What is Large Format Photography

[Donald Miller]

Wealth is a state of mind. Large Format is big negatives.

Or medium format negatives scanned at high resolutions...

Why is that different than a high MP stitched image output as an enlarged negative?

[jnantz]

<yawn>

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

<yawn>

[r.e.]

I think that the interesting question is why we have three pages of people trashing jeffacme for asking the question.

It seems clear that his post arises directly from the current thread about whether people are making money from large format, in which he posted some of the more interesting comments.

It also seems clear that his question raises directly an issue that underlies, rightly or wrongly, a lot of the discussion that goes on in this forum.

The eruption of hostility toward him and his question is quite odd.

[Donald Miller]

I think that Jeffacme asked some very pertinant questions. I present the following link for consideration of the participants to this forum.

http://xrez.com/services/3d/res_comp.jpg

This will require that you copy the above link and post it into a fresh browser to open the link if you want to see why it appears that the questions Jeffacme posed are pertinant.

[Vaughn]

1. A digital back, 39mp minimum, on a view camera is large format.

2. Stitching captures in post, 150mb minimum, is large format.

3. Output by inkjet, Lambda, or silver halide more than 16" in one dimension is large format.

#1 and #2 would be Large File Photography. #3 would be Large Print Photography. None, IMO, are Large Format Photography, nor can the traditional definition of Large Format Photography be logically stretched to include them. That said, one's use of large format photography might include large files, stitching, and/or large prints somewhere in the work flow.

I am afraid my working knowledge of digital capture is very limited...but I have read that using movements on a view camera with a digital back has limitations -- something about the angle the light hits the light receptors of the digital back. Even if this is not correct, I would not consider #1 as true Large Format Photography -- but as digital photography incorporating a view camera as a platform for the digital back.

Unless some limitation is hit, I suspect that handheld cameras capable of 40+ MP are in our future. Using MP to define LF seems to be too changable...today's "large format" will be tomorrow's "small format".

In the end, I would just have to say that true Large Format Photography is based on film capture (tho the size of the LF film is and probably always will be debatable -- as well as the use of roll film in a LF camera, LOL!). Your new definitions just don't fit, and trying to fit them into the definition of LF limits them...like trying to shove an elephant into a crate designed for a lion. They are a subset of digital photography, not of large format photography.

Vaughn

[Greg Lockrey]

I think that Jeffacme asked some very pertinant questions. I present the following link for consideration of the participants to this forum.

http://xrez.com/services/3d/res_comp.jpg

This will require that you copy the above link and post it into a fresh browser to open the link if you want to see why it appears that the questions Jeffacme posed are pertinant.

Very impressive. Now I get you. I was thinking that this thread was going to get into another "us vs them" again. Extreme resolution is a whole new way to make images, but I won't call it large format, but somewhere beyond like a rocket compared to a biplane. It too needs it's own forum. I for one am not apposed to learning this new technology since I use similar methods albeit on a lesser scale in my practice, but here on this forum I wish to learn of the older techniques that have been in use for years and that I haven't had time or opportunity to try. I don't have a problem with mixing the two technologies either.

I wouldn't mind getting one of those Pix-Orb gizmos.

[Vaughn]

I think that Jeffacme asked some very pertinant questions. I present the following link for consideration of the participants to this forum...snip...

I would call that high definition photography -- not necessarily large format photography. If the file source of the image of Half Dome was a transparency, or negative, created by using a large format camera then it is also LF photography.

The LFPF is artificially limited by its definition of LF...which is not a bad thing as it allows us to concentrate on one aspect of photography without being flooded with information.

Vaughn

[Ole Tjugen]

http://www.bruraholo.no/images/Lodalen.html

High resolution, large file - and taken in one single exposure with a Large Format camera. Somtimes the old-fashioned method is simpler.

[Donald Miller]

http://www.bruraholo.no/images/Lodalen.html

High resolution, large file - and taken in one single exposure with a Large Format camera. Somtimes the old-fashioned method is simpler.

Ole, It might be nice to know what we are comparing to what here. A single image on the internet doesn't convey much.