After having my 1st digital camera Nikon Coolpix 3 years ago as supplementary to my SLR, I decided to replace both with one single camera for travelling photos, and it’s going to be digital only. Digital camera has come to a stage to be able to fully replace our old film camera in recent years in terms of printout quality and affordability albeit few die hard fans still using film for advertisment and banner shooting. Unlike the low sensitivity of ISO up to 200 maximum and 4 Mega Piexel maximum few years ago, you could now easily find digital camera with high ISO of 6400 and above with 14MP with a lighter pocket price tag.

In fact, I was a die hard SLR fan before this as well when I was still carrying my bulky Nikon F70 with huge 28-200 zoom lens and plenty of Kodak ISO400 films along my honeymoon trip to Australia 3 years ago. Alongside I brought along the new at that time digital compact camera as a backup. It was the last time I did that. Since then I rarely brought my SLR out until it was stolen during my house break-in last year. Why?

These are my Top 5 Reasons why I think digital cameras are more suitable for travel:

1. Easier And Safer To Carry – Unless you are carrying a complete kit set with multiple zoom lenses and bulky DSLR body, digital camera especially compacts are generally lighter and smaller or thinner. It can be easily inserted into your pocket which would be safer without exposing it to the ‘public’. On top of that, carrying ten or twenty rolls of film along could be a headache as well not to mention if one of them get lost on your travel. Digital cameras use one tiny 4GB SD memory card instead which can be even detached from the camera body any time for extra safety precaution;
2. More Reliable and Safer To Point-And-Shoot – For travel addict like me, I like to snap whenever there is a scene to capture at the right time. Point-and-Shoot characteristic is the strong point for digital camera where its Live View feature on the LCD screen promises to deliver what-you-see-is-what-you-get. Unlike traditional film camera where you can know the result only after developing them and if you found you have set or shot some under- or over-exposed or hand-shaking-blur photos which is already too late;
3. Cheaper To Trial-And-Error – Similar to the above facts, you could snap, snap, snap and snap as many shots on the same spot or scene as you like to select the Best picture thenafter. It will cost you some extra MB’s of your memory card that’s all. A perfect companion for budget travellers!;
4. Comparable Image Quality nowadays – As mentioned in the intro above, technology advancment has improved the image quality of todays’ digital prosumer camera to be comparable, if not better than, the film camera. Though it’s still stepping through the spectrum from black to white, it is more than sufficient for travel potos (unless you’re willing to folk out 10 grands just to get a Sigma 4MP digital camera which will capture lights in 3 layers of sensor for realistic eye-view photos!) and
5. Able and Easier To Self-Editing – Yes, especially in this era. We could play around our photos with different colours, brightness, saturation or even panoramic view all in PC, Free! Copy and paste, resize bigger or smaller, reduce noise, storing and distribute became easier and possible in this digital era. You can keep as many copies of the original photos in multiple media like SD’s, DVD, Hardisk or USB drive! Can you duplicate you film instead?

All these points are actually used to persuade my wife to actually allow me to buy a new camera! As part of the countdown to my Shanghai trip in November, I’m going to grab one replacement Now! You may subscribe to my RSS feeds for Free latest updates of my purchase! See ya! – Travel Feeder.