Jim Bledsoe , Nov 20, 2009; 11:34 a.m.
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How much exposure latitude does the digital format offer? I use a Nikon D60 and am having difficulty finding that info. Black and white film has 7 to 9 f stops from pure white to Black. Kodachrome had about 6 f stops latitude. What is the latitude of digital? Do the EV number equal f stops in amount of exposure? Thanks.
Andrew Gilchrist 
, Nov 20, 2009; 02:30 p.m.
Yes, EV number is equivalent to f-stops.
Phil Winter , Nov 20, 2009; 05:19 p.m.
EV is an absolute value, whereas f stops are relative. There can be any number of aperture and shutter speed combinations that yield the same EV. The EV of a sunny day is 15. But f16, 1/100 and ISO 100 properly exposes for EV 15 as does f8, 1/400 at ISO 100.
From my experience, a DSLR will have about 6 stops of dynamic range. Some will claim more. And by shooting raw, it is possible to pull back some over exposed highlights and possibly get a bit more DR. I've heard that the DR of a DSLR is about the same as shooting slide film, but I have found that even slide film (Sensia 100,which I used to shoot a lot of) has better shadow detail and the highlights hang in there better than with my DSLR. I use a Canon 10D, but I don't think DR range has improved all that much, but then again, I have not campared the 10D to newer cameras.
John DeMott , Nov 20, 2009; 05:36 p.m.
The dpreview links from Rob should give you an objective, numerical answer. I strongly urge you, however, to do your own tests...not because dpreview or any other source is suspect, but because dynamic range seems to mean different things to different people. Some people will be quite happy with shadow detail that can only be extracted with significant adjustments to the raw file and that has lots of noise. Others want to see noise free shots in jpeg. Etc., etc.
The important question is how much dynamic range can you capture that will satisfy your needs. To answer that, you need to take a number of shots of high contrast scenes, e.g., white walls in bright sunlight adjacent to shadowed areas. Use the meter on the camera to separately measure the highlights and shadows and see how the photos come out when you try to include both in the same shot.
In general, cameras like your D60 should give you more dynamic range than slide film and less than negative film. Compact (i.e., point and shoot) digital cameras will have less dynamic range than the D60, while the most recent, top-of-the-line DSLRs will have more dynamic range than the D60.
John DeMott , Nov 20, 2009; 05:59 p.m.
I guess I was typing at the same time as Phil--I didn't intend my post to sound like I was trying to directly contradict his opinion on the relative dynamic range of slide film and digital. I stand by my statement, but I think the difference with Phil may simply illustrate that different people see things differently. Phil prefers the handling of shadows in a particular slide film to his 10D, so there would not be much sense in trying to do a numerical comparison because it likely wouldn't change his artistic preference. FWIW, the dxomark.com website allows easy comparisons of the dynamic ranges of various cameras. They show a 10D as having about one and a half stops less dynamic range than a recent DSLR like a D90; a D60 falls in between.
Jim Bledsoe , Nov 20, 2009; 09:53 p.m.
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Thank you each and every one. That is a great help, my Nikon manual assumes that I know all this and it is simply refreshing my memory on some points. I made the move from film to digital about six months ago and it's been a steep learning curve for an old guy.
Gary Demuelenare , Nov 21, 2009; 07:23 a.m.
try the following rough and ready guide. film negative and and raw digital have about the same dr which is 8-9 stops. jpeg digital has about 6 stops of dr. slide film has about 4+ stops of dr. if you are talking headroom then film nagative and raw has about 2 stops, while jpeg has about 1 stop. and film slides has zero headroom.
note i shot film slides for over 3 decades, that was kodak ecktachrome 64, which has the 4+ stops of dr and zerio headroom and had no trouble getting pics of any scene i wished to shoot. the limitations on dr and headroom was simply something you got used to and made changes in the technique used. having zero headroom with the ecktachrome 64 simply made sure that you shot carefdully with a full analysis of the exposure before the shot. also with slides if you overexpose there is absolutely no recovery of any highlights.
Danny Low , Nov 22, 2009; 01:15 a.m.
If you do HDR (High Dynamic Range) processing of digital images in programs such as Photoshop, your dynamic range is greater than that of film. You do the old 1 stop over and under bracketing of the image and Photoshop will merge all 3 images together to get one image with a dynamic range that gets the details of the shadows and the highlights that the bracketed shots captured. HDR is actually much more flexible than that but most DSLRs today have automatic 3 shot bracketing so that is easy to do. If you have the time, you can do much more elaborate bracketing and the only limit on what you can merge is the memory on your computer and your processor speed.
Danny
David Henderson 
, Nov 22, 2009; 05:19 a.m.
My 5D, always in raw, has noticeable more dynamic range than shooting Velvia or any of the other slide films (mainly Provia ) that I've used a lot of. I need grads much less frequently, and of course the fact that you can view a histogram is probably "worth" an extra stop or so of dynamic range anyway since you can make sure to use all the available range in a contrasty exposure; which is difficult with slide film unless you are taking multiple readings witha trusted spotmeter. Even the 10D I had for a little while had better DR than Velvia.
