Is there any difference between 4x5

[BigSteveG]

and 2 1/4 image quality in prints smaller than 11x14?

[Mark Woods]

I've made some beautiful prints with the 2 1/4 square negs. But the larger the neg the more impressive the detail in the print. Last Saturday I made a 11x14 print from an 8x10 neg and there was no grain and incredible detail. As someone said, Big Negs Rock! ;-)

[David A. Goldfarb]

Yes. MF can make very impressive prints and sometimes might appear in isolation to be as good as 4x5" or even larger, but if you made two negatives of the same scene as close as you could to each other with the most important variable being format size, and printed them to the same size, you would see a difference.

[lenser]

Steve,

As a former portrait photographer, I've had many super large (24x30/30x40) prints made from Hasse and RB67 negatives. As long as I focused well, they were wonderful.

Having said that, there is no question that a larger neg produces finer detail in the same size enlargements. This is established and without question.

In the sizes you're talking about, you likely won't see much difference, especially with finer grained films. By the time you get to a 16x20, you will almost certainly start to see divergences in detail and grain since you are enlarging basically twice more for the smaller neg to get to the same image size.

Tim

[Vaughn]

Definitely yes.

More room to record information means smoother changes in tonality on the neg and in the print.

Vaughn

[Neal Shields]

The best explaination that I have seen of this is in "Post Exposure" by Ctien.

He goes into why the eye can precieve differences in line detail beyond the theroetical limits of the retina. He also goes into the different between acceptable sharpness and perfect sharpness.

He defines acceptable sharpness as what appears complete sharp when view alone.
Perfect sharpness is when in side by side compairisons you can't tell the difference.

He places this "perfect sharpness" limit at about 30lp/mm.

Having said all that, you didn't say if you were doing wet darkroom prints or comercial prints.

Most comercial prints are limited to 300 dpi so I wouldn't expect to see much or any difference between medium format and 4x5 there as the limiting factor is going to be the printiing process not the negative size.

[BigSteveG]

The ability to make contact prints is very appealing. Although, I'm thinking that wouldn't leave much room for manipulation of the image? since the process is just to sandwich the neg and expose to light?

[Ken Lee]

The only way to know for sure, is to compare for yourself. What others might consider a match, you might perceive as a radical difference - and vice versa. Whatever differences there are, will depend on the particulars of each setup, and will be influenced by many other choices.

Remember that as formats change, so do the lenses. A 150mm portrait lens on Medium Format, is only a normal lens on 4x5. Given an otherwise identical image, to get the same depth of field with a 240mm lens on 4x5, you will need to stop down almost 2 more stops, which means you will need to shoot at almost 4x slower shutter speed, or bump up the lighting by 2 stops. Do you care ?

Also, remember that you can't just blast away with sheet film, the way you can with roll film. It takes a while to manage the film holders and cock the shutter each time (unless you use a self-cocking shutter, but those are not the norm on modern Large Format lenses). So capturing the right expression, may require a different approach. Does that matter ?

Then there is the issue of portability. Each 4x5 film holder is around the size and weight of a 5-pack of roll film. There is no hand-held, unless you use a Speed Graphic or other similar camera. Is that important ?

So it's not just a question of sharpness or smoothness. All these other factors come along for the ride, whether you invited them or not.

[Vaughn]

Steve...there are ways to manipulate the image when contact printing...burning and dodging as with enlarging, and the use of masks, for example.

Vaughn

[BigSteveG]

Neal, I'm using my own wet darkroom. Since I'm set up for 4x5 negs, my 5x7 work would be limited to contact prints. I'm thinking of using the 4x5 for lansdcapes/scenics and the 5x7 contact prints for portraits.