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Silicon Film has been promising an interchangeable digital back for 35mm SLR cameras for several years. As far as I know, it's still vaporware. One source indicates that the company ceased operations in 2001. The web site still exists, but seems to have nothing more than an "about us" page.

And it still hasn't.

Stand up Silicon Film Technologies ...

I'd say film is dead except for somebody like the poster - he clearly wants to study the craft - and while journalists and wedding photographers (and the like) who sell the content of their images more than anything else may be moving to digital, there are still holdouts in terms of artists who feel that film photography is a craft that they don't want to give up entirely.

There are some photographers yet who work, sell their photos, who don't plan on switching to digital anytyme soon. I've read recently a couple of rags that had two pros face off on digital cameras with one saying why s/he switched and the other saying why s/he won't. There are good points, merits, on both sides but in the end it's in the eyes of the beholder. Personally I want both, film and digital. Though I haven't heard anything about them in months, there was a company offering a solution, Silicon Film. They came up with a digital film where a photographer could take out the old film and insert a digital cartridge thus offering both worlds.

oops overestimated the intelligence of the slashdot system.
here are the htmlized links:

Silicon Film site (amazingly, still up)

Wired Vaporware 2002 list

Dpreview news roundup

Oh, BTW, please copy this and spread it around as prior art in case some jerk tries to patent the very concept of doing this. It's so bloody obvious.

WAY too late, bud. This has been vaporwear for about three years now.

Amazingly, this is still rumbling on after about 5 years in development, despite its original developers going bust. The idea is that you put a CCD and associated memory/circuitry in a standard 35mm camera to make it digital. Nice idea, but the prototypes they've shown so far have had crap resolution and capacity compared to modern digicams. Besides, the camera manufacturers wouldn't like it - they would much rather see you buy a whole new kit.

Silicon Film Technologies should be on there, hands down. They won in 2000 or so. You'd think after two more years they'd find a way to make this work.

It's vapor, but it could be the road to digital for people with high-quality 35mm SLR cameras. Everyone wants to go digital for the convenience, the instant feedback on the shot, the uh, privacy of not going through a photo lab, etc. There must be over a million people with SLR's of higher optical quality than most of today's point-and-shoot digitals.

In fact, I can't imagine why this hasn't flown. I don't think anyone else has beaten them to the punch, and it seems technically feasible. Maybe they can't get the sensor thin enough to close the camera back?

Digital backs like this, this and this have been available for medium and large format cameras for quite a while, although at that sort of price they're out of the range of your average amateur photographer. SiliconFilm has been promising digital backs for 35mm cameras for as long as I can remember, but they're still "under development" - read vapourware. They are showing two new models on the website (4.2 and 10 megapixels), although the product "photos" on their website leave a lot to be desired.

For those who are wondering what a digital back is and why you'd want one - it's a device which is attached to the back of the camera and provides an imaging surface in place of a roll or sheet of film. They can also have onboard flash storage or they can be wired to a computer. Pros may add digital backs to their kits because they already have thousands of dollars worth of camera bodies, lenses, filters and other accessories. Rather than buying a whole new camera system and associated accessories, they can get a digital back to fit on their cameras and keep their existing kit.

See also: Wired Story and Slashdot discussion thereof.

6. Silicon Film's electronic film system: Last year, Silicon Film Technologies made our list for failing to deliver its intriguing "digital film" system, which purported to turn an ordinary camera into a digital one. The digital film, one year later, is still not available, to the chagrin of many readers.

They're still at it. Their Web Site says it will be available soon (last updated Feb 14, 2002).

With the cost of Digital SLR's comming down people seem to be opting for a new camera body to match thier lens collection.

This is already being worked on. A company called Silicon Film has a unit that you can drop ito any 35mm camera in place of film.

The resolution is reported to be 1280x1024 pixels at 36-bit color depth.

Release was scheduled for the first half of 2000. Now they're saying (of course) the second half. They're projecting the price at around $700.

I actually think I saw this on /. a long while back, but I can't seem to dredge up the story in a cursory search.

...and so does this company.
Looks like it's made for specific camera bodies though. Also, it's been vaporware for some time now :(

No one has mentioned this at all so far, and it has been overnight (overhere!).

A company called Silicon Film makes a digital back that fits many pro-ish SLRs. The resolution is not the best, but think about all the lenses and features that you can use on an SLR!

They sell an all in one package that consists of he back, a storage "container" and something that you can download the images to, while you are on the go! Very interesting.

Now make it the same resolution as the Nikon CoolPix 990 and you have a winner!