I was given my first 35mm slr - an old screw-mount praktica - when I was 18. I used this until falling in a river did for the shutter curtains, than had two canon AE1 bodies in succession - both of these died through (mis)use in harsh conditions too. My insurance company very kindly replaced new for old on the last one of these and gave me an EOS300 and a brand new sigma 28-200 lens (the first new camera gear I had ever owned!) back in 1996 I think. This combo is still going strong in my nephew's hands, although he now has a reasonable digital compact that sees more use.
2001 saw me upgrade seriously with a financial windfall - my photography was becoming a more major hobby, I had better lenses, and wanted a more responsive and tougher body. I went for a canon 1V - what a cracking camera that was. I still regret trading it in, though after switching to digital it had stayed in the cupboard for a year.
For a long time I captured my images on film, but used them digitally. I felt that I could get as good or better quality of printed image, plus all the flexibility digital offered, by using a good scanner rather than by using the digital bodies that were available at the time.
I finally switched to digital capture in late 2006, when the pace of change in sensor technology seemed to be slowing a bit, and the 1DsII offered better quality, with all the advantages of my 1V's focussing, metering etc, and the ablility to change ISO from shot to shot (a major plus for digital capture) which I hadnt had on film.
I do occasionally get nostalgic for film, mainly when I find a particular image in my negative archives which has a very wide tonal range, but generally it has all been positive for me.
The biggest advantage is the freedom to experiment and review results rapidly, so that the learning process is speeded up. I just wouldnt have bothered with flight shots of birds, or experimented with some of the abstract stuff, for instance. And not having my own dark room meant that I was dependent of the development choices of a lab tech who might not have appreciated my intent with some exposures. With digital, it really is all down to me - both good and bad!
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