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Thread: How many years have you being doing LF photography?

  1. #11

    Join Date
    Sep 2003
    Location
    St. Paul, MN
    Posts
    141

    How many years have you being doing LF photography?

    In 1972 I quit trying to do landscapes with 35mm and purchased a 4x5 (Calumet with a 254mm Caltar). Later got a 135mm Fujinon. I shot Tri-X and Plus-X developing in tanks and later trays with d-76 and d-23. Had a Beseler 4x5 enlarger. In the 80's I did some commercial work out of my house. Then came kids and grad school. The camera was stored from that point on until recently. I just bought an old 90mm Angulon for wide angle shots. I have my basement set up to develop sheet film in trays, but now I scan the negs on an Epson 2450. There are definitely pluses and minuses to printing digitally. The debate will go on forever, probably. For the weekend shooting I do I am satisfied with my setup. I won't stop using LF until digital surpasses it in quality and cost, and maybe not even then, because I believe film has certain qualities that are unique to the medium. I'm 53 BTW.

  2. #12

    How many years have you being doing LF photography?

    1965 was my kick-off, albeit with my employer's kit. By 1969 I had bought myself a Speed Graphic for weekend work. There followed a succession of Cambos, Linhofs, Plaubels, Sinars. These days most of my commercial work is done using a Linhof Technikardan 45S while the shooting-for-pleasure stuff is on either a Toyo 810M MkII or a Sinar 8x10 F. My passion and involvement will cease when I cease.

  3. #13

    Join Date
    Mar 1998
    Posts
    1,972

    How many years have you being doing LF photography?

    Bought my first 4x5 in 1986; a Sinar C assembled from different components that were sitting in the warehouse of a camera store.

  4. #14

    Join Date
    Feb 2002
    Posts
    90

    How many years have you being doing LF photography?

    I've been at it for about 3 years. I bought a flatbed scanner to scan 6x6 negatives from my old Rolleiflex TLR and included was a frame for holding 4x5s. In the distant past I did darkroom work, but creating a decent darkroom would require house remodeling and that wasn't an easy option so I had gone digital for the printing end with 35mm. Three years ago I had my Rollei CLA'd and began using it and had to solve the problem of scanning larger negatives. The 4x5 frame included with the scanner opened the LF possibility and I began to look around for an affordable camera and lens to buy with a little windfall I'd had (some book royalites). (I had used 4x5 back in the distant past to photograph archeaological sites when I was in graduate school in anthropology. The department had a Crown Graphic.) I found the Shen Hao (I live 20 minutes from Badger Graphic Sales) and bought a 150mm Rodenstock to go with it. Since then I've acquired a 90, a 120, and a 210. I'd like to have something longer as well, perhaps a 300mm Fujinon T. So my story is that I came to LF through possibilities opened by digital processing. (By the way, I do develop my own black and white sheet film in a tank.)

    I mostly do landscape with my Shen Hao, although last year I gave myself the assignment of photographing 19th century rural churches here in Norteastern Wisconsin (some of which are being abandoned). (See http://www.uwgb.edu/galta/bairds/ for some samples of earlier 35mm landscape work and newer large format.) I still use 35mm for foreign travel photography (I'm an anthropologist.) because I am daunted by the idea of hauling my LF rig through multiple airports and by not being able to find sheet film where I go. For domestic landscape and architectural work, however, LF is where it is at. I don't use the Rollei very much. I prefer a graflex roll film adapter on my Shen Hao for medium format color work (getting E-6 processing for sheetfilm is problematic around here). That gives me the possibility of movements.

    So oddly enough, digital technique opened the possibility of LF in my case.

  5. #15
    multiplex
    Join Date
    Feb 2001
    Location
    local
    Posts
    5,359

    How many years have you being doing LF photography?

    1988 i was working as a lab-guy for a large format portraitist in providence, ri. i borrowed her 4x5 pre-anniversary speed graphic a few times and soon after bought pacemaker speed graphic of my own with a 127 tominon in a press shutter. now i have a strange addiction of buying and using large format "stuff" is there a 12 step program for this?

  6. #16

    Join Date
    Dec 2001
    Location
    San Joaquin Valley, California
    Posts
    9,599

    How many years have you being doing LF photography?

    Six years I suppose, though I'd been reading View Camera for a few years before actually getting my mits on a LF camera. First, I traded my Hasselblad for an 11x14 B&J which I immediately traded again for a Kodak Masterview 8x10 after I found out how much 11x14 film holders cost. Along the way a junk shop 4x5 Anniversary Speed Graphic(in near terminal condition) became a book-end and an 8x10 Elwood enlarger took up residence in my home. The Masterview got traded for a Deardorff V8 which is still my favorite....then I got a computer and discovered ebay and this forum, which enabled/inspired me to add a 5x7 Agfa Universal, a Gowland 8x10 Aerial, a homemade 16x20 pinhole made from one of the boxes my computer came in(which was a ridiculous idea)a ton of surplus aerial cameras and parts(and a "ton" is probably a fairly accurate estimate of wieght) a 4x5 Pacemaker Crown, an Omega D-II elarger I've been able to rebuild, a 12x20 Folmer and Schwing Banquet, and lastly a 5x7 Pre Anniverary Speed...oh, and the pinhole I'm putting together out of a Woodbridge wine cask---it'll take either 12x20 film or 9-1/2" aerial film---I haven't made up my mind yet (The "tripod" will be the tailgate of a Chevy pick-up!) To paraphrase G.K.Chesterton, LF Photography for me is a great adventure or raid, not judged by what difficulties are encountered but rather by what banner it follows and by the high ground it assails. Have FUN!---------Cheers!
    "I would feel more optimistic about a bright future for man if he spent less time proving that he can outwit Nature and more time tasting her sweetness and respecting her seniority"---EB White

  7. #17
    Ted Harris's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2000
    Location
    New Hampshire
    Posts
    3,465

    How many years have you being doing LF photography?

    1954, picked up the shiny new Graphic to shoot sports for the junior Hig newspaper. First monorail in 197? All through college and for a few years after that I used only Leica M's and MFand then returned to LF and haven't looked back since (still use the other formats too of course).

  8. #18

    Join Date
    Sep 2003
    Location
    Vermont
    Posts
    115

    How many years have you being doing LF photography?

    Started in 1980 with borrowed equipment...finally got my own Zone VI 4x5 in 1992...thinking about also getting an 8x10.

  9. #19

    How many years have you being doing LF photography?

    Since 1958 when I entered Art Center to get my BFA. Since then it has been one happy and rewarding adventure, and with a room full of gold and silver medals, and national awards,.. from the fields of advertising and industrial illustration and magazine photography, ...I've never looked back. Your only as good as your last assignment. Be well..... Richard Boulware - Denver.

  10. #20

    Join Date
    Sep 2003
    Location
    Iowa
    Posts
    153

    How many years have you being doing LF photography?

    I bought my first LF camera, a Graphic View II, one year ago. A couple of weeks ago I purchased an old 8x10 Korona C-1 Ground Camera (military issue) in beautiful condition. I am 34 and feel like a child with my new toys. Big negatives are amazing. I'm learning more & more every day. I am obsessed with it, just ask my wife.

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