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JMB
27-Dec-2010, 11:29
I am interested in purchasing a 20 x 24 camera. I think that there is at least one Ritter, Ebony, and Chimonix tearing it up out there somewhere. I also think that some of the owners had a good deal of experience digitally enlarging negatives before they purchased their 20 x 24's. Now, you won't have to post or say much to convince me to dodge the underworld of making digital negatives. But I am forcing myself to inquire if any of you are kicking yourselves where your wallets used to be after comparing your silver 20 x 24 contact prints to prints made with digitally enlarged negatives or instead actually realized the sort of PhotoZen experience that you were after.

I frankly don't have any idea how you can actually post a faithful 20 x 24 film contact print, but I am hoping that someone will have some sort of solution.

Thank You! --Joe

Scott Davis
27-Dec-2010, 12:00
Joe-

While I don't have a 20x24, I do have a 14x17, which is plenty big enough for comparison. No scan or digital re-photograph of a print from a neg this big is going to be an adequate comparison test. Your best bet is to see some comparison prints in person. Also, bear in mind that a digitally enlarged negative of that size will vary radically in quality based upon A: the size of the original negative/digital file, B: the skill of the outputter, C: the type of original negative (film, collodion, dry plate, etc), and D: the type of print being made from the file. A final print in silver gelatin will show a very different quality than a final print in gum bichromate, where very little difference between the in-camera original and a digitally enlarged negative will show.

Personally speaking, I've done some digitally enlarged negatives for platinum printing and I never really liked the quality of the digitally enlarged negative. To me, it has a plasticky feel to it. Despite the challenges and perils of working with in-camera original film, I'd rather do that than digitally enlarge. It is a zen thing I guess... makes the process feel whole.

I know a few folks who are even using these monsters for wet plate, and there is NO way to convey that quality in a digital file viewed on your monitor.

Michael Jones
27-Dec-2010, 12:24
I'm not sure there is a 20x24 scanner available, so what you'll see are photographs of images. I don't shoot 20x24 (14x17 is my limit), but I have a pair of Douglas Adams' 20x24 prints on my wall. I'll see what I can do, I mayhave some images I can post, but the concept of a 72 dpi image of a 20"x24" image is quite humorous, IMHO. BTW, he used a Wisner, of which there are several in use, includingat least one using Polaroid. Ty Guilllory made a wet plate 20x24 this year, so there are more than a few 20x24 in use. (You can also go to John Coffer's site to see his mammoth wet plate images.)

I doubt anyone undertaking the use of any ULF camera will say " [they]are kicking yourselves where your wallets used to be after comparing your silver 20 x 24 contact prints to prints made with digitally enlarged negatives " On a practical note, I can't even say this with my 8x10 images, let alone with larger silver, contact prints.

Part of the image is the fight it took to capture it and that's multiplied with ULF.

Good luck.

Mike

JMB
27-Dec-2010, 12:24
Right. Thank you Scott. Your conclusions after working in both media are important to me and exactly what I am after. I am on the lookout for an opportunity to view some original 20 x 24 contact prints. And sure, the factors that you raise have to be taken into account.

JMB
27-Dec-2010, 12:37
Great. Thank you Michael. And yes, I suppose that no one will be happily driven to write that a 20 x 24 purchase was a mistake. And its a horrible thing to ask about I guess. But as you might guess from my post, any reasonable justifcation will ease my conscience --I love silver contact prints. Its not very likely that anyone will talk me out of buying the camera. I just want to make sure that there is not a loud chorus out there against the idea in light of convincing experiences.

Ed Richards
27-Dec-2010, 12:38
Take note that most of the 20x24 cameras you see for sale have been used less than 10 times, and many were never used at all.

Hugo Zhang
27-Dec-2010, 12:42
JMB,

Where are you located? Tri here in southern California has made some incredible 20x24 carbon transfer prints that will take yoru breath away. :)

Hugo

Michael Jones
27-Dec-2010, 12:46
Take note that most of the 20x24 cameras you see for sale have been used less than 10 times, and many were never used at all.

