How important are movements if doing mostly portraiture?

[jonbrisbincreative]

I've been researching a move back to film after years in digital. I'm weary of the continuing MP wars. Since the new Sony MF sensor is spurring that on for the foreseeable future, I'm trying to find a reasonable 4x5 LF camera I can use to do some experimentation in fine art (a la Paul Strand and Alfred Steiglitz) and to expand the portraiture work I already do. The fine art stuff will be for much later in my life when I have time to pursue that. The portraiture I do as part of my photography business currently.

I'm curious about how important the standard movements are for portraiture? I find plenty of Wista 45Ds for sale on eBay but no reasonably-priced Chamonixs or Shen Haos, which I understand offer greater flexibility over the Wista. If I can even find a used Chamonix is the lack of an enclosing "box" and greater movements worth the expense considering I have almost no idea what I'm doing in LF?

I already have a Mamiya RB67 and am planning on moving away from sending my film out to doing some Diafine 2-stage development with that and the 4x5.

[Mark Sawyer]

Strand and Stieglitz (and Weston and Lange) did quite a bit of their 4x5 (in Strand's case 5x7) portraiture using Graflex SLR's, which offer no movements.

When using 8x10 with shallow depth of field, movements become much more important.

[Ari]

For portraits, I like a camera to have front tilt and front swing; those take care of most situations.
The Wista will have all the movements you are likely to need for portraiture, and a 45D comes pretty cheap.
They are also very sturdy rugged cameras with an extensive line of inexpensive accessories.

As Mark hinted at, on 4x5 movements are less important than on larger formats, especially when shooting portraits.

[jbenedict]

Might be easier in some situations to just adjust the rise or shift to tune the composition rather than have the subject move.

[Drew Wiley]

Just depends on what else you might wish to do with the same camera in the future, if you're already going to spend some money to begin with. Think of it as an
investment. But simply by definition, just about any view camera on the market, new or old, will have more than enough movements for general portrait work.
There are a few large format box camera models out there, or designs made specifically for wide-angle architectural shooting with rise only; but in general, almost everything legitimately termed a view camera will have some kind of tilt and rise. I'd be more concerned with what range of focal length lenses a given model will
accept. Portraits tend to be taken with slightly longer than "normal" focal lengths - in the case of 4x5, typically from 210 mm to maybe 300mm. You also might want to be concerned with rigidity at these kinds of bellows extension. Some designs are sturdier than others in this respect. But no need to overthink it. There
are plenty of good options out there.

[jonbrisbincreative]

Thanks for the info!

From my research it seems the Shen Haos have the desirable detents to make setup quick which will fit better with what I'm wanting to do, while the Chamonix seem to be more flexible in movements but lack a protective shell to fold them into.

At this point I feel like a Wista 45D can be had cheaply and will suit my needs but if I could find a Shen Hao at a competitive price, it would probably serve me better in the long run, assuming I do stick with the format over time.

[Maris Rusis]

When the portrait sitters face is turned with respect to the film plane I always use camera movements. First swing is used to get the catch lights in both eyes simultaneously sharp. Then tilt is used to get the middle of the top lip sharp as well. These three points, the catch lights and the lip, are what a viewer's eye scans continuously when being respectfully attentive to a face. I reckon, even with ultra shallow depth of field on a 8x10 (say) camera, the face will read "right" if these three points are sharp.

[Ken Lee]

There are many different kinds of portraits, and different equipment can be helpful for different situations. We can get by with very limited gear if we need to, but having choices makes things possible. Sometimes they're dramatic, sometimes they need to be pointed out.

Here's a portrait made on 8x10 with some drop of the front standard. The subjects are looking straight ahead, and so is the camera.

[Tin Can]

When the portrait sitters face is turned with respect to the film plane I always use camera movements. First swing is used to get the catch lights in both eyes simultaneously sharp. Then tilt is used to get the middle of the top lip sharp as well. These three points, the catch lights and the lip, are what a viewer's eye scans continuously when being respectfully attentive to a face. I reckon, even with ultra shallow depth of field on a 8x10 (say) camera, the face will read "right" if these three points are sharp.

That's the best advice I have seen in a while.

Eyes, i knew, but the lip tip is a real good one and I was going elsewhere.

[Alan Gales]

A cheap used monorail is great for portraiture in a studio setting. You won't need all the movements but you can get a strong front standard and larger lens boards if you want to shoot lenses that are heavy or in large shutters.

I had a Tachihara with 13" of bellows draw and wanted to shoot a 300mm (12") lens in a Copal 3 so I bought a monorail as a companion to my Tachi.