it is material, so in presentation and preservation, film has its own advantages and characteristics.

We can speak from the presentation aspect: digital presentation is only responsible to the screen, speaking from reverse lighting and shadow presentation. It is direct to the screen, requiring no material medium conversion. First, it doesn’t need to substitute with film methods. Its light and shadow goes from what you see when shooting to the final big screen presentation – there’s no middle process, and no need to find substitutes.

This proves that the image presentation processes of film and digital files have no comparability whatsoever.

Film to image presentation has intermediate processes, which is precisely the bottleneck of film development. But why do so many great directors still miss film? That’s because of the very subtle qualities that film produces, which current digital technology has not yet reached. Facts show this is only a matter of time – digital photography is constantly changing and improving!

From my persistence in shooting film to finally converting to shooting digital cinema, this is a change of era. Individual strength can hardly contend with it.

The Difference Between Film and Digital Color

From color science research, the British achieved research results in 1863, discovering the principle of how our eyes see. Color is composed of three primary colors: red, green, and blue – which is also the presentation principle of digital cameras. Red, green, and blue are also the three types of color-sensing cells in human eyes. These three color-sensing cells, through eye scanning, generate bioelectricity when stimulated by light, which is finally transmitted to the brain and forms images in the brain. (This is the basic principle of color entering the human body’s reaction as explained to me by a medical doctor.) This principle also confirms that the CIM and CCD photosensitive components of digital cameras are based on this principle, converting countless small photosensitive components – that is, their function is that as long as they can receive light and shadow, they can produce very weak electrical energy, then convert it to digital. Based on the size of the digital signal, digital files are formed. The CIM on digital cameras has red, green, and blue color-sensing components, forming countless pixel points, and finally these pixel points form images. This image formation is exactly the same as the principle of how eyes see color. From this principle, when light energy converts to electrical energy, digital possesses a kind of infinity to some degree – its range becomes broad, closer to human eyes.

This confirms the difference of film. Although film also utilizes the principle of light energy, its light energy creates images through silver and salt. Due to the silver-salt relationship, places exposed to light cause silver to turn black, while unexposed places, through development and fixing processes, remove areas without silver, leaving white – this is film formation, also what we commonly call “developed negatives” or base film.

Digital is exactly the opposite. When light enters, it first distinguishes image boundaries and presentation through black and white. It is completely material, so film color theoretically follows the red-yellow-blue concept. (Kodak’s success was that they were the first to solve the yellow color effect in film. Kodak truly restored the yellow effect, so their signature trademark color is yellow.) But digital’s primary colors are red-green-blue. Film and digital – these two color systems are exactly in a complementary relationship: one is material, one is light-based. Essentially they are in a corresponding relationship.

So film first produces negatives (base film), then develops positives (sample film, finished film), and through projector projection, finally presents images on the screen. Its production process is complex and refined.

This is only to tell everyone the difference between film and digital, with the purpose of better mastering digital processing and controlling its functions well, so as not to shoot films in a crude and shoddy manner.