Ed's right, most people's stomachs churn after realizing they screwed up one (or 4) $15sheet of film and then realize it would cost $6 a negative to proof it (lord knows how much paper your'll burn getting the print your want at $6 a sheet, but I'n not telling....).

Try 8x10 and then realize any ULF will be exponentially more difficult to logistically manage in the field.

The lenses I use for 14x17 weigh 2 plus pounds each and take 100 mm filters. I have tables in my living room smaller than my filmholders. Everything grows with the size of your negative.

But the images are more carefully selected & composed, and to me, far more rewarding.

Mike

Nathan Potter
27-Dec-2010, 13:00
A silver contact print is pretty much a contact print at any format. Look at a 4X5 contact print and you'll know what a 20X24 contact looks like. If your issue is how a digital negative compares to a 20 X 24 in camera negative, the format of the in camera original will be the winner. The hangup with the 20X24 format is not the image quality, given top notch optics of course, but actually executing that quality under conditions in the field. Your normal lens will be something like a 750 mm FL with vanishingly small DOF at any reasonable aperture. Keeping the whole rig steady will be a feat.

If image quality is what you are after (sharpness) then the potential in contact print from 20X24 film will not be matched by any digital negative or lesser format under enlargement. I don't think you have to see examples to know the inherent truth in that.

As some have stated here, some amazing quality can be achieved in digital negatives generated from medium to large format film originals but such requires great skill in digital procedures and transfer to printed digital negative.

Nate Potter, Austin TX.

Jim Fitzgerald
27-Dec-2010, 13:04
JMB, Hugo is right our own Tri Tran has made some excellent 20x24 carbon transfers. This is quite a challenge once you understand the difficulties in doing it. No way to post something like that. Yes, these are in camera negatives he has. I've seen them and they are great. He has some wonderful 20x24 platinum's also.

Jim

Daniel Stone
27-Dec-2010, 13:25
wowee!!!!

and I thought that 8x10 was big enough.

JMB(OP), are you completely against scanning and outputting digital negatives? The cost of film holders, the camera, and a lens to cover 20x24 will get you a GREAT 8x10 camera, a great flatbed scanner(maybe even a drum scanner w/ the trimmings), multiple lenses, and a boxload of film holders, plus film.

just sayin....

sandy king(he's on here) makes large digital negs, and IIRC, he uses a 6x7cm camera for a lot of his work, using fine-grained film such as Acros and Tmax100

might try asking him.

but I'm not stopping you going with a straight analog process :D

-Dan

William McEwen
27-Dec-2010, 14:07
Joe, I realize you're after contact prints, but if you want 20x24s, how about using an enlarger to make direct enlargements from 8x10 negs?

jmooney
27-Dec-2010, 14:55
And I spent today bidding on a 6x9 camera because 4x5 is too big and too much gear for me. I feel like a big P&^#%.

ic-racer
27-Dec-2010, 15:17
Joe, I realize you're after contact prints, but if you want 20x24s, how about using an enlarger to make direct enlargements from 8x10 negs?

Unless one is doing a UV process, this is the way to go. Sure the enlarger is bigger than a 20x24 camera, but you don't have to move it to the scene!

It is only a 2.4x enlargement. The only people that will know or care that it is not a contact print will be the 5 people in the world that regularly use 20x24 cameras :D

mdm
27-Dec-2010, 17:40
I saw some very good 20x24 contacts a few months ago for the first time. To be honest, they looked like very good photographs but nothing more. There are many ways of making good photographs that do not involve a 20x24 camera.

The exception would be, if you were making one of a kind tintypes, polaroids or something of that nature.

Take the money you would spend and give it to the Red Cross or Hospice.

Michael Jones
27-Dec-2010, 19:13
Here are two of Gary Adams' 20x24 contact prints from the late 1980s.

