8x10 tranny films

[Brian Vuillemenot]

Hi Tim,

How are you arriving at those enlargement figures? I thought that a 24X36 made from an 8X10 would be a 3 times enlargement (8x3=24; 10x3=30), while that from a 4X5 would be a 6 times enlargement (4x6=24; 5x6=30)?

[kthompson]

Fair enough--just so happens that I do work in a museum (albeit one of a few staff photogs within an agency of several museums & archives)--for exhibitry, for years & years--murals were done by bumping 4x5 up to 8x10 and going that route, because of the limitations from the lab point of view. Some of these are fairly large. Not uncommon to have them made 16-20 some odd feet lengths, as 2, 3+ 4x8s seamed together. Some of the b&w's used to be made in-house, then in the last decade or so, these were thankfully farmed out. So--the studio has always been 4x5 oriented. Out of 3 studios/labs in my agency, only one has ever had an 8x10 within the span of my time. Yet, there are thousands of 8x10 and larger negs & glass plates for example in the archives--even in the museum where I work, next to me now is a hollinger box of 8x10 nitrate negs whose fate I'm pondering....and in another room are the beginnings of a project that involves contacting & duplicating 900 8x10 and 6x8 glass plates from the late 1800s.

So, I'm no stranger to the incredible details found buried in them...only from a practical point of view of storage as a record, and the types of output & use they will get--which is almost impossible to predict, since your work continually contributes to the "record"--meaning you draw from the work of your predecessors and so on. Out of this, the 8x10 has become cumbersome to a degree as the types of output have shifted to getting higher quality from smaller sizes. Having 900 glass plates with flaking emulsions is more of a chore to print than 900 4x5 negs, but back in 1885-1900 when they were shot, it was pretty much the norm. The same could be said for 8x10 negs & chromes-which would be problematic from a storage point of view eventually. Unless you're in a cold vault at Iron Mtn or someplace like that and money is no object....

That said--the longterm historical record is 4x5 estar based b&w sheets--we have to maintain these files as well as produce them. We've found that you can do just about anything with a 4x5 neg or CT. I'm gonna have to agree to disagree here with you on the repro end of it. What we do is used in everything from slick 4 color mags like Civil War Times, American Legacy to Time-Life series history books and school textbooks, and some postcards, calendars, posters and a billboard or two. Then, the museum exhibits often contain large murals. You can definitely see the differences between a 35 or 2-1/4 neg against a 4x5 optically repro'd this way--but in my limited experience in this type of environment--this gap is narrowing with the Lightjets and drum scanners. We did an exhibit at the tail end of last year and had 18 some odd murals in it, with one that was 16 feet long by 8 high. All were output on a Lightjet, coming from a range of formats, including some lousy digital-born files from outside (sigh). In the past 5 years or so, the ratio of digitally output murals & larger prints to optically has shifted quite a bit--so now it's almost 99% Lightjet/Lambdas. These jobs are sent out on gov't bids, and it used to be cheaper to get them done optically--but now the Lightjet's are almost rock bottom prices at about half what a consumer might pay. There are exhibits up in our building though that have both types of murals in them--and given that these come from both current & historical negs/CTs, it's almost impossible to tell the difference beyond price. Frankly, if the scan is good & the original is good--I don't see how there'd be that *much* difference between a 4x5 and an 8x10. With offset repro, there could be a question of pre-press quality, but since alot of printers are going over to direct to plate now, I'm still pretty fuzzy about the benefit.

Right now it's the great perspective control of a view camera and the long-life of polyester based sheet films--coupled in with the basic financial reality of a 100 yr old infrastructure of a studio based on sheet films that keeps us shooting it....I hate to say it, but this might be the twilight of 8x10 chromes for a commercial & industrial point of view-- that might not mean much to some--but when places like Alderman Studios (used to be the world's largest studio) quit using truckloads of the stuff--there better be a comparable market to pick up that slack. Just look at a film like Pro Copy--all the archives in this country couldn't keep up the demand for that once the commercial labs went digital. Since the system ordered literally truckloads of 4x5 b&w film last year, not to mention hundreds of feet of aerial film, microfilm & tens of thousands sheets of paper--I hope (fingers crossed) we're doing our part. Sorry--not much 8x10 though.

KT

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[tim atherton]

kent,

I tend to agree with you if we are talking about what is basically "commercial' photogorpahy (even if it's "gevernment" commercial photogorpahy) - in it's broadest terms. Use the minimum and most cost effective to get the job done. The critical attention paid to those murals isn't going to be so great the the difference matters that much.

But if we are talking about - for want of better terms - fine art or "creative" photography - whether for gallery and museum display or for other kinds of work, that difference can be improtant - and at times, critical and can make a difference.

And as a former senior imaging specialist at a Government Archives - all I can say is that I'm glad it's not the archivists who decide what and how something is photographed...!

You are also probably right - we are probably in the last gasp of LF colour of all sorts - though one can always hope that someone will pick up the slack with obscure small runs of colour material from the Balkans or something - look they are even making Dye Transfer matrix material now....

