Yes, go digital. It is the wave of the future. The only people I know still using film in my industry are art photographers. Most folks in the newspaper and magazine world have switched to digital.

The only thing I want to mention here that has not been said before (and I am not trying to start the age old debate) is that the the next time you are thinking of buying a new computer and you really want ease of use for digital photography, digital video and DVDs consider checking out a Macintosh.

If you have not used or seen Apple's free software iPhoto then it is worth a trip to the nearest Apple store just to see it, not to mention iMovie and iDVD.

Ira is right, DVD is the way to go. But I also use the digital pics in another way. Take our recent trip to Italy. Since returning I have done the following, all using iPhoto.

1) I organized, edited and backed up all my photos using iPhoto.

2) I burned my 450+ pictures to DVD to share with my kids and friends when they come over to our home. This is the 21st century version of the travel slide show. But I can add commentary and music. I did this all with iDVD, iPhoto and iMovie. All free applications that come with any Mac.

3) I created a website (it is half done and I will post it as soon as I finish it) directly from iPhoto with comments on each picture and more for my friends who are far away but want to share in our adventures.

4) I created a 36 page, full color, hard bound book about our trip for my parents Christmas gift. They loved it. All I had to do was put them in the order I wanted, type in some captions and click on Make a book: and few days later I received a beautiful book in the mail from Apple. The book took 2 hours to do and I had it in my hands in 3 days.

5) I exported 35 of my favorite photos to Apple (with one click) who made beautiful 4x6 inch prints for me and mailed them to be within a week.

I am not suggesting that you dump your old computer and run out and buy a Mac. Just think about this the next time you buy a computer at least go and take a look at what a Mac has to offer.

(I should add here that I also own Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, PageMaker and numerous other pieces of photo and layout software and have used the for 10+years but I never use it on vacation pics since I got iPhoto.)

Happy clicking! Jim in Redmond, WA