Mike

Pawlowski6132
27-Dec-2010, 21:10
HERE (http://cgi.ebay.com/ULTRA-LARGE-FORMAT-20x24-Golden-Busch-VERY-RARE-/170581464239?pt=Film_Cameras&hash=item27b77294af)you go dude.

dsphotog
27-Dec-2010, 21:41
HERE (http://cgi.ebay.com/ULTRA-LARGE-FORMAT-20x24-Golden-Busch-VERY-RARE-/170581464239?pt=Film_Cameras&hash=item27b77294af)you go dude.

That's not far from me! I could pick it up & hold it for a buyer! (you have to pay for the camera) BUY IT NOW!!

JMB
27-Dec-2010, 22:03
Hugo and Jim,

Thank you for the recommendations re: Trin. I am in China at the moment, but I am likely to be in Los Angeles in February. I would very much like to see Trin's work. Can we meet-up at some point?

Ed and Jim,

Thank you for the sobering thoughts. These are real considerations, especially the way that I burn print paper in my attempts to make even small photographs.

Nathan,

Right. The features and characteristics of the 4x5, 5x7, and 8x10 contact prints, which I have seen have definitely inspired me to attempt to reach similar results in larger sizes. And this, perhaps, should be adequate inspiration. I also suspect that you are quite right that execution [not digital rivally] becomes the critical issue because of the challenges of working with a large camera. Still, I wanted to make some kind of inquiry in light of the claims that I hear from time to time about digital negatives, given the difficulty of executing with the 20 x 24 camera. I especially wanted to inquire, because I think that some of the guys out there using the 20 x 24 [and others still shooting in smaller LFs] also have a lot of experience printing with enlarged digital negatives. Thanks so much for your input.

JMB
27-Dec-2010, 22:04
Sorry. I guess that should have been Ed and Michael. Thanks guys.

Pawlowski6132
27-Dec-2010, 22:05
Sorry. I guess that should have been Ed and Michael. Thanks guys.

What about me?

sanking
27-Dec-2010, 22:08
wowee!!!!

and I thought that 8x10 was big enough.

JMB(OP), are you completely against scanning and outputting digital negatives? The cost of film holders, the camera, and a lens to cover 20x24 will get you a GREAT 8x10 camera, a great flatbed scanner(maybe even a drum scanner w/ the trimmings), multiple lenses, and a boxload of film holders, plus film.

just sayin....

sandy king(he's on here) makes large digital negs, and IIRC, he uses a 6x7cm camera for a lot of his work, using fine-grained film such as Acros and Tmax100

might try asking him.

but I'm not stopping you going with a straight analog process :D

-Dan

What you write about digital negatives from 6X7 cm, and 6X9 cm, and 6X12 cm, and 5X7" is true.

But I also have a 20X24" camera and have made quite a number of prints with it, mostly palladium, some kallitypes, and a few carbons. One of them is reproduced in Dick Arentz' 2nd edition of pt/pd printing, and I have the original print hanging in my home. It is pretty darn spectacular in real life if I say so myself.

20X24" is pretty insane but being half crazy already I never let that bother me. Problem is I have grown so used to the extreme control with digital negatives that I have printed very few of the large 20X24" negatives I have made over the past several years. But it is pretty hard to find a scanner that will do 20X24. Course, I see this guy in Atlanta who has a large Screen drum scanner that will do up to 20X24 and I sure am tempted!!! But maybe not even I am that crazy. On the other hand . . .

Really no point in posting images becuse on a computer monitor you won't see any difference from a 12 mp digital point and shoot. Sorry, but that is the way it is.

Sandy

JMB
27-Dec-2010, 22:17
Daniel,

I am trying hard not to be completely against the idea of working with digitally enlarged negatives. And I would like to think that it is possible for me to hear dissenting voices of reason even though I am very much in love with silver contact prints. Your recommendation re Sandy King in light of his experiences with digital negatives is definitely of interest because I believe I saw an old post somewhere that he is or was also a proud owner of a 20 x 24 camera. Are you out there Mr. King?

Hugo Zhang writes that Tri Tran has done some marvelous work with his 20x24, so there is apparently no looking back for Tri, at least. So this is definitely the kind of input that I am after. Thanks for taking the time to offer some advice. I appreciate it.

