[twblalock]

There are a lot of reasons it made sense: getting to see your photos instantly instead of waiting for (and paying for) film development, the ability to change the white balance after photos are taken, not lugging a bunch of film around, not worrying about airport x-rays ruining your film, getting a digital copy of your photos without using a scanner, and many other very big advantages.

[batbomb]

And the iPad

[hamitron]

x-rays don't ruin film

[lb1lf]

That depends. A lot of older X-ray machines were designed on the more is MORE philosophy, definitely ruining most film.

The fine print on so-called ‘film safe’ machines typically state they won’t visibly affect film slower than ISO800, inclusive.

(Plus, the damage is accumulated, so if you lug a lot of film through a lot of airports, you will get the occasional nasty surprise.)

That being said, I’ve never had any problems having my film -when I travel with it- inspected manually.