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Thread: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

  1. #21

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    Re: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

    I love the results from 4x5, but I don't like shooting it. It feels very fiddly to me. The GG is too small to get my loupe into the corners, and it feels like I need to be more careful with focus than 8x10 (since it will be blown up twice as much).

    8x10 by contrast makes it much easier for me to judge focus and composition. And I love the fact that it scans to a cleaner file than 4x5 on my Epson.

  2. #22

    Re: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

    I do miss my 8x10 but the 4x5 is lots easier to manage. The big camera was always a real production to carry around and set up.

  3. #23

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    Re: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

    I love 8x10! Yeah, it's a pain to lug around but once set up it is a pure joy. My eyes could never see super wide lenses on my 4x5 very well, on my 8x10 I don't even need a loupe, just reading glasses. So for focusing and composition for me it's no contest.

    And then there is always the occasional great image (emphasis on occasional) and getting it on a large sheet that can be printed to almost any size makes me glad I make the extra effort.

    When I load a piece of 8x10 I take extra care to make sure the shot is worth it and that everything is set up perfect, that extra care i think has improved my photography.

    As far as being crazy about perfect images and quality, isn't that why we are using large format in the first place?

    www.timeandlight.com

  4. #24
    Greg Greg Blank's Avatar
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    Re: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

    Once you make a 24x30 from a good 8x10 negative you never want to make another 16x20 print from 4x5 I have an 8x10 enlarger, so I doubt I will get rid of the camera. I would actually like to go bigger like 12x20. But I have been considering modifying or having the back of my camera modified to 4x10 that way I can scan the negatives for color, and print 16x40's optically from B&W negatives.

    That stated its a lot easier to focus the 4x5 plane than the 8x10 one.
    "Great things are accomplished by talented people who believe they will
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  5. #25
    ARS KC2UU
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    Re: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

    I got into 4x5 in the mid 1990s when my father brought me a 4x5 monorail kit he had bought at auction for a song. To that time I had been doing 6x17 and 6x9 with Fuji rangefinder cameras.

    Following that LF introduction I also bought a well-used 8x10 field camera and used it for a short while. I took a few shots with it and, like other posters here mentioned, I really enjoyed the look of the image on the ground glass and the stunning results when I got a good one. Just something about the 8x10 that really inspires a desire to use it.

    But that doesn't solve the problems others also mentioned about transport, setup, and costs of film and developing. For me the real reason I abandoned it back then in favor of 4x5 was the trouble of loading and carrying film around on my sojourns using a glove bag. I'm a part-time (i.e., amateur) photographer during off-hours on my frequent business trips. And handling 8x10 in a glove bag in hotels on business trips is quite a troublesome piece of business.

    So about a year or so later I sold the camera and focused on MF and 4x5 almost exclusively.

    But now being much closer to retirement... I know I will be looking to get back into 8x10 again some day down the road. Not for the day-to-day photo work I may do at that time. But just to have it as an option when I really want to see that big image on the gg screen or on the film.

    Cheers

    Bob G.
    All natural images are analog. But the retina converts them to digital on their way to the brain.

  6. #26
    3d Visual Effects artist
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    Re: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

    Quote Originally Posted by Greg Blank View Post
    Once you make a 24x30 from a good 8x10 negative you never want to make another 16x20 print from 4x5 I have an 8x10 enlarger, so I doubt I will get rid of the camera. I would actually like to go bigger like 12x20. But I have been considering modifying or having the back of my camera modified to 4x10 that way I can scan the negatives for color, and print 16x40's optically from B&W negatives.

    That stated its a lot easier to focus the 4x5 plane than the 8x10 one.
    my usual print size is 8x10 and 11x14. I've occasionally done some a bit larger, but not very often. I dont doubt larger prints 8x10 negatives would be much better!
    Daniel Buck - 3d VFX artist
    3d work: DanielBuck.net
    photography: 404Photography.net - BuckshotsBlog.com

  7. #27

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    Re: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

    Quote Originally Posted by Daniel_Buck View Post
    my usual print size is 8x10 and 11x14. I've occasionally done some a bit larger, but not very often. I dont doubt larger prints 8x10 negatives would be much better!
    There's an almost contact-print quality to those kinds of small enlargements that I love. I used to "blow up" FP4+ 35mm to little 3x4.5 prints on 4x5 paper, and you really can't see the grain or any lack of sharpness.

  8. #28
    3d Visual Effects artist
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    Re: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ben Syverson View Post
    There's an almost contact-print quality to those kinds of small enlargements that I love. I used to "blow up" FP4+ 35mm to little 3x4.5 prints on 4x5 paper, and you really can't see the grain or any lack of sharpness.
    indeed And any larger than 11x14, and it's difficult to keep a bunch of prints around, I like 8x10 prints, nice and easy to handle and deal with, but big enough to see the photo decently
    Daniel Buck - 3d VFX artist
    3d work: DanielBuck.net
    photography: 404Photography.net - BuckshotsBlog.com

  9. #29

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    Re: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

    Try some contact prints with it first! How can you not be making contact prints?! I really enjoy it - there is something rewarding about the process to me. Maybe because it is so simple but done right they just look amazingly life-like.

    Granted a 4x5 enlargement is pretty darned close, but I seem to be addicted to making 8x10 contact prints. Go take a portrait of your loved one(s), make some contact prints, and there they are - staring back at you from the print!

  10. #30

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    Re: dumping 8x10 and sticking with 4x5. anyone regret?

    FWIW, I make ~11x14 inkjets for print portfolios from Epson scans and I can tell which were 8x10 and which were 4x5s, maybe it isn't even the grain or resolution but it's really the depth and presence that are different.

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