Pawlowski6132
27-Dec-2010, 22:22
Sorry to always be the village idiot but...can someone tell me, in one sentence, what a "digitally enlarged negative" is?

thanx,

Joe

sanking
27-Dec-2010, 22:32
Sorry to always be the village idiot but...can someone tell me, in one sentence, what a "digitally enlarged negative" is?

thanx,

Joe


Joe,

Well, you scan the original negative, then apply tonal corrections in Photoshop, and then output a negative on an inkjet printer using a clear transparency, or perhaps you send the file off to have an LTV negative printed on continuous tone film. Then you use the digital negative to make a contact print with whatever process you use.

The advantage of printing with digital negatives is that you can make all of the corrections in Photoshop so you have almost an infinite amount of control over the image.

Sorry, off to bed now because I am having a minor surgical procedure tomorrow and need to get some rest.

Sandy

Jim Fitzgerald
27-Dec-2010, 22:33
[QUOTE=JMB;665853]Hugo and Jim,

Thank you for the recommendations re: Trin. I am in China at the moment, but I am likely to be in Los Angeles in February. I would very much like to see Trin's work. Can we meet-up at some point?

It would be nice to get together maybe somewhere in the OC area. Tri's work needs to be seen if you are interested is seeing different types of 20x24 prints. By February I hope to have my 14x17 camera up and running. Hopefully going to finish everything but the bellows this week. Maybe I'll have a 14x17 carbon print or two to show.

Jim

Pawlowski6132
27-Dec-2010, 22:37
Joe,

Well, you scan the original negative, then apply tonal corrections in Photoshop, and then output a negative on an inkjet printer using a clear transparency, or perhaps you send the file off to have an LTV negative printed on continuous tone film. Then you use the digital negative to make a contact print with whatever process you use.

The advantage of printing with digital negatives is that you can make all of the corrections in Photoshop so you have almost an infinite amount of control over the image.

Sorry, off to bed now because I am having a minor surgical procedure tomorrow and need to get some rest.

Sandy

Huh. Wow. thanx Sandy. Facinating.

JMB
27-Dec-2010, 23:19
Hey Pawlowski,

I am overrun by the posts. Your post came while I was replying to another. Thanks for the post and the Ebay recommendation. If I make a purchase, I hope to do it through the forum, however.

William, IC-Racer, and MDM,

Generally, I am very interested in the impact of image size relative to viewing space. And I am quite convinced that certain images gain huge impact at large sizes. Hence, when I begin making direct enlargements from 8x10 negatives, I hope to make enlargements substantially larger than even 20 x 24 that would not be feasible by contact print.

Still, I am also very much in love with contact prints, and I have always felt that the impact of some images [definitely not all] could be increased if they were larger [and of course larger without losing the natural characteristics of contact prints]. Hence, my interest in the 20 x 24 camera.

Your point, I think, is that a good enlargement to 20 x 24 from an 8x10 negative [only about 2x larger] may nevertheless still be indistinguishable from a 20 x 24 contact print. Now, that's something to think about, at least within the world of silver printing. I guess if your view is right, then the 20 x 24 would only create some advantages for carbon, platinum, or other types of contact printing. And a much larger camera would be required to realize and demonstrate unique, distinguishable contact print quality in very large scale photographs.

I will have to compare some 8x10 enlargements to 20 x 24 contact prints and reach some conclusions. Thank you!


And I suppose that I am really after a way to make the biggest it seems to me that I am thinking that when I begin enlarging 8x10 negatives directly as prints that I will attempt to go very large.

JMB
27-Dec-2010, 23:25
Sorry folks. Please disregard the last two lines of my last message. It's a decomposed, cannibalized sentence that I did not erase. Thanks to all of you for your sound advise and helpfullness.

Bruce Barlow
28-Dec-2010, 04:47
I think Richard Ritter has a 20x24 in process. It's not a trivial undertaking. I am also not sure what the pricing is, but I believe it is close to the Busch on e***, for a new camera, supported, adjusted, and in the future, repaired (if needed).

