(reference to Surlyadam's post)
I'm not sure I think Slide film is more "natural". Slide film with something like a velvia is.. of course.. as fake as a saturation boost in Photoshop. They both take the colours as the human eye would see them and boost them to be brighter than normal. Providing you dont choose *which* colours to boost (or change) it's pretty similar.
I'm not sure how you did the scan but there's some post processing oversharpening as well, particularly in picture 2 (default post processing in the scanner, perhaps).
I know where you're coming from with your reference to Velvia's saturation. There may be also be some manipulation in the scanning process (the lab that developed the film scanned it), but it's a necessary evil to view them on a computer, and it's still not Photoshop level intervention. I'd rather view slides on a light table or projector, but that's not an option here.
I was originally talking about creating an amazing image in camera vs on your computer, and the process involved. It's about aesthetics really, I suppose. When I look at an image, I can usually tell if it were created digitally or with film (referring to natural), and the film images come across to me as more alive. I'm also referring to DSLRs, not a point and shoot camera.
I've probably become somewhat dispirited in the digital age of cameras too. It used to require a lot of study and experience to create an exceptional image. Now just about anyone with money and photoshop skills can make the viewer say "Wow!" I may have ruined this thread now, and turned it into a digital vs film monster as well. But I was really only expressing my views of photography and what I love about film. It's the intimacy of it. As a film photographer, you have to study the scene and decide if and how to make your film capture it. With a digital camera, you can set up your laptop in the field, taking pictures, recomposing and merging images till you get what you want. This seems like a disconnect.
The heart of photography to me is what I see from Ansel Adams (Large Format black & white) and Galen Rowell (35mm Velvia). These are people who understood light and film and I'm always amazed when I see what they've captured with their cameras. Digital images can look incredible, but there seems to be a loss of something real, at least to me.
When I see someone in the field with the latest Canon or Nikon digital SLR, I just shrug and smile politely. I'm sure they're looking me and wondering what I'm up to with that archaic 5lbs of camera, scanning the horizon with my spotmeter...