Epatsellis To a point true, I guess, as long as you discount Adams, Weston, Karsh and thousands of other "artists".
This does nothing with artistical representation. They all are still short to H.C.Bresson, means format is of less importance, and to shoot at THE moment is more important. Things around us change fast.
Again, large format is a technical matter and nothing more.
What you gain with 35 mm camera is a shot and a photograph as a work of art. What you can get with any large format is overdetailing, or might you can add something?
LMAO.
Excuuuuusse me. I love HCB. But to say his work is more important than Weston????
Are you freaking crazy to make that comparison? Two different worlds, two different results. One mastered the art of the decisive moment, the other captured the world of total mastery of the photographic process. Which is more important?
What you mostly gain with a 135 camera is crap. It is to HCB's credit that he pulled a large body of work out of that format (thanks to Magnum and 777). What you gain from LF is the true depth of what photography can deliver. To accept anything less... well you decide.
tim in san jose
__________________
Where ever you are, there you be.
What you gain from 35 mm is the ability to capture the decisive moment, catch the lightning in the bottle - if you can't, or have nothing to say, or have a poor grasp of technique, 35 mm will expose you mercilessly.
What you gain, or rather lose, from LF is an in-built tendency to obsess about technique and an intrinsically slower working tempo, which in many situations (such as photographing in the typically changing weather conditions of the UK) can lead to a fatal failure to deliver results. If you can rise above this, and express yourself artistically on a level where rendition of detail and plasticity of tone are part of your creative vocabulary and not ends in themselves, then LF work can be sublime - otherwise, it's a total blind alley!
i don't know nemo ..
i shoot 4x5 and larger without slowing down.
i don't obsess about technique,
and i shoot my slr ( 4x5 ) like it is a 35mm camera ...
the only things that large format offers that smaller than 4x5 formats don't
is the ability to process one film at a time
( if there was something special in exposure ),
a large negative to do contact printing
( without the hassle of enlarging a small negative onto larger film )
and the ability to look cool
(something big on a tripod to fiddle around with,
cause a scene, be famous for 15 seconds, look like a film maker with the loupe and light meter,
an antiquarian with the dark cloth, or a surveyor with a theodalite or astrolabe ) ...
this thread reminds me that we are not all one big happy snapper family
that some people resent others who use bigger or smaller cameras,
because they don't use a leica or a ebony ...
who cares what it was taken with it's the image that counts anyways ...
if you can't see ... it won't matter what you are shooting with ....
I've been reading this thread and it really has become one big pile of horse shit. Somebody please lock it up.
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"Photography is an illusion. It is amazing that human beings consider a photograph to be a representation of reality."
---John Sexton
What you gain from 35 mm is the ability to capture the decisive moment, catch the lightning in the bottle - if you can't, or have nothing to say, or have a poor grasp of technique, 35 mm will expose you mercilessly.
What you gain, or rather lose, from LF is an in-built tendency to obsess about technique and an intrinsically slower working tempo, which in many situations (such as photographing in the typically changing weather conditions of the UK) can lead to a fatal failure to deliver results. If you can rise above this, and express yourself artistically on a level where rendition of detail and plasticity of tone are part of your creative vocabulary and not ends in themselves, then LF work can be sublime - otherwise, it's a total blind alley!
I suspect your restating of my 135 comment is closer to the truth. I guess I meant that more crap comes out of a 135 camera precisely because there isn't a obsession with technique in a format that demands more technique because of it's limitations. When I was in school, the obsession was imposed upon us by learning the ins and outs of LF first. Those of us who carried that knowledge through to our later 135 work, did well. Those of us who didn't.. well we called them artists. Interesting work not well done.
I understand the concept of the camera becoming an extension of the arm, and extension of the eye. Much easier to do with a FM2 than a rb67 or an 8x10 (or 10x8) Horseman. If you don't have the obsession, as you call it, to pull in the rest of the craft, then... what you get is artistic dung.
tim in san jose
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Where ever you are, there you be.
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The real problem here is a bunch of old stale stinky notions on why someone chooses a particular format for a particular photograph.
While there is some reasoning behind the stereotypes, there are no rules. I was trying to address that earlier. I posted an 8x10 contact print of a process not easily arrived at by 35mm, with a distinct set of characteristics, and sharpness isn't one of them. You choose what suits. I'm not going to try to be HCB with a view camera, nor am I going to try to screw a 14" heliar with a packard shutter on to a 135 range finder. Arguing against a set of weakness from a set of strengths and vice versa as if your reasoning points the only one true way to make a negative is simply a circle jerk of stupefying magnitude.
What I really don't understand is militancy bordering on religion concerning subjective subjects pontificated by people with vastly different concepts, tastes and intents. Sounds like a bunch of digiheads.
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--J Brunner, The Prints of Darkness
I use a Leica and a ShenHao about equally. Never put the Leica on a tripod and never use the 4x5 without one. I never use a meter with the Leica, and take several minutes to take spot readings with the 4x5 and develop stictly according to zone system tests. With the Leica I often go from noticing a shot to exposing in under 5 secs, with the ShenHao it's more like a half hour. They are both wonderful approaches to photography but they do different things. Doing both extremes keeps me hungry and on my toes, but comparing them to see which is better is a futile exercise. I couldn't make the shots I make with my M2 on a ShenHao, and the M2 couldn't dream of the quality of the prints I get from my ShenHao.
The real problem here is a bunch of old stale stinky notions on why someone chooses a particular format for a particular photograph.
I thought the notion (or lotion) was about which male uses large format as a penile enhancer, which male uses medium format as an aphrodisiac and which male uses 35 mm as sex toy?
a bunch of digiheads.
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