Richard has made a couple, at least, to my knowledge. Prof. King has one (good luck with the medical stuff, sir). Another that went to Sweden had a nine foot bellows extension (yup, nine feet). We made a special "Video Owner's Manual" for it in my basement.

It also weighs about 30 pounds, plus lens and tripod, and at 30 pounds, it needs a much smaller tripod. The e*** seller says the Busch weighs about 100.

Just for kicks, you might want to talk to Richard and get details. I urge a phone call. Even I have trouble getting Richard to respond to emails sometimes.

I think he also has an 11x14 "in inventory" from a canceled order. With holders. We almost used it in our 8x10 Tire Kicker Workshop.

Michael Jones
28-Dec-2010, 06:44
William, IC-Racer, and MDM,

Your point, I think, is that a good enlargement to 20 x 24 from an 8x10 negative [only about 2x larger] may nevertheless still be indistinguishable from a 20 x 24 contact print.

Not true nor possible. And its pretty easy to prove to yourself. Take a good negative and make your best contact print. Then chuck it in your enlarger, adjust so it is the same size as the negative/contact print, and make the your best print. Lay them side to side and you'll discover it is not very hard to pick out the contact print.

Try it.

Mike

Brian Ellis
28-Dec-2010, 07:46
Not true nor possible. And its pretty easy to prove to yourself. Take a good negative and make your best contact print. Then chuck it in your enlarger, adjust so it is the same size as the negative/contact print, and make the your best print. Lay them side to side and you'll discover it is not very hard to pick out the contact print.

Try it.

Mike

Hi Mike - That's certainly true, when you only have two in front of you and you know one is a contact and one is an enlargement. But I'm not so sure it's also true when you're looking at say 50 prints in an exhibit by a master printer (i.e. someone capable of making great enlargements) and you know some are one and some are the other but you have no idea how many of each. In that situation I think it becomes much more difficult then to distinguish the two. I say that because I had a surprisingly hard time figuring out which was which when I attended a Paul Strand exhibit some years ago that included both types of prints.

Michael Jones
28-Dec-2010, 08:43
Hi Mike - That's certainly true, when you only have two in front of you and you know one is a contact and one is an enlargement. But I'm not so sure it's also true when you're looking at say 50 prints in an exhibit by a master printer (i.e. someone capable of making great enlargements) and you know some are one and some are the other but you have no idea how many of each. In that situation I think it becomes much more difficult then to distinguish the two. I say that because I had a surprisingly hard time figuring out which was which when I attended a Paul Strand exhibit some years ago that included both types of prints.

Hi Brian:

I agree with your comments. The exercise was for a side by side comparison because there is a differece. Now in an exhibit of a master like Strand, there may be no appreciable difference. Its just that IMHO there is a difference, it needs to be recognized and if necessary, your work adjusted accordingly.

I find it much easier to get a satisfying contact print that one from enlarging. Hence, I gave up enlarging. On the other hand, I remember your prints from 35mm and wondering (and asked you as I recall...) why you were using large format.

The bottom line, regardless of how you get there, is the print.

Mike

Monty McCutchen
28-Dec-2010, 12:00
The bottom line, regardless of how you get there, is the print.

Mike[/QUOTE]


Mike brings up an interesting point that is often discussed and rightly so. A bad contact print is still a bad photograph. The print regardless of how you ended up there still has to be worthing of your efforts and skill. That being said I think many of us have to ask ourselves what role photography plays in our lives. For Kirk,one of our moderators, who is a professional photographer the end product truly is what matters as he has to please clients, get assignments filled, get projects done in a timely manner, get invoices out etc etc and therefore the best way to get to the end product is what matters day in day out. For myself and I would suspect for many others on this forum, photography is a bastion of refuge from what my professional obligations, pressures, and stresses bring to my life. From that contextual perspective PROCESS becomes an important factor in your photography that possibly could even be AS important as the end product of the photo itself. That is a question only the individual, inlcuding the OP can answer for themselves.

