As a PTSD vet from Vietnam I use photography as my therapy. I agree with others that a smaller format might not be so overwhelming. Mostly I enjoy the time out. I also have found though, that the discipline of large format sometimes redirects me and gets my mind out of the funk. Take the camera out and play with it. You don't even have to make an exposure. (You can take a sheet or two just in case) It's a toy, have fun with it. John
I have a friend who took up rock climbing and became a fanatic. She says that when she is doing it, it totally takes her mind off of everything else. Her concentration is directed so completely on what she's doing that it cleanses her mind of all the usual noise and destructive thought patterns.
Well, I am no good with heights and I would never take up rock climbing! But when I switched from MF to LF, I noticed a direct parallel. When going through the process of finding the camera angle, visualizing the shot, evaluating the range of tones, setting up the camera, adjusting the position, and framing and focusing the shot, then taking the image - the usual routine as detailed elsewhere on this site - I find that it takes my mind completely off of whatever it was that I was thinking about before I saw the image and started taking the picture.
In other words, get out and expose some negatives, any shot will do for starters. Worry about developing later. When one of the negatives turns out to be a stunning image, the satisfaction will be immense.
Robert,
Several people have mentioned putting aside the 7x17 and grabbing a smaller camera and using it to break the spell. I'll take the opposite position and tell you to concentrate solely on using the ULF camera and figuring out everything you need to become fluent with it. Stick to using the big camera at the exclusion of all others.
While the previous advice is well intended, I believe it is off the mark. The photography is different with a ULF camera compared to a smaller one, and until one becomes engaged with ULF, the understanding of the challenges and rewards associated with something like a 7x17 cannot really be appreciated. Using a small camera (which I would consider anything under 5x7) does not bring with it the same satisfactions and accomplishments. In this age of auto-everything digital 8 megapixel cameras and inkjet printers, ULF guys have to be a bit off to even consider putting up with the hassles of the bigger cameras. Even finding film and holders to purchase is challenging. But the entire craft and process of making the ULF image makes it worthwhile.
If you are like me, using the small cameras and doing something easy with them or to just be active is not where my head is at. Using them doesn't produce what I want and therefore becomes a source for further negative feelings because I've wasted my time on something I didn't really want to do and neglected the thing important to me. This deepens the funk rather than eliminates it.
There is a reason you bought the 7x17. It doesn't have to do with shooting a lot of film or being convenient to use. But, I'd agree with the others that you need to do something and take that first step to break out of the state you are in. Checking the holders for light leaks would be a start. If hauling the big camera outfit around is too much right now, perhaps using a 7x17 viewfinder frame and just walking around composing with that will get you interested in some photographic possibilities and get you starting to "see" with the format. You can make such a thing out of cardboard and fold it up to carry in a pocket until you see something worth investigating photographically. Once you see it, take notes about when the best time to shoot would be, which lens and film, etc., then return with your camera and put it on that big piece of film.
If you're like me, the effect of depression is that it makes it very, very hard to get started, but makes it very easy to get stopped. So you'll muster up a huge effort of will, expose some film, feel that euphoric sense of movement, and then a processing problem with the film will stop you dead in your tracks. Or you'll simply wake up one morning incapable of doing whatever you had planned for that day.
Once you're stopped, it's ten times as hard to get started again.
If that sounds familiar to you, you know that at least you're not alone. In fact, judging from some of the previous responses, it ought to be pretty clear that you're not alone.
One thing that helps a lot for me is to exploit my desire to make good on commitments I make.
I'm part of a group that meets every other week, to review new work. The expectation is that you'll show up at each meeting. Not having work to show is not an acceptable reason for not showing up.
So I attend, even when I'm down. It isn't easy, but it helps. You don't have to show up very many times in a row before people start urging you to make some progress, and that helps. When you DO at last show up with a few new negatives, the feedback helps even more. At each stage, you get more positive energy from the interactions, and in turn that helps build up momentum that can help to carry you past glitches that would stop you dead in your tracks if you were trying to tackle it alone.
It's a big leap to go from ground zero to making prints from that 7x17 folmer-schwing. Tackle it in smaller steps, and enlist the aid of others to help keep you motivated. I like joe's suggestion to make a 7x17 framing card and use it to whet your appetite as the first step.
But it's not neccessary for you to try to dig yourself out of the hole by yourself. I don't know where you live, but if you can't find a group of photographers locally, there's always email - a distant second to real contact but far better than nothing.
