The World’s Largest Photo, Taken with the World’s Largest Camera

[Primo I.]

Nice article on the "The World’s Largest Photo, Taken with the World’s Largest Camera" here is the link:
http://twistedsifter.com/2014/05/worlds-largest-photo-taken-with-worlds-largest-camera/

[Dan Fromm]

All that was old is new again.

http://www.largeformatphotography.info/forum/showthread.php?18098-Ultra-Ultra-Large-Format

http://www.largeformatphotography.info/forum/showthread.php?18143-Giant-Pinhole-Camera

[Ray Heath]

I had another look just to refresh my memory, and yep I was right it is quite a weak image after all that trouble and effort.

[Brian C. Miller]

... it is quite a weak image after all that trouble and effort.

How could they produce a strong image? It's not like a person can just pack up an entire dirigible hanger in their back pocket and go gadding about. Any image area 28ft x 108ft is going to require a building to do it, so you're kind of stuck with where the building is located.

[Patrick13]

Upgrade to a building with tilt-shift, for sure :p

[Kirk Gittings]

How could they produce a strong image? It's not like a person can just pack up an entire dirigible hanger in their back pocket and go gadding about. Any image area 28ft x 108ft is going to require a building to do it, so you're kind of stuck with where the building is located.

I think he has a point. Would a McDonald's hamburger 100 feet in diameter have any significance in the history of cuisine beyond the Guinness record? Big in and of itself has very limited value.

[Mark Sampson]

Hey, it's an enormous engineering problem solved. Since bigger *must* be better, I suppose that the content of the image is beside the point.

[Brian C. Miller]

I think he has a point. Would a McDonald's hamburger 100 feet in diameter have any significance in the history of cuisine beyond the Guinness record? Big in and of itself has very limited value.

Uh, does it ever? (Besides being a new Guinness record!)

There is a practical subject limit when working with a bug-eyed monstrous format. There are a lot of photos that you'll never get with a format that large. Bit of a given, right? f/stop of 896 is awfully slow, and they had something like a 35 minute exposure. The Mammoth Camera (http://www.historiccamera.com/cgi-bin/librarium2/pm.cgi?action=app_display&app=datasheet&app_id=456) was only used to photograph a train, and nothing else. No studio sittings, and definitely not street photography. On a sunny day, the exposure time was 2-1/2 minutes.

The pinhole project wasn't about making a photograph of a startling or significant subject, but just to have some fun making it. The Mammoth Camera was built because Chicago & Alton Railway didn't want to ship a train over the ocean.

Really, what's the significance of the Giza pyramids? It's a tourist trap, now, just like the Easter Island statues.

Priorities: Hundreds of years from now, it will not matter what my bank account was, the sort of house I lived in, or the kind of car I drove... But the world may be different because I did something so bafflingly crazy that my ruins become a tourist attraction.

So, as far as "modern age" things are concerned, that pinhole image is right up there for "baffingly crazy" category. If someone wants to make socially significant images at that scale, go for it!

[StoneNYC]

Old news.

Aldo I agree, boring...

They should rent a floor in a skyscraper to do it properly...