I'm one of those with a 20 x 24 Ebony. The process of shooting the big, cumbersome, (mine weighs in at just over 50 lbs without holder or lens) insanely enjoyable ground glass is a big part of the joy I get from my photographic pursuits. I like the slow nature of shooting this big. I shoot both negatives for Pt/Pd Gumover output and Wet Plate Collodion both Alumitypes and Ambrotypes. I shoot quite a bit of portraiture and without fail the big camera creates a different experience for the sitter than when I use my 10 x 12. The 20 x 24 is always the more enjoyable process between myself and the sitter. It just brings something different to the table that has nothing to do with the final product. No one is ever going to confuse me with Carleton Watkins OR Sandy King when it comes to final output, but when taken in its total experience shooting 20 x 24 is VERY rewarding to me and I wouldn't trade it for the ease and or final output viably argued by others of the smaller formats.

If you are out my way pm me and we can arrange a meeting to see some of the things in person discussed above by all the excellent posts so far.

Monty

Hugo Zhang
28-Dec-2010, 13:19
Very well said, Monty! I can only admire those of you shooting 20x24. 16x20 is the biggest one I can handle at this moment.

sanking
28-Dec-2010, 13:26
Very well said, Monty! I can only admire those of you shooting 20x24. 16x20 is the biggest one I can handle at this moment.

I agree, and having seen Monty at work with his 20X24" camera, and with some really huge lenses, I have to say that the kind of work he does takes maximum advantage of the format in that the final images are very distinctive and have a look that clearly would not be possible with smaller formats. In Monty's case it is not about sharper images, though his prints are plenty sharp, but about the nature of the specific processes he uses and the particular look of the long focus lenses used at large apertures.

BTW, Monty, putting my name in the same sentence with Carelton Watkins really makes my day, though lord knows I will never do work anywhere near as awesome as that of Watkins, or any of those other fantastic Mammoth format wet plate pioneer photographers of the west.

Sandy

JMB
29-Dec-2010, 14:52
I have been following everyone's remarks very closely and have started to dig in myself.

I just came in from the darkroom. I made my first contact print tonight [8x10]. And Lord I am just beside myself. I have to say that it seems very unlikely that even a 2x enlargement could be indistinguishable from a contact print. I have loved contact prints for some time. Indeed, I was seduced into photography by Stieglitz's and Weston's prints. But it was not until I finally made my own contact print that I understood how much is attributable to a contact print simply because it is a contact print. It's not necessarily the sharpness that's so incredibly special. It's really the way that it renders light. It seems to me that you would lose this with any sort of enlargement. It's just not a fair fight to compare enlargements to contact prints.

And of course its really not the point that one guy might make a more powerful enlargement than another guy's contact print. If Ansel Adams made a spectacular enlargement, then he also had it in his power to make an even better contact print of the same subject. As far as I can tell, this is just the first law of photography.

There are other ways of putting how I feel at the moment. It seems that the contact print method is more important than the film, the developer, and the paper; Lord, or maybe even as important than the photographer. If Edward Weston had been making only enlargements, we may never had heard of him. And I am beginning to think that enlargers are almost as much a menace to photography as digital cameras and ink jet printers.

Hence, so far, I am after the 20 x 24 camera. Now, I don't know why a contact print renders light the way that it does. Will a digitally enlarged negative render light the same as a silver negative simply because the negative is pressed against the silver emulsion on the paper? Or is the unique light rendering a function of light passing through silver pressed against the paper? Something tells me that the silver in the negative may not be so easily substituted with ink, putting aside other issues.

There is much to be gained in impact, it seems to me, by making large images of certain subjects. So it makes sense to work on ways that make it possible to make very large prints without sacrificing the contact print. All of my life I have always learned the obvious the hard way. But now it seems to me that photography without the contact print is like the Bible without Genesis; Kant without the Critique of Pure Reason; Marx without Capital, or Edward Weston without Amidol [or should that be Amidol without Edward Weston?]

mdm
29-Dec-2010, 15:01
Why must it be a 20x24 contact print? Edward Weston never made one.