While you are working up to 7X17, keep taking pictures with smaller formats. I am in the middle of building a 4X5 camera but I go out at lunch a couple of times a week with my Yashica. I am not likely to hang any of these pics on the wall but they keep me in a good frame of mind. Every weekend I am a little bit closer to having my field camera. I can't wait to shoot 4X5 at the lake. There is no way I can carry my CC400 that far. It is a "by the road" camera.
I've been clinically depressed for 20-years now and I understand what you're saying. I'd follow the previous advice and pick one format - probably the 7x17 and stick with that. At least for a while.
What it's so hard to describe is the feeling of complete worthlessness that can come over you. The feeling that there is just no reason to get out of bed in the morning. I found I needed postive reinforcement, and I found one way to give it to myself.
I got a notebook and wrote down every step needed to accomplish something. For instance, I would not write down "load film holders" - I'd write
1. gather filmholders
2.vacuum and dust filmholders
3.carry filmholders to darkroom
4.take film from cabinet
5.take film to darkroom
6.turn off light
7.open film box
8.load filmholders
9.put unused film back in box
10.close box
11.turn on light
12. check filmholders to be sure darkslides are turned correctly
and so forth. I would then load the filmholders and checkoff each of the items on the list. I'd save the list in a notebook. It gave me a great feeling of accomplishment to check off a dozen items as successfully accomplished - and when I'd feel down on another day, I could glance through the notebook of accomplishments for visual proof that I was able to accomplish things.
I found, unlike some of the other folks here, that being around other people usually made me even more depressed. I found large format photography in the woods alone to be refreshing - and that it helped lift my depression.
I've been through this and I feel your pain... It was a year where I didn't shoot much, however, and I wasn't in LF yet, so my experience is limited. My gut feeling is that you should forget about ULF for a short while, but there have been some good points made in favour of it, so let's go through the pros and cons.
Shooting ULF:
PROS: Big negatives are a big reward. New, fresh look at things. Shooting ULF is a kind of zen that will hopefully allow you to get a better grip on yourlife. No need to develop right away. You can store your unprocessed negatives until you're ready (but that defeats the "big neg, big reward" point).
CONS: Getting the spares and expendables is a lot of hassle. Camera is big and heavy, you must be in a relatively good mood to even consider carrying it. Step by step LF photography looks overwhelming in your current confused/exhausted state of mind - and the cost of failure is just a much as the value of the possible reward. Reward is uncertain and far away in the future.
Shooting 35 mm or MF:
PROS: Camera is small and light, you don't need to gather too much energy to grab it. You can use it around the house or in the neighbourhood, while ULF just seems to aks for remote locations and extraordinary things that you don't have the energy to chase. The technical side is easy - no zone system or complex focusing to tax your confused and/or forgetful mind. All the tedious processing is easily done commercially. Good results are more immediate and easier to achieve.
CONS: Results can be seen as "more of the same" if you are a regular 135/120 shooter. Using a small camera doesn't cure your "7x17 envy". The sense of accomplishment isn't the same.
BTW: Don't mind is your bellows is not light tight. My 8x10 bellows is just a loose mesh of pinholes. hundreds of them, and I can't afford a replacement. But I use it nonetheless, wrapping the bellows in my dark cloth just before I insert the film holder. It works very well, even under full sunlight, even though my tests without the darkcloth revealed severe light leaks.
I was clinically depressed from early 1986 to about 1990. While it didn't stop me from photographing, the illness made it really really hard to get things done. Doing commercial assignment helped and maybe even saved my life -- knowing that I had real deadlines and that other people's jobs were depending on me. But doing projects just for myself? Very very difficult to even get started. the entire enterprise of just being seemed pointless much less personal photography. There were weeks I didn't leave my apartment.
The photos I did do during that period. I really had to fight for and the spirit of that fight seems to be in them and other people respond well to them too. What finally got me over the hump? Realizing it was just an illness an not my entire life; realizing that staying alive and using photography as a locus for my (non sexual) passions ma led me to the conclusion that I just never knew what surprises a day would bring.
Build your worlds one brick at a time. Fear is the mindkiller. You are bigger than any label or illness. Depression is addictive: it wants you to stay depressed.
Get professional treatment. Depression is an illness just as much as Diabetes or a broken leg, and you wouldn't try to treat those yourself. Photography isn't a cure but it can be an excellent adjunct to effective therapy.
Wilhelm (Sarasota)
Agree completely with Bill.
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