[kthompson]

I'd be the first to admit that we're not doing fine-art. You're right--the murals are used in "exhibitry" which when you say that, tends to conjure up images of art galleries and the like--but I'm referring to exhibits where the murals are used as visual signage or even design elements in environments and the like--so it is very different.

Where I work--we're all film based for the longterm, but digital is making rapid inroads, in ways that even 5 years ago, I didn't imagine. Back in 1997, I was sent with another staffer to a week long digitzation conference at the Smithsonian CAL lab--all about managing photo collections in the "digital age"--the message was to shoot film; Film--cold storage vaults--scan for access. In the time since then, it's amazing how many of those large archives represented there have full-out digtization projects--with some shooting all digital now--all the while carrying another party-line of sticking with film.

The trickle-down effect of this has been this push in a big way to get records online for access. You look at LOC American Memory or NARA's NAIL(ARC)--and then try to strip it down into a state budget reality and it's a no brainer to a photographer to stick with film--whereas to computer folks, it's the other way around.

For us--I think we'll shoot sheet film as long as it's made. But what has happened has been this split between the types of imaging going on--where in the past, you might see a curator go out into the field with a roll of TX, they now take a digi-point-n-shoot ( a PHD--push here dummy) camera and then that unfortunately becomes a part of the record as well. It's like a reformatting project almost. where for one party--they want to get it out to as many as possible in the most efficient way in "real-time"--now. Then, the archivists with trying to select & store out a vast amount of info knowing they can't save everything--and museums trying to figure out how to embrace this multi-media wonderland we have at our fingertips.....for one group--it's okay to film it & destroy the original for the sake of access. For another, it's more about preserving beyond the immediate moment, even if they never use the thing within their lifetime. There isn't a right or a wrong here, it's just a different approach to the same problem.

I'm not happy about it--but I'd like to stay employed, so I have to adapt. The curious thing is that when it comes to shooting events--which we always did on chrome film & b/w like TX using 2 cameras?--when it comes to shooting these, digital is perfect. I shot a historical type gov't event last year--as the "film guy"--while another guy shot digital. My stuff went into the record files--the digital is what was actually used. It's going to be harder down the road to make these decisions though--because like I said, you really never know what all is going to be used. That film I shot could sit in a drawer forever--all nicely packed in Mylar sleeves and PAT envelope in an "archival" file cabinet that cost more than the camera almost, in a room being monitored for temp & rh. Is it worth archiving a grip & grin? There are alot of questions unanswered in this--but then look at one archive up in DC using Nikon digital slrs to do building surveys and look at preservation programs shooting 35mm of all things instead of 4x5? It comes down to money--space--time. the reality is the smaller formats and even digital will fit the bill for some things. times change....

fwiw--we're embarking on a huge photo documentation part of a conservation survey of some textile panoramas-- over 100, 6x10 foot sized rolled paintings. We're doing a prototype--but if (big?--money.) it happens, it would mean building a scaffold/platform to shoot down onto these rolls below. Our part is alll 4x5 and encompasses camera/lens and 3 speedo 2400 ws packs & 6 heads rigged to a scaffold. 8x10 would be great for this--but it would blow the budget sky high--and then in the end, we wouldn't be able to print them in-house or scan them even, so 4x5 it will be.

Opinions expressed in this message may not represent the policy of my agency. E-Mail to and from me, in connection with the transaction of public business, is subject to the North Carolina Public Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.

[Richard Fenner]

Brian, Tim is referring (approximately) to area enlargement, rather than linear enlargement (as you are). Eg 4x5 to 8x10 is 4x area enlargement (20 square inches to 80 square inches), or 2x linear enlargement (each side is multiplied by 2 to end up with the 8x10). I never understood (and still don't) why both exist and any practical difference - I don't think there is, as long as you always adopt the one system.

I used to use area enlargement as well (to me, it made sense) but after checking with Schneider on what the magnification of a loupe actually refers to, I use linear enlargement now - the Schneider technician said that's what they use ie an area looked at under the 6x loupe is the equivalent to seeing part of a 4x5 as if it was 24x30.

[Richard Fenner]

The 'approximately' obviously doesn't belong there. For some reason, I was thinking about 6x7 to 4.5 at the same time.

[Mark Sampson]

Tim, k, thanks for your answers. I don't shoot larger than 4x5 for myself, and when I did use 8x10, I made contact prints. And at work, I think I've used the 4x5 camera twice in the last year (sigh) and the 8x10 cameras have been gathering dust for a long time. And on the job our color work has been based around color negative, which I've also used for personal work for the last 20 years. So that got me to thinking (wrongly) that an 8x10 chrome was pretty much an end product unless scanning for offset repro. And that since I'd bet a majority of photographers on this list are not full-time professionals, output options would be difficult and expensive. Obviously there are newer and better ways now, and it's interesting to hear about the workflow that gets you to the final print. Tim, I like your thinking about print size, but darkroom and logistic considerations have kept my prints to 16x20" so far.