JMB
29-Dec-2010, 15:22
Edward Weston placed the bar very high, indeed. His accomplishments will not be easily exceeded or even matched. But one way to work towards the advancement of photography [even Weston's achievements] is to find ways to achieve the impact of very large prints without sacrificing the contact print.

Pawlowski6132
29-Dec-2010, 19:40
... But one way to work towards the advancement of photography is to find ways to achieve the impact of very large prints without sacrificing the contact print.

Many "advanced" photographers never contacted printed anything over 4x5. I think you're WAAAAY overestimating the value of a large print. In fact, I prefer to view smaller prints many times. It forces one to step closeer and get more intimate with the image. Or, perhaps, it's even easier to see the "whole" image easier and not get distracted by the details.

I think you should think through this more before you jump into the deep end.

Joe Forks
29-Dec-2010, 20:33
He should definitely think it through before he jumps, however, he should not base his decision on what others did or did not do. Sandy may have summed it up very nicely with this quote; "20X24" is pretty insane but being half crazy already I never let that bother me.". Joe only needs to justify this to himself, and his significant other if there is one. Interestingly enough, while I was standing on the ledge wondering whether to jump or not, my S.O. practically nudged me right over. I told her it was expensive, and if I screw up a shot it's 10 or 15 bucks every time, and she said "so what? You can do it, you'll figure it out, and you will grow from the experience".

I'm going to tell you the same thing, Joe. Do it. You CAN do it, and you will grow from the experience, even if it doesn't work out.

Jay DeFehr
29-Dec-2010, 23:29
Joe,

I think it's great that you're excited about a huge camera, and making huge negatives to make huge contact prints. Nothing exceeds like excess, as they say. Like Monty, it's the experience of the process that matters most to me, the final product is icing on the cake.

Regarding contact prints vs enlargements, there are important difference related simply to the printing process. When contact printing, there is no non-image-forming light on the printing paper, and no degradation due to a second optical system. Vibration during exposure is also mostly a non-issue when contact printing, but an insidious inevitability when enlarging. All these things apply equally to digital negatives contact printed. I should add in fairness, that most of these issues can be mitigated or eliminated when enlarging, so that a good enlargement can look much like a contact print. So, in the end, it's the process you enjoy the most that matters. Good luck, and have fun.

JMB
30-Dec-2010, 08:09
Thank you Joe, Jay, Pawlowski and everyone for your comments. Your thoughts have been very helpful, and I appreciate the time that each of you have taken to respond. Happy New Year.

stefandiller
13-Jul-2017, 12:28
Hello Mike,
just came opver your post. I did a lot of photography on 20x24", mostly identical twins.
After nearly stopping to do wet work in the lab I decided I must get my hands on a really big drum scanner to scan the 20x24" negatives.
I finally ended up buying two Crosfield 6250 drum scanners which can accomodate 22x30" on the large drum and scan it in 11000 (eleventhousand ;-) ) dpi. A real monster, being nearly two meters long and weighing 1400 pounds.
A 2 GB b+w file is something awesome, especially coming from a drum scanner.
I know there is (or had been at that time I did the webpages) no real way to show the beauty of the contacts via WWW, but if you like, have a look at:
http://www.zwillingsprojekt.de/html/bilder.htm

FrancisF
30-Jul-2017, 10:26
I understand that you do not really see the grandeur and benefit of an ultra large format print on a computer screen or even a glossy magazine. The real experience with these contract prints only comes from viewing the work in person. Are you planning any shows of your twin project in the USA? I would like to see your work in person.

I have read about Gary Adam's 20x24 contract print project, "Mojave Desert Photographic Project" from the 1990's. Gary Adams wrote about it in 1992 in View Camera magazine before he died. I do not think the reproductions in the magazine could do the photographs justice. I have tracked down prints in Indianapolis, Las Vegas and Nashville but have not had a chance to go to these places to view them.

Francis Fullam
Chicago, Illinois